’90s ABC Sitcom Actor Sentenced to 19 Months in Prison

Home Improvement alum Zachery Ty Bryan has been sentenced to 19 months behind bars while already serving a separate sentence in a California jail.

The former child star, 44, appeared virtually for his sentencing in Lane County, Ore., on Friday after previously confessing to three probation violations during a Dec. 29 hearing, according to local news outlet KEZI. 

Bryan’s sentencing had already been pushed back after he was sentenced to 16 months for his 2024 felony DUI arrest in La Quinta, Calif., on Feb. 23.

The former ABC sitcom star’s attorney, John Kolego, told PEOPLE he was “extremely disappointed” with the result of the sentencing due to Bryan’s ongoing jail time.

“Mr. Bryan needs help. He had a very traumatic childhood and he was abused and exploited as a child and has had resulting difficulties, but sending him to prison is really not the appropriate fix for this situation,” Kolego told the outlet. “What he needs is help.”

Kolego claimed that Bryan’s relationship with fiancée Johnnie Faye Cartwright, who was also arrested on Nov. 29 in Oregon, is “toxic,” adding, “It was a toxic relationship that he’s been navigating, and he’d been drinking, but he doesn’t deserve to go to prison for 19 months, so I was extremely disappointed.”

Kolego also added that during Bryan’s virutal court appearance, he “said that he was sorry in front of the court, that he realized that he had an alcohol problem, that he was going to do everything that he could to deal with that problem so that he could be the best kind of father he knows for his children, that he has seven children that he loves very much.”

Bryan and Cartwright were both arrested on Nov. 29 after police responded to a call of reckless endangerment and found the couple and their three children in a pickup truck near a popular Oregon campsite, according to a Facebook post by the Lane County Sheriff’s Office.

“They were driving together in the area,” police claimed in their statement. “At some point Bryan got out of the pickup truck and began walking on Big Fall Creek Road. Cartwright then attempted to run over Bryan, crashing the truck with the children inside into the ditch. Bryan was able to move out of the way and avoid injury. No one inside the pickup was injured.”

“Deputies interviewed Bryan and Cartwright. Deputies observed signs both were impaired,” the police statement continued. “Deputies also interviewed witnesses contacted on scene. Per a court order from a prior case, Bryan was not supposed to be in contact with Cartwright.”

After their investigation, police arrested Bryan on suspicion of violating probation from a prior domestic violence conviction, while Cartwright was arrested on suspicion of one count of driving under the influence, three counts of reckless endangering, and one count of attempted first-degree assault. She pleaded not guilty to one count of driving under the influence, two counts of recklessly endangering another person and three counts of reckless driving, and was later sentenced to 30 days of incarceration, community service and two years of probation.

Bryan has had numerous run-ins with the law, including a January 2025 arrest in Myrtle Beach, S.C., which saw him faced with second-degree domestic violence. He was also arrested in October 2020 on a felony charge of strangulation and misdemeanor charges of assault and interfering with a police report, pleading guilty to menacing and assault in the fourth degree, constituting domestic violence.

In July 2023, Bryan was arrested on suspicion of felony assault, third-degree robbery, and assault, for which he pleaded guilty to felony assault in the fourth degree and was sentenced to seven days in jail and 36 months of supervised probation.

In 2024, Bryan was arrested twice on DUI charges, joining his past DUI arrests from 2004, 2007, and 2017.