A 56-year-old man pleaded guilty on the day before his scheduled trial to savagely assaulting a woman at a vacant home on New Village Road in Norwich two years ago.

Ralph J. Spero, 56, of Norwich will be sentenced in January to eight years in prison followed by eight years of special parole for second-degree kidnapping and second-degree strangulation.

Spero was scheduled to go on trial Tuesday in New London Superior Court. On Monday, he decided to plead guilty under the Alford Doctrine, which indicates that he doesn't agree with the state's allegations but did not want to risk a harsher sentence if convicted at trial.

Police say Spero, son of the foreclosed home's former owner, repeatedly assaulted the woman, whom he knew, over a number of days at the home, where he was squatting. Initially dispatched to help the building inspector with a complaint about a broken electrical meter, officers found Spero and the woman in an upstairs bedroom after forcing their way into the home. She had numerous cuts and bruises on her face and several areas of her hair ripped out and was taken to The William W. Backus Hospital for treatment.

Spero is being held in lieu of $61,500 bond at the Corrigan-Radgowski Correctional Institution in Montville. Judge Hillary B. Strackbein will sentence him on Jan. 11.