[StBernard] Marrero man's lust for little boys leads to 25-year prison sentence

[Westley Annis]

Marrero man's lust for little boys leads to 25-year prison sentence

Published: Friday, August 10, 2012, 8:52 AM     Updated: Friday, August 10,
2012, 9:07 AM

 By Paul Purpura, The Times-Picayune 

A Marrero man was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison for sexually
abusing a teenage boy he met in Chalmette and drove to an Avondale rail
yard, where he had the youth perform a sex act. Byron Johnson, 44, closed
his criminal case in Jefferson Parish by pleading guilty to sexual battery,
indecent behavior with a juvenile and failing to register as a sex offender.

By the time he was arrested Sept. 11, Johnson already had a lengthy history
for offenses involving minors, authorities said. When he was 21 years old in
1989, he pleaded guilty to two counts of molestation of a juvenile, for
abusing a 7-year-old boy and an 8-year-old boy, 24th Judicial District Court
records show. He was sentenced to three years in prison.

Thursday's guilty plea stems from his luring a 14-year-old Chalmette boy
into his 2005 Chevy Impala on Sept. 11, in offering to give the boy a ride
home from a store, the St. Bernard Parish Sheriff's Office said in
announcing the arrest.

Johnson had met the teen the day before in Chalmette. At the time, Johnson
worked for a garbage disposal company that has an office on Paris Road near
the Mississippi River ferry terminal in Chalmette. In an affidavit, police
listed his job as a "garbage man."

Johnson then told the boy he'd pay him to wash and detail his car, leading
Johnson to cross the Mississippi River on the Chalmette-Algiers ferry.

Instead, Johnson drove the boy to an isolated area of a rail yard in
Avondale. A Union Pacific Railroad police lieutenant noticed Johnson's car
and struck up a conversation, according to a Jefferson Parish Sheriff's
Office affidavit.

Johnson told the lieutenant the youth was his son. As Johnson drove away,
the lieutenant realized that Johnson was black and the youth was Hispanic,
and so he stopped Johnson's car.

It was then that the teenager said he lived in Chalmette, and that Johnson
drove him to the area and showed him pornography and had him perform a
sexual act, according to the affidavit. The lieutenant notified the
Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office.

The teenager later told Sheriff's Office Detective Jason Rivarde that
Johnson offered to teach him to drive and at one point had the teen climb
into his lap. Johnson then fondled the boy. The boy moved back to the
passenger's seat, where Johnson had him perform the sexual act. The boy told
Rivarde he feared the much-larger Johnson and so complied with the man's
wants, according to the affidavit.

In accepting the plea deal Thursday, Judge Lee Faulkner of the 24th Judicial
District Court sentenced Johnson to five years for failing to register as a
sex offender, 20 years for sexual battery and seven years for the indecency
charge. Faulkner ran the five years consecutive to the 20 years, and ran the
seven concurrent with the other sentences.

Additionally, Johnson will have to register as a sex offender for 25 years
after he's released from prison.

The St. Bernard Parish Sheriff's Office said in September it also planned to
book Johnson with second-degree kidnapping, but the status of that case was
not clear this morning.

"Mr. Johnson's matters in St. Bernard have not been resolved," his defense
attorney Michael Kennedy said. "At this time I am not aware of any decision
having been made regarding if those charges will move forward or not. St.
Bernard has had an active warrant for Mr. Johnson this entire time, but
based upon the sentence he received, St. Bernard could decide that funds
could be better spent elsewhere rather than on trying a man who is already
serving 25 years. That is of course however within the power of the district
attorneys office, if they wish to pursue the matter."

C 2012 NOLA.com. All rights reserved.