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A Tucson man pleaded guilty Monday to raping two women in separate incidents last year and agreed to spend the next 30 years in prison.

The plea agreement that Russell Nunn, 47, signed was identical to the one prosecutors rejected five months ago.

Nunn raped two women, ages 78 and 64, in August and November 2007.

The evidence against him was so overwhelming that he offered to plead guilty in May in exchange for a 30-year sentence.

The Pima County Attorney's Office rejected his offer.

At the time, prosecutor Bunkye Chi said the office might be willing to extend Nunn an offer but with a minimum sentence of 35 years and leaving it up to the parole board whether he got out after that.

Without a deal, Nunn was facing two consecutive sentences of 25 years to life.

In May, John Seamon, assistant Pima County public defender, said the prosecutors' decision to go to trial would not only cost taxpayers a lot of money, it would force two older women to recount the details of their experience in a courtroom of strangers.

"They are going to spend tens of thousands of dollars to get the same result they could have gotten in 20 minutes. This is a disgrace," Seamon said at the time.

After Monday's hearing, David Berkman, Pima County's chief criminal deputy county attorney, said the decision to accept the plea agreement was made because of the declining health of one of the victims.

"Five months have gone by, and it's in the best interest of the victims," Berkman said.

Court documents indicate the attacks were extremely brutal.

In the first, the 64-year-old victim was raped and beaten so severely she spent 10 days in intensive care with life-threatening injuries.

Ten weeks later, the 78-year-old victim was asleep when her attacker entered her home through a sliding-glass door and raped her several times.

Both attacks occurred on the East Side, near North Pantano Road and East Fifth Street — about a mile from where Nunn lived.

Nunn will be sentenced Nov. 7 by Pima County Superior Court Judge Hector Campoy.

In addition to the 30 years, Nunn could receive an extra 2 1/2 years because he committed the crimes while on parole in another sex-related case.