Two months after he said he was hallucinating during a plea hearing prompting a competency evaluation, a Lincoln man who forced a woman into a "slave contract" returned to the courtroom Monday to finish the plea he started.
Nicholas Talbot, 36, pleaded no contest to second-degree assault, a felony that could get him up to 20 years in prison.
First, retired Lancaster County District Judge Paul Merritt Jr. found him competent based on a psychiatric evaluation by Dr. Y. Scott Moore.
Talbot is diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and depression, Merritt said.
Moore's letter talked about how Talbot has hallucinations, prompting the judge to ask several times throughout the hearing if Talbot had heard voices other than his or the attorneys.
Talbot said he hadn't.
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At a hearing Aug. 3, another judge stopped a hearing after Talbot said he could see two people in the courtroom who told him "just to agree with everything and get it over with."
He had been set to enter a no contest plea to second-degree assault, but after a sidebar with the attorneys the judge ordered a competency evaluation to make sure he was able to appreciate the seriousness of his decision and that it is based on what he wants to do.
On Monday, Talbot returned and went through with the plea.
Deputy Lancaster County Attorney Carolyn Bosn said in exchange the state agreed not to pursue any additional charges in the case that started Jan. 19 after police were called on a report of a sexual assault.
A 32-year-old woman said Talbot had forced her to sign what he said was a legal "slave contract" that allowed him to whip her, burn her with lighters and make her drink his urine, among other abuse.
In an affidavit for Talbot's arrest, police said she told them Talbot had abused her before, but the assaults were escalating so she told a woman with whom she was delivering food as members of a church group.
She took the woman to the pastor's home, where the woman showed them her injuries. They called police.
Bosn said police found burn marks where Talbot had put out cigarettes on her back and buttocks, whip marks and burns from a lighter and the heated tip of a screwdriver.
She also said Talbot wrote "PROPERTY OF NICK" on her left arm in black marker and forced her to drink his urine once or twice a day.
Bosn said the woman was afraid to come forward sooner because he told her he would have her parents and grandmother killed in front of her and that police would laugh at her if she tried to report it.
When police talked to Talbot, he showed them the agreement and said he believed he was allowed to burn and torture her because she had signed it. Talbot said he felt bad and may have taken things too far, Bosn said.
He is set for sentencing Nov. 3.