Tyler

EDITOR'S NOTE: The name of the victim is withheld from this article to protect her identity and encourage the reporting of such crimes.

By CASEY KNAUPP
Staff Writer

A 31-year-old Tyler man received 10 years of probation in Collin County after he admitted to breaking into his estranged wife's house and assaulting her with a pistol while her 6-year-old daughter was inside.

Brian David Fairhurst faced up to life in prison when he pleaded guilty Aug. 29 to burglary of a habitation -- entering her Allen residence on Jan. 30, 2006, -- and committing or attempting to commit aggravated assault or sexual assault.

Judge Robert T. Dry, of the 199th District Court, sentenced Fairhurst to 10 years probation and a $1,000 fine, personnel from the Collin County District Clerk's Office confirmed Wednesday. The judge also ordered Fairhurst to serve six months in the county jail.

The defendant was scheduled to go to trial on the charge Sept. 8.

As Fairhurst's wife and her daughter left their residence at 7:30 a.m. on Jan. 30, 2006, Fairhurst was waiting. Because he had been physically abusive in the past, she complied when he ordered her to go back inside the apartment, according to an Allen police affidavit.

Fairhurst ordered the child into one room and the woman into another. After he threatened her with a handgun, the victim agreed to have sex with him out of fear. She pleaded with Fairhurst, who ordered her to put a sock in her mouth before he taped it, the affidavit states.

The woman requested he check on the child and, as he did, she ran out the front door. Fairhurst caught her outside and hit her, bruising her face and neck, the affidavit alleges.

The victim began to scream and Fairhurst stopped hitting her. She ran away and was assisted by two apartment maintenance workers. At 7:55 a.m. Allen police received emergency calls. A rented 2006 Dodge Caravan was seen leaving the apartment.

Allen police Capt. Robert Flores said Fairhurst and the victim were separated and getting a divorce when the incident occurred.

Fairhurst also faces two to 20 years in prison for a Wood County charge of sexually assaulting the woman and unlawfully restraining her by force and intimidation on Jan. 1, 2006.

According to a Wood County arrest affidavit, Fairh-urst and his now ex-wife were at a New Year's Eve party when he sexually assaulted her in the bathroom. She reported Fairh-urst was angry because she would not have sex with him.

The defendant pushed her to the floor and would not let her up until he got her car keys away from her. She said they argued and he wouldn't let her drive home, the affidavit states.