Stripper: I Was 'Sex Slave' For Florida County Commissioner

SPRING HILL, FL — A 71-year-old Hernando County official is facing multiple prostitution-related charges and one woman who was at his home told a local newspaper she was his "sex slave."

Commissioner Nick Nicholson was booked into the Hernando County Detention Center on Thursday, online court records indicated. His bail was set at $3,000 and he was released later that day.

When a reporter from the Tampa Bay Times went to Nicholson's home, located on the 4000 block of Tiburon Avenue in Spring Hill, a woman answered the door. She had been named in the commissioner's charging papers.

The woman identified herself Friday as a 30-year-old stripper who had struggled with a drug problem, the newspaper reported. For Nicholson's exploited her “vulnerability," she told the newspaper and she had been his sex slave for months.

The two had an arrangement that she would have sex with him in exchange for housing and money for groceries, drugs and rehabilitation, she said.

“I had originally agreed to the arrangement,” the woman said. “I did work at a strip club, but that’s different. Here, I was a sex slave. … Whatever he wanted, I had to do."

The woman's husband told authorities Nicholson paid the couple $100 on Tuesdays and $200 on Saturdays to have sex with the woman. A police report said a second woman was also having sex with him for cash.

Nicholson faces two counts of buying the services of a prostitute and one count of keeping a house of ill fame — setting up and maintaining a place for prostitution, online court records indicated.

The county government said in a statement: "This is a personal legal matter for Mr. Nicholson; therefore, the Hernando County Board of County Commissioners nor its staff, will provide a statement on this subject at this time."

Nicholson was elected in 2012. The GOP Executive Committee of Hernando County voted on Thursday to seek Nicholson's resignation.

John Allocco, chairman of the county GOP Party, said in a statement that he was "deeply concerned" about Nicholson's alleged behavior and arrest. He said that they have had concerns about Nicholson's behavior for years.

He said they passed a resolution in 2015 asking Nicholson to resign and not run for re-election.

"I wish that he would have taken our advice and used his time as an opportunity to straighten his life out," the statement said. "Whatever the outcome, please know that I will do whatever is necessary to make sure Hernando County has a positive future."

This isn't the first time Nicholson has been caught up in a scandal involving a stripper. In 2012, he was investigated over his relationship with a Pasco County stripper who was arrested on child abuse charges, the Hernando Sun reported. A child she was caring for somehow consumed crack cocaine. Nicholson was not charged due to a lack of sufficient evidence.

According to Nicholson's biography on the county website, he is an active member on the Metropolitan Planning Organization Advisory Council, is liaison to the Southwest Florida Water Management District, and serves on the Pasco-Hernando Workforce Board as part of the Jobs and Education Partnership.

He currently serves as Chairman of the Withlacoochee Regional Water Supply Authority, Chairman of the Transportation Disadvantaged Local Coordinating Board, and is a member on the state Department of Transportation Interstate 75 Relief Task Force.

Photo credit: Hernando County Sheriff's Office