Guilty plea in sex abuse case

Nov. 02--William Nicholson pleaded guilty to four sexually-based abuse charges, ending a case that restarted after a previous plea was tossed on a legal technicality.

Monongalia County Prosecuting Attorney Perri Jo DeChristopher said Nicholson pleaded to three counts of incest and one count of sexual abuse by a parent, guardian or person of trust. Sentencing will be at a later date.

Nicholson appeared before Monongalia County Circuit Court Judge Russell Clawges for a hearing earlier this week.

The pleas bring Nicholsonâ??s nearly decade-long case a step closer to its conclusion. He was initially charged in 2009 in a case related to abuse of a juvenile relative.

He previously pleaded guilty to two counts of incest in the case. Clawges sentenced Nicholson to back-to-back, five- to15-year prison terms and supervised probation.

However, in 2011, he appealed his case, raising several issues. One was that he was never told about the terms of supervised release. Nicholson said thathad he known of the terms, he would not have agreed to that plea agreement.

In December 2016, Clawges issued a ruling in that case. Clawges noted that he believed Nicholson was disgruntled because of the back-to-back sentences. But Clawges also said that the court did not in-form Nicholson of supervised release, and he therefore did not know the maximum penalty for his plea.

Clawges' ruling sent the case back to square one, and the May term of the grand jury indicted Nicholson on new charges. This week, Nicholson pleaded to four charges related to the case.

Follow Alex Lang on Twitter @LangDpost. Email: alang@dominionpost.com.

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