Brian Bigsby convicted of burglary, assault

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

A 41-year-old city man faces three to 18 years in prison after a jury convicted him of aggravated burglary and felonious assault in a home invasion and baseball-bat attack that seriously injured his ex-girlfriend nearly five years ago.

After four hours of deliberations, the jury convicted Brian Bigsby, of McHenry Street, on Friday at the end of a four-day trial before Judge Lou A. D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

Bigsby is jailed without bond pending sentencing at a later date.

Bigsby fled immediately after the April 27, 2007, attack on Victor Avenue and was apprehended in Los Angeles in July 2010 and indicted a month later by the Mahoning County grand jury, said Rebecca Doherty, chief of the criminal division in the county prosecutor’s office. “He was on the run for over three years,” she noted.

“He came over to her house at 2:30 in the morning, forced his way in and beat her with a baseball bat in the presence of his 1-year-old child and her 11-year-old daughter,” Doherty said.

The victim suffered severe facial injuries and a broken knee cap, said Doherty, who added that she’ll seek the maximum sentence for Bigsby. The victim still has vision problems due to the attack, Doherty said.

The long delay between the indictment and the trial stemmed from postponements of the trial due to a change in defense lawyers, from defense requests for postponements, and from the victim’s need to undergo knee surgery, Doherty added.