Sandy Sachs PHONY ARREST set up by Chris Paciello

Photo taken for Murano in happier times

For a guy who took part in the 1993 robbery and murder of a Staten Island woman, former Madonna flame Chris Paciello seems to have become quite a friend of law enforcement.

Sandy Sachs, who was Paciello's partner in West Hollywood's Murano restaurant, is ready to file a multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the L.A. County Sheriff's Department, charging that Paciello vengefully persuaded a cop buddy to have her busted on a phony drunken-driving charge.

Sachs' lawyer, Gerson Horn, says Paciello set her up after she sued him for allegedly failing to make good on a promised $600,000 investment. Horn tells us that, on April 16, cops received a call from off-duty deputy Sheriff Ralph Garay, who claimed Sachs was drunk at the restaurant and about to drive home. According to Horn, Paciello can be heard on a dispatch tape coaching Garay to tell on-duty cops Sachs should be arrested.

Horn says a deputy who came to the restaurant "saw no evidence that Sandy was drunk." But, after Paciello's girlfriend, Erin Naas, also allegedly told police Sachs was drunk, Sachs was confronted at her home by several officers. Horn says they "threw her to the ground, handcuffed and pummeled her. Her body was covered with bruises."

A forced blood test determined Sachs' alcohol level was within legal limits. The L.A. district attorney's office has declined to file charges against her. Horn says Sachs' suit will accuse police of wrongful arrest, battery and civil rights violations.

Sheriff's spokesman Mike Parker says, "We found no wrongdoing by our employees. It was a legal arrest." Paciello's lawyer, Keith Fink, says, "A friend of Chris' did the responsible thing by calling in someone who appeared drunk."

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