Psychiatrist Claims Teen’s Framing Him Two Sides Give Different Versions Of Events As Trial Begins On Indecent Liberties Charge

A psychiatrist accused of trying to force a girl to perform oral sex on him is being framed by the teenager because he wouldn’t let her drive his car, a defense attorney said Tuesday.

Edwin Johnson, 43, was arrested last summer and charged with indecent liberties with forcible compulsion, a felony that could send the Texas native to prison for at least 2-1/2 years if he’s convicted.

He was placed on paid suspension from Eastern State Hospital after the events of July 27. A hospital spokeswoman said Tuesday that Johnson no longer is employed there.

Psychiatrists at Eastern earn from $89,000 to $103,000 a year, the spokeswoman said.

Johnson’s trial began Tuesday in Spokane County Superior Court.

He is accused of pulling a 17-year-old girl into his car at Howard and Riverside in downtown Spokane when she asked him for a quarter to make a telephone call.

While driving up the South Hill, the girl asked him to stop the car, but Johnson continued to a grocery store on East 29th, deputy prosecutor Carol Davis told the jury. Then he fondled her breasts, hit her on the back of the head and tried to shove her face in his lap, Davis said.

“He asked her if she was a prostitute. He asked her, ‘How much?”’ Davis said. “She told him again and again, ‘I’m not a prostitute.’ She just wanted out of that car. … She was very frightened.”

However, defense attorney Bevan Maxey said the girl asked Johnson for a ride and willingly climbed in his car. Once inside, she admired the red Lincoln Continental and asked if she could drive.

Johnson pulled into the Super 1 Foods parking lot and agreed to let the girl drive around the lot, Maxey said. But when she drove erratically and nearly hit some mailboxes, Johnson made her stop and took away the keys, Maxey said.

That’s when the girl became angry and a fight broke out, with the girl scratching Johnson’s face.

“Yes, what happened in that car was bizarre,” Maxey said in his opening statement Tuesday. “But what happened in that car was not of a sexual nature.”

After she got out of the car, the girl ran into the grocery store and police were called. Johnson was stopped downtown a short time later and arrested.

Officer Jay Mehring said Johnson told him he’d been with friends at a tavern in the Valley and was on his way home. He didn’t mention picking up the girl, Mehring said.

, DataTimes