Sevier deputy who suffered panic attack after shooting at unarmed man quits

SEVIERVILLE, Tenn., - A Sevier County deputy who opened fire without warning in a neighborhood and suffered a panic attack four minutes later has resigned, records show.

Sevier County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Justin Johnson quit in lieu of termination last week – more than a year after the panic-attack incident and the same day USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee contacted his bosses about a prior law enforcement job he kept off his application.

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But Brian Mullinax, 41, remains charged with assault in Sevier County Circuit Court for causing Johnson to suffer a panic attack four minutes after Johnson opened fire in a neighborhood of mobile homes in December 2015. Johnson fired without warning over the head of Mullinax’s girlfriend, Tina Cody, and a paramedic.

Resignation after inquiry

Mullinax was unarmed and was face-down on the ground several yards from Johnson when Johnson suffered the panic attack.

The entire incident was captured on Johnson’s body camera, but Sheriff Ron “Hoss” Seals did not seek either an internal investigation or an independent probe of the shooting incident, testimony has shown. Johnson was not suspended and returned to patrol.

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Seals has repeatedly declined to comment and did not return a call Thursday seeking comment on Johnson’s resignation. USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee obtained a copy of Johnson’s separation notice.

The resignation allows Johnson to apply for other law enforcement jobs.

It was dated the same day USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee contacted Seals’ office about personnel records that showed Johnson was forced to resign from the Johnson City Police Department just months after he was hired there in 2013.

He did not include that job on his employment history in his 2016 application for the deputy’s job in Sevier County nor did the county’s background screening yield information on it.

Prior history

Documents obtained by USA TODAY NETWORK-Tennessee showed Johnson is a preacher licensed by the Appalachian Association of Free Will Baptists who worked as a cashier in Nashville in 2010 while studying to be a preacher but moved back to Johnson City, where he graduated high school in 2008, after dropping out of the Free Will Baptist Bible College.

He worked briefly as a jailer for the Washington County Sheriff’s Office before being hired as a police officer with the Johnson City Police Department in June 2013.

By September 2013, he was in trouble with field training officers, who documented weekly remedial training and worries about his unsafe handling of guns and suspects, records show.

In one incident, a supervisor wrote that Johnson “fanned” a fellow officer with the muzzle of his gun and tried to fight a suspect using the same hand that he was using to hold his gun.

A month later, he was accused of lying to Johnson City Police Chief Mark Sirois in an email warning the chief that a “lunatic” woman with a “fatal attraction” for Johnson, a married father of three, would be filing a complaint against him that he denied in advance. He later admitted an affair with her.

The only prior law enforcement experience Johnson listed in his application filed in June 2016 at SCSO was a stint as a jailer in Cocke County and 18 months as a patrol officer at the Newport Police Department.

Criminal case in the balance

It’s not clear what 4th Judicial District Attorney General Jimmy Dunn will do with the case against Mullinax in light of Johnson’s resignation. Assistant Public Defender Aaron Kimsey is pushing for a dismissal, arguing Mullinax is not criminally responsible for Johnson’s panic attack and was only charged because SCSO feared a lawsuit. One has now been filed by attorneys Stan Young and Cameron Bell.

Johnson wrote in a report about the December 2015 shooting that he fired seven shots after turning toward a noise behind him. His body camera showed he remained forward, facing Mullinax as Mullinax walked onto a porch with a cell phone, telling Johnson he was filming the arrest of his girlfriend.

He never mentioned the panic attack in his report, but a SCSO detective later charged Mullinax with causing it.

Johnson was summoned to a mobile home park on Sharp Road by paramedics after an overweight woman who had fallen inside a camper-style trailer began making complaints about Robin Sutton, her landlord, and accusing Sutton and Cody of stealing her purse, records showed.

When Cody walked from the yard of the trailer and climbed through a fence into a field, Johnson drew his gun but instead of walking toward her or issuing commands, he ran around another mobile home, blocking his view of her, walked onto Sharp Road and then headed toward the field, the video showed.

Johnson, with help from a paramedic, was trying to handcuff Cody, who was on the ground, when Mullinax, her boyfriend, walked out of a trailer in front of Johnson and, according to testimony, began yelling that he was filming Johnson with his cell phone.

Johnson wrote in his report that he heard a sound behind him and then turned to see an armed suspect on the porch of a mobile home behind him. The video showed Mullinax was on a porch of a trailer facing Johnson.

Johnson issued no warning and fired over the paramedic’s head.

Johnson immediately ran away after firing the shots. When he returned to the location in the field where a paramedic still had Cody on the ground, he yelled at Mullinax, “You drop that (expletive) thing. Do it now.”

Mullinax dropped the phone and got on the ground. He yelled a complaint but did not threaten violence.

Crime or cover?

Mullinax and Cody spent 42 days in jail on felony aggravated assault charges filed against them by SCSO and directly accusing them of causing Johnson’s panic attack.

The couple were held without a preliminary hearing for weeks. The law requires such a hearing for jailed suspects within 10 business days of arrest. A judge in March tossed out the felony charges, but sent the case to a Sevier County grand jury review.

The grand jury rejected charges Cody caused Johnson’s panic attack, instead indicting her for resisting arrest. The grand jury indicted Mullinax on a misdemeanor assault charge.

Sevier County Circuit Court Judge Jim Gass has set a July trial date.