A 47-year-old Long Beach man was convicted yesterday of sexually assaulting a young female relative for two years until he was caught in a sex act with her on a Disneyland ride.
Johnny Lawrence Johnson was convicted of four felony counts of lewd acts on a child younger than 14 and two counts of having sex with a child 10 or younger, according to Orange County Deputy District Attorney Rick Zimmer.
Johnson began assaulting the girl when she would visit him in the Long Beach area in the summers of 2013 and 2014 from Texas where she was living at the time. She was 9 and 10 years old then, Zimmer said.
Prior to the March 12, 2015, incident at Disneyland the defendant was living with the girl and her family, Zimmer said.
Johnson and the girl, who was 11, were on the Dune Buggy ride in the Haunted Mansion’s graveyard scene when a Disneyland employee noticed the victim performing a sex act on the defendant, he said.
Moments before in an unrelated incident, a man jumped off the ride, prompting an employee to summon his supervisor for help. The supervisor first noticed the suspicious activity on a camera, Zimmer said.
Johnson is scheduled to be sentenced December 11 and faces up to 50 years to life in prison.
Los Angeles prosecutors agreed to let the Orange County District Attorney’s Office take over the entire case.
City News Service contributed to this report.