Hayden Panettiere's BF Brian Hickerson Took Domestic Violence Classes After 2020 Arrest

Hayden Panettiere's boyfriend, Brian Hickerson, took classes on domestic violence after being accused of punching the actress in 2020 ... TMZ has learned.

We obtained court docs filed in Brian's criminal case out of Wyoming … which came months after Hayden called cops on him in L.A. over alleged abuse. He was taken into custody after officers say they saw marks on Hayden's body.

In court docs filed in August 2020, Brian's legal team made the case for a warrant for his arrest being dropped.

Brian said that he had voluntarily obtained a domestic violence prevention evaluation from the Curran Seeley Foundation and said he was "committed to following any recommendations."

The Curran Seeley Foundation appears to be an outpatient rehab in Wyoming that provides "treatment and prevention services to all those directly or indirectly affected by drugs."

In the paperwork, Brian also detailed his financial issues. He explained he had "borrowed money from family" to pay for his bond in the case. His lawyer said Brian did not have the funds to pay to travel from Los Angeles, where he lived, to Wyoming for court.

In the end, Brian reached a global resolution in his criminal cases. He was sentenced to 360 days but had 358 days suspended ... and was ordered to serve 12 months of unsupervised probation.

As TMZ first reported, Brian was accused of sending threatening messages to Hayden about cooperating with cops.

One alleged text from Brian to Hayden read, "Time to go to war I guess."

He appeared to make other veiled threats about releasing information he had about her unless the cases were dropped, saying in another alleged text, "Even if I sit in a jail cell for ten years. All of the stuff that is vaulted overseas with my people will come out the second I step foot into prison. And all that does is hurt your name while simultaneously clearing my name. And at that point who actually cares?"