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Don Johnson

Massachusetts Exonerations
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On April 6, 1994, 28-year-old Don Johnson was arrested by police in Worcester, Massachusetts after a woman alleged he had raped her.

The woman said she was in Yogi’s bar when a Black man wearing glasses and a green coat came in and asked her if she wanted to buy some “rock.” She said she did and followed him out of the bar onto Daniels Street. She said another Black man joined them. When they got to the top of a hill on Allen Place, she said the man with glasses raped her when she refused to provide oral sex in exchange for drugs.

Police officer Joel Kaddy interviewed the woman. She said that after the rape, the man took her checkbook. The woman was taken to a hospital where a rape kit was collected.

Kaddy talked to Pat Doherty, the bartender, who said that he saw the woman leave the bar with a Black man who was wearing black round glasses.

Kaddy went to the area on Allen Place where the woman said she was assaulted. He found her checkbook.

After retrieving the rape kit from the hospital, Kaddy called Doherty at the bar to get his name. While he was talking on the phone Doherty said the man who had left with the woman was outside, looking through the bar’s window.

When Kaddy arrived at the bar, Doherty said the man. Kaddy saw Johnson walking on Cleghorn Street and took him into custody. Doherty identified him in a showup as the man he saw looking through the window.

At the police station, Johnson admitted that he had been in the bar and asked the woman, whom he knew from “detox,” if she wanted to buy some cocaine. He said they walked to Wallen Place with another man he did not know. According to Johnson, the woman wanted to pay for the drugs with a check, which he refused.

When informed that two ripped up checks had been found in the bar, Johnson refused to say anything else.

Kaddy did not have the victim engage in any identification procedure because she was too intoxicated. He relied on Doherty’s identification.

In June 1994, Johnson was indicted on charges of aggravated rape and assault and battery.

On November 22, 1994, Johnson pled guilty in Worcester County Superior Court to charges of indecent assault and battery and assault and battery. He would later say that he pled guilty even though he was innocent because his lawyer told him that if he went to trial, he was risking a life sentence. Johnson claimed his lawyer told him that “this was a case of a white woman versus a Black man and a jury would never believe a Black man.”

Johnson was sentenced to one year in prison. With credit for time served, Johnson was released in the spring of 1995.

Years later, Johnson moved to Greenville, Mississippi where he had been born. On March 7, 2012, Johnson was arrested there on a charge of receiving stolen property. A records check revealed an outstanding warrant for failing to register as a sex offender in Boston in 2009.

On March 16, 2012, Johnson was arrested on a federal charge of traveling interstate without updating his sex offender registration. On July 26, 2012, Johnson pled guilty to the charge. He was sentenced to six years in prison.

In 2014, Johnson, acting as his own lawyer, filed a motion in Worcester County Superior Court seeking DNA testing. Johnson said his lawyer had never shared the police report of the crime with him, so he had been unaware that a rape kit had been taken.

The motion was denied without a hearing.

In 2018, now represented by a lawyer, Johnson filed another motion for DNA testing. The prosecution objected, arguing that the state sex offender registry statute required a defendant to show that his liberty had been restrained as a “direct” consequence of his conviction. The prosecution argued that Johnson’s federal conviction was an “indirect” consequence. The trial court judge agreed and denied the motion.

Johnson appealed, and in 2019, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court disagreed with the trial court. The Court vacated the denial and remanded the case for the trial court to decide whether Johnson was otherwise entitled to testing.

On October 29, 2019, the motion for DNA testing was granted. A report of the testing, dated October 29, 2021, said that male sperm had been found in the rape kit, and that Johnson had been excluded as the source.

Based on the report, Johnson filed a motion to withdraw his guilty plea. On October 21, 2022, Justice William Ritter granted the motion, and the conviction was vacated.

On December 6, 2022, the prosecution dismissed the case.

In April 2023, Johnson filed a lawsuit seeking compensation from the state of Massachusetts.

– Maurice Possley

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Posting Date: 1/7/2025
Last Updated: 1/7/2025
State:Massachusetts
County:Worcester
Most Serious Crime:Sexual Assault
Additional Convictions:Assault
Reported Crime Date:1994
Convicted:1994
Exonerated:2022
Sentence:1 year
Race/Ethnicity:Black
Sex:Male
Age at the date of reported crime:28
Contributing Factors:Inadequate Legal Defense
Did DNA evidence contribute to the exoneration?:Yes