Woman gets prison for child's killing in 2002

Woman gets prison for child's killing in 2002

SENTENCE: A girl's remains were dug up near her adoptive mother's former home in Big Bear City.

December 29, 2006

JOHN F. BERRY

The Press-Enterprise

SAN BERNARDINO - A former Big Bear City woman convicted of killing her 4-year-old daughter in 2002 was sentenced Friday to almost 14 years in prison.

Sharon Michelle Gill, 50, was sentenced for the killing of Lillian Leilani Gill after accepting a plea agreement Nov. 30, when she pleaded no contest to three charges, including voluntary manslaughter.

Gill was ordered to pay a $10,000 restitution fine and will serve as many as four years on probation after her release.

A Feb. 9 hearing was scheduled on a separate $56,000 in restitution to her ex-husband.

John Gill, her 49-year-old ex-husband, said outside of the courtroom that he has forgiven Sharon Gill for the crime.

"People have this villainous image of her, and that's not true," John Gill said. "Anybody can get pushed over the edge."

Sharon Gill's attorney, Richard Moss, told San Bernardino Superior Court Judge Marsha Slough that his client has accepted responsibility for her actions.

"She feels it's a tragedy for all concerned," Moss said.

John Gill sat in the audience and skipped his opportunity to make a victim-impact statement. He said afterward that he just wanted to see the sentencing.

"It's the end of a long journey regardless of what happened today," he said. "It doesn't bring my little girl back."

John Gill, initially a suspect in Lillian's disappearance, said he has since regained custody of his 7-year-old son, taken by authorities days before his wife was arrested Feb. 4, 2004.

Sharon Gill's pre-sentencing report indicated that she had strangled her daughter in their Big Bear City home in March 2002. She explained her daughter's sudden disappearance by claiming that she had shipped the autistic girl to a special school in Italy.

John and Sharon Gill adopted Lillian after authorities found the 1-year-old girl in February 1999 living in a camper without utilities and with parents involved in drugs, officials have said.

"Lilly had behavior problems and would throw tantrums and even hit her mother," a sheriff's report said.

On Friday, John Gill said he refused to let his wife give their daughter back to authorities.

Moss, when asked about his client's motivation in the killing, would only refer to a sheriff's report stating that Sharon Gill had apparently "just snapped."

John Gill said he did not learn the truth until early 2004 when his wife stopped their car, took him into the woods, and confessed. He said he felt overwhelming sadness at that moment.

"Sharon was a good mother, a good wife. She had my total trust," he said. "When it said in the Bible (that) Jesus wept, I understood completely what they were saying."

Sheriff's officials searched the Gill home with a cadaver dog on Jan. 31, 2004, but did not find Lillian's body.

The remains of a small child were found at Sharon Gill's former home after she led authorities to the garden where she said she had buried her daughter, a sheriff's report said.

A pre-sentencing report said Gill deserved the maximum sentence.

"(Gill) ended an innocent life, hid the body and proceeded to cover up the incident to escape incarceration or being caught," the report said. "It is hard to conceive someone would adopt a child and do what (Gill) did."

Reach John F. Berry at 909-806-3058 or jberry@PE.com