FRANKFORT, Ky. -- Dan Johnson, a Republican state lawmaker in Kentucky who defiantly denied allegations that he sexually assaulted a teenage girl in the basement of his home, died in an apparent suicide Wednesday night, a coroner said. He was 57.
Bullitt County Coroner Dave Billings said Johnson died of a single gunshot wound on Greenwell Ford Road in Mount Washington, Ky. Billings said Johnson stopped his car at the end of a bridge in a secluded area, then got out and walked to the front of the car. He said an autopsy is scheduled for this morning.
"I would say it is probably suicide," he said.
Johnson was elected to the state Legislature in 2016, part of a wave of Republican victories that gave the GOP control of the Kentucky House of Representatives for the first time in nearly 100 years. He won his election despite Republican leaders urging him to drop out of the race after local media reported on some of his Facebook posts comparing Barack and Michelle Obama to monkeys.
The pastor of Heart of Fire church in Louisville, Johnson sponsored a number of bills having to do with religious liberty and teaching the Bible in public schools. But he was mostly out of the spotlight until Monday, when the Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting published an account from a woman saying Johnson sexually assaulted her in the basement of his home in 2013.
At the time, the woman told police about the incident. Police investigated but closed the case and did not file charges.
On Tuesday, Johnson held a news conference in the pulpit of his church, in which he said the allegations against him were "totally false" and were part of a nationwide strategy for defeating conservative Republicans.
Shortly before 5 p.m. Wednesday, Johnson posted a message on his Facebook page asking people to care of his wife. He wrote that PTSD "is a sickness that will take my life, I cannot handle it any longer. It has won this life, BUT HEAVEN IS MY HOME." The post appears to have been removed.
A Section on 12/14/2017