Sentencing hearing delayed after concerns raised

KINGWOOD — A sentencing hearing for Clay Conor Johnson was delayed Friday after a woman raised questions about his mental health and sobriety.
Johnson, of Bruceton Mills, was indicted in January 2019 on charges of fleeing while DUI, fleeing with reckless indifference and two counts of destruction of property, in relation to a June 2018 incident in which his vehicle hit two police cruisers.
In August 2019, he was charged with misdemeanors in another incident, after his wife called police and said he had taken an entire bottle of medicine and was trying to leave the house.
In December 2019, Johnson entered into a plea agreement to plead guilty to an information charging him with misdemeanors of aggravated DUI, reckless driving, obstructing an officer, DUI and two counts of destruction of property.
The state agreed to drop the indictment and all the other charges, in exchange for the plea. But Friday Preston Assistant Prosecutor Savannah Wilkins asked for the maximum sentence on all the convictions, to run consecutively, but suspended for probation.
While on probation, Johnson would have to complete his treatment, get his driver’s license reinstated and not possess any guns while on probation.
Wilkins cited the August incident, saying in the presentence report Johnson said he did not misuse drugs. But the police report for the incident indicates he reportedly took all his prescription medications at once, Wilkins said.
The prosecutor said she believes supervision is necessary while Johnson completes the terms of the plea deal.
Johnson’s attorney, J. Brandon Shumaker, said Johnson’s actions in August were due to “a bad reaction to medication.”
“I was having an issue with those medications. They weren’t working out for me,” Johnson told Preston Circuit Judge Steve Shaffer.
The mother of Johnson’s child read a statement in court, detailing “numerous incidents” of stalking, physical abuse and threats she said Johnson perpetrated against her.
Those included allegedly shooting at her and on another occasion taking a bottle of prescription medicine and telling her children he was going to kill himself if she wouldn’t spend the night with him.
Johnson refused treatment through the Wounded Warrior project, the woman said.
She asked the judge to order Johnson not to have contact with her and for the court to notify her of his treatment and whereabouts, so she could remain on guard.
Shaffer asked Shumaker if he wanted a continuance to allow time to refute the woman’s statement. Shumaker said Johnson is in an ongoing family court case regarding custody of his child.
His client denies all the woman’s comments as “allegations thrown out without evidence,” Shumaker said.