<p>A millionaire businessman accused of hiring a hit man to kill his wife nearly 18 years ago and later fleeing to Thailand to avoid prosecution claims double jeopardy prevents him from being tried for murder in state court.</p><p>James V. Sullivan, 63, could face the death penalty if he is convicted of murder in the Jan. 16, 1987, death of Lita Sullivan. The 35-year-old woman was fatally shot after opening the door to her Atlanta townhouse to a gunman carrying a box of pink roses.</p><p>Related federal charges against Sullivan were thrown out in 1992 a few days after the trial had begun. His lawyers argued at a Superior Court hearing Monday that the state charges, filed in 1998, should be barred because they violate Sullivan's right not to be tried twice for the same crime.</p><p>"These charges relate to the exact same offense," defense lawyer Don Samuel said. "To retry him for the same homicide would violate his rights."</p><p>Samuel also said that the state's case amounts to a "sham prosecution" because, he argued, it was the state's intention and the government's intention all along to bring the current charges if the federal charges failed.</p><p>But county prosecutors argued that the trial should go forward because the federal case alleged Sullivan made telephone calls for the intention of killing his wife, while the state case alleges he actually killed her.</p><p>"It's a huge distinction, the only distinction," prosecutor Anna Green said.</p><p>Green added that there is "absolutely no evidence" that the federal government had influence over the state's decision to seek murder charges in the case.</p><p>Judge John J. Goger said he would rule after further evidence is presented in the case. No new hearing date was set.</p><p>Sullivan fled the country around the time of his 1998 indictment on state murder, aggravated assault and burglary charges, after, the FBI said, he sold a liquor store and his multimillion dollar home in Florida; He was arrested in Thailand on July 1, 2002, and returned to Atlanta in March of this year after lengthy extradition proceedings.</p><p>Over the years, prosecutors have suggested Sullivan paid Phillip A. Harwood $25,000 to kill his wife because he feared losing money and a Florida mansion in the couple's divorce. A hearing on division of assets in the divorce was to have occurred the same day as the murder.</p><p>Harwood, a truck driver who moved James Sullivan's furniture from Georgia to Palm Beach, Fla., where he and his wife had a home, pleaded guilty in February 2003 to voluntary manslaughter in Fulton County Superior Court and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.</p><p>A few months later, he filed a motion to withdraw his plea, but a judge rejected it. Still pending is a motion in federal court challenging his imprisonment in which he argues that he didn't kill Lita Sullivan, and that he was induced to say he did by ineffective lawyers.</p><p>According to his plea, Harwood, 53, agreed to testify truthfully if called as a witness at Sullivan's murder trial, which could happen as early as April. But his testimony could be complicated by his recent claims in court papers.</p><p>Asked about the issue Monday, prosecution spokesman Erik Friedly said, "All I can say is that our theory of the case stands and that's what we intend to present."</p>
