CLEVELAND, Ohio — A former East Cleveland police officer who previously served prison time and was featured on the popular podcast Serial will spend the next 22 months in prison after a jury on Monday found him guilty of beating his wife unconscious as she tried to call 911.

The jury found Denayne Davidson-Dixon, 35, guilty of aggravated assault and domestic violence. Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Nancy Fuerst sentenced him to 18 months in prison for the attack and an additional four months for violating the terms of his parole.

The charges stem from a Sept. 29 argument where he punched his wife in the face knocking her unconscious as she called police for help. She regained consciousness, called 911 and told dispatchers she was spitting up pieces of her teeth. She suffered three broken bones in her face.

Davidson-Dixon at the time told police he acted in self-defense because his wife hit him first.

“Davidson-Dixon viciously punched his wife which resulted in her suffering three facial fractures,” Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O’Malley said in a statement. "It is now fitting that he is headed back to prison for the second time in three years.”

The attack came about a month after Davidson-Dixon was charged with domestic violence in a separate incident involving his wife. He pleaded not guilty in that case and a trial is scheduled Feb. 26 in Cleveland Municipal Court.

Davidson-Dixon was on probation at the time of the attack for a 2017 conviction featured on Serial’s third season. Fuerst sentenced him in May 2017 to two years in prison after he pleaded guilty to attempted felonious assault, interfering with civil rights, obstructing justice and carrying a concealed weapon.

In that case, Davidson-Dixon and another patrol officer drove a handcuffed man, Jesse Nickerson, to a park instead of the police department and tried to fight him after the two argued during a traffic stop.

Davidson-Dixon contacted Nickerson after the incident and ordered fellow officers to contact Nickerson to try and coerce him from testifying against him.

Fuerst granted Davidson-Dixon, a former linebacker for the Arena Football League’s Cleveland Gladiators, early release in November 2018 after serving only 20 months of his sentence. He was placed on three years of probation.

Part of Davidson-Dixon sentence at Monday’s hearings includes and extra four months in prison for violating the terms of his probation after his judicial release.

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