Published: July 22, 2008 08:00 pm      

Professor gets three years probation

PONTIAC -- A Texas scientist has been sentenced to three years of probation for making threatening phone calls to the parents of his daughter's ex-fiance, whom he blamed for her suicide.

Sixty-five-year-old Pavel S. Nizin also was ordered Tuesday to receive mental health and anger management treatment.

The physics professor at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston pleaded no contest last month to misdemeanor stalking in Oakland County Circuit Court.

Authorities say Nizin's daughter, Olga, killed herself after the engagement ended last year.

Her father repeatedly called her fiance, Mark Leuchter, and his parents, who live in West Bloomfield Township.

Defense attorney Richard Rosenberg says Nizin as a stalker is out of character and "makes zero sense."