Kidnapping, a metal pry bar & a broken nose: Gulfport man had history of domestic violence
A Gulfport man pleaded guilty in March to felony domestic violence aggravated assault in a case that could have sent him to prison for decades for kidnapping a girlfriend, hitting her with a metal pry bar, punching her in the face until her nose broke, and strangling her.
Instead, Avery Dion Sullivan, a 32-year-old abuser repeatedly convicted of domestic violence in the past, got a five-year prison sentence for the March 2022 attack.
Judge Randi Mueller imposed the sentence with additional orders that Sullivan have no further contact with the victim. In addition, the judge revoked Sullivan’s probation on a prior felony domestic violence conviction and ordered him to serve the remainder of that eight-year sentence.
During his plea hearing, Sullivan pleaded guilty to one count of felony domestic violence for strangling the woman.
In February 2023, a Harrison County grand jury indicted Sullivan in that case on three counts of felony domestic violence aggravated assault, one count of kidnapping, and one count of felony domestic violence simple assault.
In a second indictment handed down the same month, Sullivan was charged with felony domestic violence simple assault for a January 2022 assault on the same woman. The charge was a felony offense because he had already been previously convicted of domestic violence for attacks on women in May 2015, July 2016 and March 2018, according to the court records.
The first time Sullivan was indicted for felony domestic violence was in 2018.
In that case, the charge became a felony offense because Sullivan, at that time, had already been convicted of two different counts of domestic violence against women in Gulfport Municipal Court. State law makes it a felony offense if someone is convicted of domestic violence within seven years of a new offense. In this case, at that time, Sullivan had already been twice convicted of domestic violence for the 2015 and 2016 assaults.
The Harrison County District Attorney’s Office prosecuted the case.
This story was originally published March 17, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
