Nancy Kerrigan's brother denied jail

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WOBURN, Mass., Aug. 8 (UPI) -- The brother of U.S. Olympic skating medalist Nancy Kerrigan was ordered Wednesday to get treatment instead of going back to jail.

Mark Kerrigan, 47, asked a court in a hearing in Middlesex County Superior Court to allow him to spent the next four to six months in the Middlesex County House of Corrections in Massachusetts, the Boston Herald reported. He was released July 27.

Kerrigan's probation officer, Paul Cashman, also wanted him behind bars.

"The defendant was given conditions to abide by and at this point he hasn't done anything," Cashman told Judge Kathe Tuttman. If he's not willing to work with probation, then our hands are somewhat tied. We would ask that the balance of the sentence would be imposed and served."

Tuttman instead told Kerrigan he must follow the directives of a 2011 court order. That means treatment for drug and alcohol abuse and cooperating with probation officials.

Kerrigan was convicted last year of assault and abuse of an elderly person. His father, Daniel, 70, died after a fight with his son at the Kerrigan home in Stoneham in 2010.

Kerrigan's mother, Brenda, was at the hearing. Nancy Kerrigan did not attend.

Nancy Kerrigan won a silver medal in the 1994 Winter Olympics in Norway. She had been forced to withdraw from the U.S. championships a few months earlier after an attack on her knee carried out on behalf of a rival skater, Tonya Harding.