Wife testifies that ex-Bush lawyer beat her, broke jaw with flashlight over divorce papers

The wife of President George W. Bush's former deputy White House counsel testified this week that her husband brutally beat her with a metal flashlight after she filed to divorce him.

According to the Stamford Advocate, Judge Richard Comerford began the trial of 61-year-old J. Michael Farren by explaining that he had granted an unusual request that the defendant not be present at the trial. Michael Farren has called the trial a "judicial lynching," and claimed that his mental health would suffer if he attended.

Mary Farren testified on Monday that she had asked her husband if his mother or sister could spend the night at their multimillion-dollar Connecticut home because she feared the "intensity" of his reaction after she served divorce papers in 2010. Michael Farren had demanded that she withdraw the papers, but she refused, saying that she would file reconciliation papers to postpone the divorce if he agreed to counseling.

"I've done everything for you. I don't deserve this," she recalled her husband saying before he tackled her in the bedroom.

She testified that Michael Farren began strangling her, and said, "I'm killing you."

He pulled out tufts of her hair, slammed her head on the floor, and threw her across the room, according to her testimony. She said that Michael Farren then retrieved a metal Maglite flashlight from his nightstand, and began striking her in the face and head.

She later determined from the broken bones that her husband must have hit her with the flashlight 10 times. After losing consciousness twice, Mary Farren said that she was able to get her children into the car and escape to a neighbor's home.

During a civil trial last year, a jury awarded Mary Fallen $28.6 million in damages.

Watch the video below from News 12, broadcast July 8, 2014.