Man gets 4-year sentence for past assault of family members

PORT ORCHARD – A 38-year-old North Kitsap man was sentenced on Monday to four years in prison after a jury found him guilty of repeatedly sexually assaulting his sisters over a period of several years when they were young.

In October 2022, a Kitsap County Superior Court jury found Joel Albert Johnson guilty of 11 charges related to the assaults of two sisters, which allegedly occurred during a time range between 1997 and 2006. Jurors also found for aggravators for an ongoing pattern of sexual abuse of a minor. Johnson said Monday that he planned to appeal the convictions.

The prison sentence, handed down by Judge Bill Houser, matches what Houser imposed on Joel Johnson’s brother, Nathan Ronald Johnson, now 41, who was also charged with assaulting the girls. Nathan Johnson pleaded guilty to two charges in 2019, and he was sentenced to four years in prison in 2020.

Joel Johnson represented himself during a lengthy sentencing hearing on Monday after his attorney, John Henry Browne, withdrew from the case at the outset of the proceedings, citing conflicts between himself and his client. Prosecutors had sought a sentence of 14.5 years, while the man’s attorney, before he withdrew, had asked for time served, which he said in court documents amounted to about a year, noting that his client was in the ages of 12-21 years old in the date ranges of the charges he was convicted on.

As he handed down the sentence, Houser pointed to the man’s youthfulness and referenced the sheltered family life he grew up in. Houser said that Johnson had been immature for his age and had failed to appreciate the effects of his conduct on the two victims but said that he had since matured and become successful in his private life. Johnson had been working toward a medical degree when he was charged, according to court documents.

“He was homeschooled as a child, and the opportunity to experience outside influences regarding the interaction between boys and girls, particularly romantically or sexually, was almost nil,” Houser said. “He grew up in a conservative environment culturally and in religious belief. There was little to no education about sexual matters within the family unit. There was no opportunity for any other exposure to sexual norms available to Mr. Johnson except through his church. The teaching from his family placed the male child above the female children.”

The case’s proceedings have stretched out for years: The two brothers were originally charged in 2016 after the two women came forward as adults to report the incidents to law enforcement. According to court documents, one of the girls was in the age range of 4-11 years old at the time of the charged offenses, and the other girl was in the age range of 7-16 years old.

Statements from both women were read in court on Monday. One of them asked Houser for a sentence that didn’t involve incarceration, noting the void that would leave in the lives of her brother’s children: “I feel my heart breaking every day knowing how many are hurting through this process and I hope to see this chapter closed for everyone, as gently as possible,” she wrote.

The other woman reflected on the ongoing effects of the incidents and the trauma her brother had caused. “No amount of time Joel spends in prison will take away any of the pain he has caused,” she wrote. “My hope going into this was to make the knowledge of his crimes available to the public so that any children in his life could be better protected than I was. I believe that was achieved with his conviction. My hope for the future is that everyone affected by Joel’s actions can now find healing.”

Before he was sentenced, Johnson asked that Houser take his wife and children into account and minimize any damage to them and offered an apology specifically to one of the sisters: “I hope (she) knows how sorry I am,” he said. “I take full responsibility for every part I played in his tragedy, because it really is. I’m so very sorry. Also, there was a lot of talk about hate in the trial, and I want them to know that they may hate me, but I don’t hate them. I don’t, and I won’t.”