A plea agreement reached on Monday kept a Brewton man from spending as much as 10 years behind bars.

Terry John Scarborough was originally arrested in August 2011 and charged with sexual abuse of a child under the age of 11. The arrest came after a Grand Jury reviewed evidence in the case and handed down the indictment against him.

The charge of sexual abuse in the case against Scarborough was listed as a Class C Felony charge. The charge also had the defendant facing as much as 10 years in prison.

In the agreement, Scarborough entered a best interest plea of guilty to one count of child endangerment, which is a misdemeanor charge according to court officials.

Scarborough will receive a one year suspended sentence followed by two years of unsupervised probation. An additional stipulation in the agreement states Scarborough is not to have any unsupervised contact with minor children other than his biological children while on probation.

Court records also show that Scarborough does not reserve any issues for appeal in the case and will not be allowed to appeal the conviction or sentencing. The defendant also agreeed that if he appeals or otherwise attacks the conviction on one count of child endangerment, jeopardy in the case has not been attached and the State may choose to reinstate the original charge of sex abuse of a child under 12 and proceed with prosecution on the reinstated charged.

A conviction on the original charge would have caused Scarborough to register as a sex offender under the Alabama Sex Offender Registration and Community Notification Act rules. However, with the change in charge and sentencing on the misdemeanor charge, registration in this case would not be required.

Susan James served as attorney for the defendant in the case with Trisha Mellberg, deputy district attorney in the Alabama office of prosecution services as prosecutor in the case.