The Queens man charged with kidnapping and killing the third wheel of a polyamorous love triangle with him and his wife pleaded guilty in Queens Supreme Court Monday.
As part of the plea deal, Malik Wilkerson, 35, admitted he kidnapped Sheryl Outerbridge, a 38-year-old mother of three, who authorities said was romantically involved with him and his wife Devonee.
He will be sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Wilkerson, who court sources said had blown off many of his previous court appearances, faced the potential of life without parole if he had been convicted of the first-degree murder.
Outerbridge had been living on and off with the couple before their three-way went south, police said at the time.
After she tried to flee the couple in Dec. 2013, they found her and brought her back to their home, where they beat her with a paint roller, a beer bottle, and a hammer, and burned her thigh with a cigarette, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors said Outerbridge died from her injuries after the beating.
Wilkerson, who conferred privately with his mother about the decision Monday, did not admit guilt in the murder as part of the plea deal, which he first declined in court.
He changed his mind after Judge Richard Buchter told him that he could not change lawyers for the second time.
Devonee was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2014 after pleading guilty to the same second degree kidnapping charge as her husband