Anthony J. Sully, a former Millbrae police officer and convicted serial killer, has died from natural causes at the age of 79 while on death row at San Quentin Rehabilitation Center in California. Sully was sentenced to death on June 3, 1986, for the murder of six victims. The victims were identified as Kathryn Barrett, Barbara Searcy, Gloria Jean Fravel, Brendan Oakden, Michael Thomas, and Phyllis Melendez.
Sully, who had been incarcerated at San Quentin since June 15, 1986, was pronounced deceased at 2:21 a.m. on September 8 at an outside medical facility. A Marin County Sheriff’s coroner will conduct an autopsy to determine the exact cause of death.
During his time as a police officer, Sully set up an electrical contracting business in a warehouse in Burlingame. Inside the warehouse, he committed heinous acts of violence against prostitutes, including rape, beatings, and murder. Sully denied committing the murders, but extensive evidence, including circumstantial and physical evidence, as well as accomplice testimony, supported his conviction on each count.
In a separate incident, another former San Quentin death row inmate, Ronald L. Sanders, also died from natural causes. Sanders, aged 71, was pronounced deceased on September 7 at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville. He had been sentenced to death on March 3, 1982, for the murder of Janice Dishroon Allen.
Currently, there are 654 condemned inmates in California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation prisons. The state has not carried out a death row execution in 17 years, with the last execution taking place on January 17, 2006. In 2019, Governor Gavin Newsom signed an executive order instituting a moratorium on the death penalty in California.
San Quentin State Prison, once home to America’s largest death row, is now undergoing plans to transform and rename the facility as the “San Quentin Rehabilitation Center.”
Author: Ryan Scott
Just a guy