Arizona’s Senate majority leader was twice involved in domestic violence incidents that left his then-wife bloody, police reports reveal. Despite pleading guilty to disorderly conduct in one of the cases, the politician later claimed under penalty of perjury that there was "no evidence that domestic violence has occurred during this marriage."
Sonny Borrelli, the head of Arizona’s Senate Republicans, made headlines in February when he was subpoenaed in a Justice Department investigation into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The probe is not Borrelli’s first brush with the criminal justice system. In 2001, he was charged with misdemeanor assault, over an incident involving his wife. Borrelli pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct and has maintained that he never hit his wife, but that she assaulted him and that he took a guilty plea to protect his family and avoid a legal battle. Borrelli’s stepson has since backed his version of events.
But three years later, in a previously unreported incident, police found Borrelli’s then-wife hospitalized with more dramatic wounds. Despite placing the call to the police in 2004, and previously pleading guilty to disorderly conduct in the 2001 case, Borrelli later claimed in divorce documents that his marriage had been free from domestic violence.
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Campaign for Accountability, a nonprofit ethics watch group that uncovered the 2004 case, says Borrelli may have perjured himself in the divorce records. The CfA, which shared the 2004 report with The Daily Beast, penned a letter this week to Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, requesting an investigation.
“Arizonans have the right to elected officials who adhere to the highest standards of conduct, yet Sonny Borrelli’s behavior is deplorable,” CfA Executive Director Michelle Kuppersmith told The Daily Beast. “Not only does Borrelli have a history of assault, but we now know he consistently lied about his behavior—to the public, to police officers, and to the court, and he must be held accountable.”
Borrelli did not return emails or voicemails sent to his office.
The 2001 case has been extensively documented. It comes up every election cycle, Borrelli told the Phoenix New Times. The story first reached a large audience in 2016 when Borrelli (a state representative at the time) ran for state senate.
A police report from the first incident describes a harrowing scene. Early on a Sunday morning, police in Lake Havasu received a call “that upon call back sounded like an assault in progress.”
Police arrived to find Borrelli’s then-wife, Julie, with “dried blood around her mouth. Her eyes were watery and swollen. There was a bump on the left side of her head the size of a nickel,” an incident report reads.
Julie told officers that she and Borrelli had arrived home after visiting friends. She’d been drinking, she said, and Borrelli became unexpectedly angry—something she claimed he did at times “for no apparent reason.”
“During the argument, [Borrelli] struck her in the face more than once (she couldn’t remember how many times),” the report reads. She also claimed that Borrelli “pushed her to the ground 3 separate times. The last time she was pushed to the ground her head struck a video poker machine.”
Julie’s son—Borrelli’s stepson—was a witness to the event. But he’s since recanted his testimony.
In the 2001 incident report, police note that the 14-year-old called 911 from his bedroom, at which point Borrelli yanked the phone cord from the wall. Police later interviewed the boy, who said he saw Borrelli punch Julie in the face three times, and that Julie had swung a crutch twice at Borrelli, who “blocked both of the blows.” The boy also described multiple instances that night during which Borrelli had allegedly interrupted 911 calls. Earlier during the fight, the boy said, Julie had dialed 911, only for Borrelli to take the phone from her.
After the Arizona Capitol Times wrote about the incident in 2016, the son—by then an adult and a Marine—penned a letter claiming his mother was unwell and had coached him in his responses to police.
“At the time I told the police officers exactly what my mother instructed me to say to them,” he wrote in a letter quoted by the Capitol Times. “Going against her orders at (14 years old) was simply unthinkable. But Sonny never struck her. He only defended himself from the violent side effects of one of her rages and tried to restrain her from hurting himself and others.”
He declined to answer further questions to the press at the time of the letter. A phone number associated with him went unanswered when The Daily Beast reached out for comment about the 2004 incident.
When the story first received widespread attention in 2016, Julie had recently been sentenced to a year in jail for attempted theft. Divorce records suggest that her recent employment history is unknown, that she did not have a divorce attorney. Calls and voicemails to multiple numbers associated with her went unreturned.
Borrelli has also denied striking Julie during the 2001 incident. In 2016, he characterized Julie as having a stress-induced “meltdown,’ due in part, he said, to Borrelli’s ongoing child custody battle with his first wife.
He also blamed that custody case for his decision to plead guilty to a reduced charge of disorderly conduct, telling the Capitol Times that his ex-wife would have won custody of their six-year-old if he’d gone to court on assault charges.
“My ex found about it, my first ex, saw another bite at the apple,” Borrelli said. “So, do I spend $5,000 on just trying to get rid of the misdemeanor, or do I fight with $5,000 in court to retain custody? You know what? I’d spend the $5,000 and go in debt until the day I die to protect my kids, and I had custody of my son.”
He told the Phoenix New Times in 2016 that he’d intervened in his wife’s 911 call because "it looks bad already. Whoever calls 911 first wins. She's a lying bitch."
He offered a similar explanation to the Capitol Times. “Here’s the problem with these DV laws,” Borrelli said. “He who calls 911 first wins. And they know they got power.”
But in 2004, Borrelli was the one to call the police. On August 22 that year, police were dispatched to Borrelli’s home on what officers described as “a delayed domestic violence assault.” Borrelli greeted officers and told them he’d got into a fight with his wife, whom he said was bipolar and had been drinking.
“During the argument, his wife picked up a knife and came at him with the knife in her right hand raised above her head,” he told officers, according to a police report. “He attempted to disarm her, and while doing so the confrontation ended up on the floor of the master bedroom. He thinks he struck his wife in the face while attempting to get the knife away.”
The officer observed that “Borrelli had a small puncture wound in the palm of his right hand. On his chest were several vertical scratches that appeared to have barely broken the skin. The scratches were about six inches in length. Borrelli appeared to have no further injuries. Borrelli refused medical treatment. When Borrelli demonstrated his wife’s aggressive attack, his minor injuries did not appear to be consistent with his statements.”
The officer went on to note that “in the master bedroom of the residence was a knife on the floor located on the north side of the room. The knife was about eight inches in length. It had a white painted handle as if it was a display knife. Next to the knife were several of what appeared to be blood drops. In the master bathroom on the counter top was also several blood drops.”
The knife was seized as evidence. A police evidence report for the knife, which includes a brief summary of the case, also emphasizes skepticism of Borrelli’s report. “Met with Borrelli who says he was assaulted by his wife,” the four-sentence synopsis reads. “Evidence does not match with [Borrelli’s] story.”
While one officer interviewed Borrelli, another went to a local hospital to look for Julie. They found her in the emergency room, where she was receiving treatment.
“Julie Borrelli had a large amount of dried blood completely covering the lower portion of her face,” the report reads. “Julie Borrelli had dried/smeared blood on her hands and arms as well. Julie Borrelli had a noticeable bruise/swelling on the right side of her neck (near her lower jaw).”
The officer noted that she might need stitches for cuts on her inner lip, that one of her teeth “was obviously out of place” and a bloody tooth chip was sitting on a doctor’s bedside tray. Julie claimed her teeth had been “perfect before tonight.”
When questioned about the incident, Julie told the officer that Borrelli “did it again.”
The couple had fought after hosting friends, Julie said. She claimed to have become angry with Borrelli for “not let[ting] her finish her sentence,” after which “Sonny became angry towards her and started hitting her several times. Sonny picked up one of his many guns (unknown which one). Sonny took it into the back yard and fired it one time. After that, she drove herself to the hospital.”
Julie denied any knowledge of a knife attack. “She told me: she does not know anything about a knife being involved in the argument,” the police report reads. “The only knives she knows about are is [sic] a Swiss Army knife and their typical kitchen knives. The Swiss Army knife is under the bar and [during the fight] they were never near the kitchen to get those knives. She believes Sonny is capable of self-inflicting injuries.”
The Arizona Republic reported in 2016 that Julie “successfully sought an order of protection issued against Borrelli in 2004 in Lake Havasu Municipal Court. The order was quashed six weeks later.”
The 2004 domestic violence incident never saw the inside of a courtroom. The case exceeded its statute of limitations while waiting for a prosecutor, court records show.
Borrelli and Julie legally separated in 2013, but divorce proceedings dragged on for years, with Julie failing to respond to legal filings, according to a 2018 court document.
In that document, Borrelli petitioned for final dissolution of the marriage, noting that there was “no evidence that domestic violence has occurred during this marriage.”
He signed the document, declaring “under penalty of perjury that the contents of this document are true and correct to the best of my knowledge and belief.” He made a similar such declaration at the bottom of a 2017 filing in the divorce, in which he stated that “no domestic violence has been reported during this marriage.”
The denial of domestic violence appears to contradict his 2001 guilty plea, as well as his 2004 accusation against Julie.
In its letter to Arizona’s Attorney General and the Mohave County District Attorney, CfA argued that the divorce documents might constitute criminal perjury.
“It appears beyond dispute that Mr. Borrelli was arrested for a domestic violence assault and subsequently pleaded guilty to charges stemming from that incident,” the letter reads.
“The 2004 incident and the order of protection issued against Mr. Borrelli suggest that the 2001 attack on his wife may not have been an isolated incident. Regardless, the dissolution of marriage Mr. Borrelli signed under penalty of perjury required him to attest that there had been no domestic violence during his marriage and the police and court record make clear this is untrue: there was, indeed, domestic violence during Mr. Borrelli’s marriage to Julie Borrelli.”
