At a news conference at the church Tuesday, alongside family, campaign members and other church members, Johnson said the woman accusing him was motivated by his political opponents, according to the Louisville Courier-Journal. The woman supported Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, Johnson said, and disagreed with his conservative stance on abortion rights.
“This is an assault on all real people. There’s no perfect people, and you get into office and all of sudden political hacks come against you and start accusing you after you’re in office,” Johnson said.
He added that there is a “season” of sexual abuse allegations in politics, referring to the accusations against President Trump and Republican U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama. He said he didn’t think all the women who’ve spoken out about abuse across the nation were lying, however.
The woman accusing Johnson told KyCIR that she never returned to the apartment below the fellowship hall. When she didn’t show up to the church for service the following Sunday, Johnson sent her a Facebook message, the report said. In the message, he said his daughter told him he had been “mean” to the victim, and to his son, Boaz, the night of the party, the KyCIR report said.
“Sarah said I was mean to Bo You and Her by telling you all to go to bed so sorry don’t remember I was told we all got drugged at TK’s anyway so sorry if I sounded mean, you know you are one of my favorites, love you sorry! Boaz did Great Sunday! Your future Husband!” the message read, according to KyCIR. TK’s refers to T.K.’s Pub, a local bar.
The victim told KyCIR that she responded the next day, saying: “Drugged or not, I think you know what happened that night and that’s why you’re sending this message. I never thought something like that would happen to me, especially by someone like you. I looked at you as a Dad, but now I sincerely hope I don’t see you again, but I might try to maintain a relationship with your kids. And there is no point in responding to this message either because I don’t want to talk about it ever again.”
Louisville metro police said they closed the case after investigating the allegations, according to KyCIR.
On Tuesday, Johnson acknowledged that he sent the victim a Facebook message shortly after the night she stayed over, but again said he did not remember what happened on the night of the alleged abuse because he was “drugged” at the bar, according to the Courier-Journal. He said he didn’t file a police report about the alleged drugging because he did not want to bring accusations against a bar.
He later said at the news conference that he did recall what happened on that night and that he never approached the victim while she was sleeping, according to the Courier-Journal.
The KyCIR report also detailed other incidents from Johnson’s past. A grand jury indicted him for complicity to commit arson and making a false police report in 1987, according to the report, which suggests Johnson may have been linked in another arson incident 13 years later in which his own church was burned down.
Article Appeared @https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2017/12/13/kentucky-lawmaker-who-was-accused-of-molesting-a-teenage-girl-likely-killed-himself-coroner-says/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_pp-kentucky-10pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.b4de3d623918