Dallas
Micah Johnson’s mother, Delphine Johnson, told TheBlaze website in an interview that her son wanted to be a police officer as a child. His six years in the Army Reserve, including a tour in Afghanistan, were “not what Micah thought it would be … what he thought the military represented, it just didn’t live up to his expectations.” According to the military lawyer who represented him, Johnson was accused of sexually harassing a female soldier while deployed.
His father, James Johnson said haltingly and through tears: “I don’t know what to say to anybody to make anything better. I didn’t see it coming.”
The 25-year-old fatally shot five officers in Thursday’s attack while hundreds of people were gathered in downtown Dallas to protest recent fatal police shootings, and wounded at least nine officers and two civilians.
Dallas Police Chief David Brown clarified Monday where Johnson was killed with a bomb delivered by a remote-controlled robot, saying that it happened on the second floor of El Centro College, not a parking garage as authorities previously described. Brown did not provide more details, including the locations of the negotiations that came before the bomb.
The police chief again defended the decision to use the robot, saying he had “already killed us in a grave way, and officers were in surgery that didn’t make it.”
“This wasn’t an ethical dilemma for me,” Brown said. “I’d do it again … to save our officers’ lives.”
Authorities have said Johnson had plans for a larger assault, possessed enough explosive material to inflict far greater harm and kept a journal of combat tactics. Eleven officers fired at Johnson and two used an explosive device, Brown said, adding that the investigation will involve more than 170 hours of body camera footage and “countless hours” of dashcam video.
“Bravery is not a strong enough word to describe what they did that day,” Brown said of officers’ response to Thursday’s events.
Surgeons at Parkland Memorial Hospital spoke Monday afternoon about treating some of the victims. Dr. Brian H. Williams, who is black, said: “It weighs on my mind constantly (that he was unable to save the officers). … It has to stop. Black men dying and being forgotten. People retaliating against the people sworn to protect us.”
Johnson’s time in the Army was marked by a sexual harassment accusation in May 2014 while in Afghanistan. The Army sent him stateside, recommending an “other than honorable discharge” — which is “highly unusual” because counseling is usually ordered before more drastic steps are taken, said Bradford Glendening, the military lawyer who represented him.
“In his case, it was apparently so egregious, it was not just the act itself,” Glendening said. “I’m sure that this guy was the black sheep of his unit.”