Repairman’s Car Damaged : Actor Gets Jail Term, but It May Be Lifted

Todd Anthony Bridges, who starred for eight years in the ABC television show “Diff’rent Strokes,” was sentenced Friday to one year in County Jail for making a bomb threat against a car repairman who he complained took too long to fix his car.

But the 21-year-old actor, who pleaded no contest last month to a felony charge of making a bomb threat, was given until Jan. 7 to begin serving the sentence. And the jail term could be lifted then if Bridges stays out of trouble and obeys court orders to see a psychiatrist and perform 300 hours of community service, Deputy Dist. Atty. John Spillane said.

San Fernando Superior Court Judge Robert D. Fratianne placed Bridges on three years’ probation, ordered him to pay a $2,500 fine and barred him from possessing or using any deadly weapon or explosive.

The bomb-threat charge carried a maximum penalty of three years in state prison.

Bridges Admonished

“You have to learn to control your temper,” Fratianne told the actor at the sentencing hearing.

Bridges was accused of planting a homemade bomb that exploded March 26 inside a car in Northridge owned by Gregory Tyree, owner of an auto-repair shop. No one was injured, but Tyree estimated that his car suffered damage amounting to several thousand dollars.

According to court records, Tyree told investigators that, five days before the bombing, Bridges had phoned him and threatened to blow up his car.

Tyree told a probation officer that, after several of Bridges’ checks bounced, he angered the actor by demanding that he pay cash in advance for work on his Porsche.

Denials by Bridges

Bridges said he was mad at Tyree because it had taken more than nine months to fix his car, a probation report said. Bridges, however, denied making the threats or planting explosives in Tyree’s car.

The actor, who originally was charged with possessing explosives with the intent to injure or intimidate, said he pleaded guilty to the bomb-threat charge because a jury trial would have been too costly and would have hurt his career, the report said.

In a letter to the judge, Bridges wrote that he “had trouble handling all the pressure” of fame and of his parents’ divorce two years ago.

Bridges also wrote that problems in his business affairs left him “with little of the money that I have earned.”

Bridges was convicted in 1983 of carrying a loaded gun in public. He paid a $240 fine and was placed on probation for 12 months, court records show.