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, the county 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, Kentucky.
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 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, who investigated the incident but closed the case and did not file charges. On Tuesday, said the allegations against him were “totally false” and said they were part of a nationwide strategy of defeating conservative Republicans. .
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Shortly before 5 p.m. Wednesday, Johnson posted a message on his Facebook page that asked people to care for 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.”
