A woman just released from prison on multiple drug and theft charges is back in jail after she allegedly beat her grown daughter during an argument.
The business was powered by Dr. Craig Gialanella, an Essex County doctor who issued 413 prescriptions for about 50,000 oxycodone tablets in the names of 30 “patients” from Atlantic County from Jan. 1 to Dec. 7, 2016.
He pleaded guilty in exchange for a suspended sentence. His license was revoked.
While many of those arrested with Connolly seem to have gotten diversion programs through either pretrial intervention or drug court, she was sentenced to four years in prison along with other concurrent terms.
She was paroled Dec. 14. Four weeks later, she was in the Atlantic County Justice Facility.
"She had an opportunity to get out on parole and behave in a noncriminal manner and observe society's rules, and she did not do that," Judge Patricia Wild said in ordering her held Friday. "Not only that, her victim is her daughter."
The judge called the circumstances of the assault chilling.
Connolly's daughter was driving Jan. 10, when the two got into a verbal argument and started punching her daughter, according to the affidavit read by Assistant Prosecutor Paige Cramer.
"The victim pulled over and got out of the vehicle in an attempt to get away from her mother," Cramer said.
That's when Connolly allegedly followed the woman, knocked her to the ground, got on top of her and grabbed her hair, "smashing (the victim's) head to the ground repeatedly."
It was not clear exactly where the attack occurred. The victim was not named to determine whether she was the same daughter arrested with Connolly in 2017.
The victim's brother took her to the hospital and police were called.
Connolly's parole officer was notified of the incident and called Connolly to come in to the office, defense attorney Sarah Weinstock told the judge.
Connolly was arrested when she came to the office the next day.
She tried to call her daughter from the jail, but the victim did not answer, Cramer said.
A friend later reached out to the victim, allegedly saying Connolly asked that she drop the charges.
No witness tampering charges have been filed, and Weinstock said she has not seen any evidence of those allegations.
Parole did not violate Connolly on the new charge, her defense attorney said.
They intend instead to wait to see how the charges pan out, Weinstock said.
They recommended she be released on a monitor and immediately attend Crossroads Recovery Center to address her drug and mental health issues.
Connolly was not on her medication the day of the incident, her attorney said, citing issues with getting into Crossroads quickly enough.
But the judge said if Connolly was having issues getting her medication, she could have reached out to parole before the incident.
Wild also questioned parole's role in these type of cases.
"I have no faith in the fact that parole's going to follow through," she said. "It really bothers me where parole doesn't make a decision independent of a Superior Court judge."
The judge said if Connolly can get inpatient treatment somewhere, that could be considered a change of circumstance to possibly reopen her detention hearing.
"But parole has to take some control over this and decide what's going to happen," she added.
The judge also questioned how quickly Connolly was paroled.
She was sentenced Feb. 27, 2023, and paroled less than 10 months later.
Weinstock pointed out that a "four flat," which is four years with no minimum parole ineligibility, can have a release date of less than a year.
"I know the numbers sometimes surprise all of us," she said.
Department of Corrections records show Connolly did even less time than that in state prison.
She was released to a halfway house March 25, just less than a month in to her sentence.
