Lifestyle made me arrogant, says football star in sex trial
Johnson apologises to girl, 15
ADAM Johnson told a court yesterday that being a footballer made him ‘arrogant’ and that he took advantage of a child who ‘ought to have been safe in my company’.
The former England player apologised to the 15-year-old schoolgirl he groomed, saying he was ‘stupid’ and had regretted his behaviour ever since.
The 28-year- old admitted kissing the teenage fan passionately when they met in his car last year and said he wanted to touch her intimately – but insisted he never did so nor got her to perform a sex act on him.
The former Sunderland winger described his ‘easy’ life as a footballer, with ‘pretty much everything, all we need, catered for’, and said he amassed ‘significant wealth’ from his career. He admitted being arrogant as a result.
‘ I think it’s every young boy’s dream,’ he said. ‘ You get put on a pedestal, people scream your name, it’s the best thing in the world.’
At one point during his evidence, Johnson appeared to become emotional as he agreed he had put himself before his family.
The footballer revealed he had been sending explicit text messages to other women in their 20s at the same time as flirting with the girl.
Johnson also insisted there was no connection between his encounter with the teenager and him researching the ‘age of consent’ online four days later. The footballer told Bradford Crown Court he was in the dressing room at his club training ground when the players discussed a TV programme about different ages of consent around the world.
He said he did the search at around 9.30am, adding: ‘There are a lot of players in our team from all sorts of countries and we were having a discussion about laws and rules and things in different parts of the world.’
Johnson has admitted one count of grooming and another of sexual activity with a child, but denies two further counts of sexual activity with a child.
Speaking from the witness box yesterday, Johnson said he enjoyed kissing the schoolgirl in his Range Rover car when they in County Durham on 30 January last year. He said: ‘I had all sorts of things going on in my head at the time. I was thinking “what am I doing, I have so much to lose”. I was not thinking clearly.’
Meanwhile in a prepared statement to police, read out in court, Johnson admitted his behaviour was ‘ wholly unacceptable’ and apologised ‘unreservedly’ to the girl, adding: ‘She’s a child and ought to have been safe in my company.’
He went on: ‘I was attracted to her. It was my fault, everything is my fault.’ Asked why he did not stop, he said: ‘ I don’t know. I was caught up in the texting like I was speaking to any other person and I should have known a lot better.’
When asked in court by his barrister Orlando Pownall, QC, if he touched her intimately or got her to perform a sex act on him, he replied ‘no, never’, adding: ‘I didn’t do what she said I did.’
Timings of text messages indicated the entire meeting lasted only 15 minutes and Johnson then drove to Sunderland’s stadium to go with his team to a hotel, as they were playing a match the next day, the court heard. As he drove away, he said he thought ‘what I just did was really stupid and at the same time I didn’t think it was too bad’.
Johnson was sacked by his club and dropped by his sponsor after admitting to two of the charges.
He also said his personal life was a mess and he had ‘ not been a very good person’ towards his girlfriend and their baby daughter.
Asked about his habit of texting other women, he said: ‘Spending a lot of time in hotels it’s quite easy to get carried away.’ The court heard his long-term girlfriend Stacey Flounders became ‘ suspicious’, but Johnson accused her of being ‘paranoid’.
He argued with her via text message as he was also texting the girl at his hotel after they met, the jury heard. Miss Flounders told him to make more effort in their relationship. She wrote: ‘I’m not just an idiot who’s at home all the time, doing s*** for you and having your kids.’
But Johnson replied: ‘ You need to stop getting on my case all the time.’ He told the jury he should not have criticised her and ‘she was right.’
The trial continues.
‘I was not thinking clearly’