A district judge on Tuesday sentenced maverick cab driver Phil Sullivan to 15 days in county jail for ignoring a court order that prohibited him from collecting tips from passengers.
Sullivan, 75, of Woody Creek, was ordered straight to Pitkin County Jail. When a reporter asked him if he would resume his taxi operation when he’s freed, Sullivan didn’t mince words: “Yes,” he said.
The sentencing hearing, held in Pitkin County District Court, attracted a number of Sullivan supporters, some of whom pleaded for leniency and no jail time, calling the outspoken driver a good man who means well. Wearing a faded yellow T-shirt with the logo for the Mellow Yellow Taxi service — which he co-founded in the mid-1970s — Sullivan also told District Judge Gail Nichols that he didn’t deserve time behind bars.
But Nichols said she had little choice but to jail Sullivan because he was in contempt of court for blowing off an injunction she issued last July that forbid him from accepting gratuities from passengers. The judge ruled him in contempt following a trial Feb. 22.
The injunction was issued after the Colorado Public Utilities Commission had contended that Sullivan did not have the proper license — a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity — to tote passengers around town. The PUC made its case by enlisting undercover officers to collect a tips from Sullivan, most recently in late August, more than a month after the injunction was issued.
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