By: Patti Weaver
(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Stillwater man avoided a jury trial this week by pleading guilty to choking his ex-girlfriend in January of 2018, for which he was placed on three years’ probation with an order to have no contact with the woman, complete a 52-week batterers’ intervention program, provide a DNA sample, and pay a $960 prosecution fee and other assessments including court costs.
Gary Dean Houston Jr., 52, was released from the Payne County Jail on Monday after serving a jury-recommended one-year sentence in another case for attacking the same woman in June of 2018, while he was free on bail on his earlier domestic violence charge, a sheriff’s spokesman said.
In his first case of domestic assault and battery of the woman to which he pleaded guilty Monday, Payne County Sheriff’s Deputy Jacob Secrest said that when he was sent to her camper trailer in rural Stillwater on Jan. 31, 2018, “I could immediately notice red bruising on the right side of her neck,” according to his affidavit.
She said that for about seven months, she had been living with Houston, who had left before the deputy arrived, the affidavit said.
She said she “was picking up trash off of her floorboard and Gary (Houston) got into her car and then grabbed the bag of trash from her and began yelling at her and asking her what she was hiding,” the affidavit said.
Houston “began to punch her in her right shoulder and side while she drove,” the affidavit said.
As she pulled into the driveway of the trailer park, “Gary drove his left forearm and elbow into her neck and pinned her head against the driver’s side window,” and choked her, the affidavit said.
She began to honk her car horn and one of her neighbors came to her aid, the affidavit said.
She said “the son-in-law of the neighbor began to punch the window of her car in an attempt to break it open to get Gary off of her because he could not open the door,” that was locked, the affidavit said.
She said “she finally was able to open the door for them and get out of the car,” the affidavit said.
She said “Gary followed her into the trailer saying that he loved her and asking her not to call 911,” but she told him, “No, you really hurt me! I’m leaving! Leave me alone!” the affidavit said.
She said “Gary wanted a hug, but she told him no because he just tried to choke her out and to just let her leave, but Gary continued to block the door to keep her from leaving the trailer,” until his daughter told him to let her go, the affidavit said.
She said “Gary again followed her yelling at her that he wanted his phone, but that she told him to go away because ‘the police are on their way’ and that is when Gary left on foot heading north away from the trailer park,” the affidavit said.
In his later domestic violence case, Houston was jailed on June 16, 2018, after Stillwater Police Detective Richard Alley sought an arrest warrant for him, court records show.
The same woman had reported at 3:09 a.m. on June 12, 2018, that Houston strangled her at her residence at 3 a.m., Alley wrote in an affidavit.
She said that from July 2017 until April 2018, they were in a dating relationship that she broke off due to two previous domestic abuse incidents, the affidavit said.
She said that Houston came to her residence and told her they should work things out, the affidavit said.
When she ran outside, Houston caught her in the street and “grabbed her around the neck with his left arm and pulled her up off the ground,” the affidavit said.
She said “she managed to break free enough to scream” and run to a nearby convenience store for help, the affidavit said.
The Stillwater police officer said she had bruising on both sides of her neck in that attack, the affidavit said.
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