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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

DISTRICT OF OREGON

THE HON. MICHAEL J. McSHANE, JUDGE PRESIDING

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Government,

vs.

DANIEL STEPHEN JOHNSON,

Defendant.

)

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No. 6:14-cr-00482-MC-1

REPORTER'S EXCERPT TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

EUGENE, OREGON

Tuesday, May 1, 2018

OPENING STATEMENTS

PAGES 1 - 35

DEBORAH COOK, RPR, CSR

OFFICIAL COURT REPORTER

405 East 8th Avenue

Suite 2130

Eugene, Oregon 97401

(541) 431-4162

Deborah_Cook@ord.uscourts.gov

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APPEARANCES OF COUNSEL:

FOR THE GOVERNMENT:

Jeffrey S. Sweet

United States Attorney's Office

405 E. Eighth Avenue, Suite 2400

Eugene, OR 97401

541-465-6771

Fax: 541-465-6917

Email: Jeff.sweet@usdoj.gov

Lauren E. Britsch

U.S. Department of Justice

Criminal Division

1400 New York Ave NW, 6th Floor

Washington, DC 20530

202-514-2220

Fax: 202-514-1793

Email: Lauren.britsch@usdoj.gov

Ravi Sinha

United States Attorney's Office

1000 SW Third Ave, Suite 600

Portland, OR 97204

503-727-1014

Fax: 503-727-1117

Email: Ravi.sinha@usdoj.gov

FOR THE DEFENDANT:

Craig E. Weinerman

Office of the Federal Public Defender

859 Willamette Street, Suite 200

Eugene, OR 97401

541-465-6937

Fax: 541-465-6975

Email: Craig_weinerman@fd.org

Lisa A. Maxfield

Pacific Northwest Law LLP

1255 NW Ninth Avenue, No. 11

Portland, OR 97209

(503) 222-2661

Fax: (503) 222-2864

Email: Lamaxfield@pacificnwlaw.com

*****

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Cook Court Reporting, Inc. - (503) 537-0339

www.cookcourtreporting.com

Page 3

WITNESS INDEX

Page/Line

EXHIBIT OFFERED INDEX

EXHIBIT 271, 272, 273 OFFERED 4 9

EXHIBIT RECEIVED INDEX

EXHIBIT 271, 272, 273 RECEIVED 4 13

JURY INSTRUCTIONS 4 20

OPENING STATEMENT 13 19

OPENING STATEMENT 19 14

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PROCEEDINGS

Sunday, May 13, 2018, at 9:03 a.m.

THE COURT: Let's go on the record.

MR. SWEET: Your Honor, the government has exhibits

271, 272 and 273. Mr. Weinerman and defense have copies of

those. They don't have any objections. Skipping over some

other exhibits we haven't offered yet, but for the purpose of

this morning, we would seek to admit 271, 272, and 273.

(EXHIBIT 271, 272, 273 OFFERED.)

THE COURT: No objection.

MR. WEINERMAN: No objection.

THE COURT: Those will be received.

(EXHIBIT 271, 272, 273 RECEIVED.)

MR. SWEET: And I will bring a copy up.

THE COURT: Will we be ready to call witnesses this

morning?

MR. SWEET: Yes, Your Honor, if we could take that

15 minute break after opening, that would be helpful.

THE COURT: Okay.

MR. WEINERMAN: Judge, counsel is not going to take

very long. We need to switch the equipment, the pack, so I

don't -- hopefully that will go smooth, but that may take a

minute or two or more.

THE COURT: Would you rather I have the jury go

back?

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MR. WEINERMAN: I will leave that up to the Court.

I have tried it on once, hopefully I can get it on so it's

seamless, but I can't guarantee that I will pull that off.

So maybe you can bail me out if it looks like I am not doing

it the right way.

THE COURT: I will. Ready.

MS. WARREN: Your Honor, I think our computer

problems are resolved. But it's not clear that it's showing

up on the big screen.

COURT CLERK: I don't have it published, yet.

MS. BRITSCH: It's just a black screen at the

moment -- yes, that looks fine.

THE COURT: Let's get the jury, and I will give them

some instructions.

(JURY IN.)

THE COURT: Please be seated. If I can have the

jury stand and be sworn.

(JURY SWORN.)

JURORS: We do.

THE COURT: Folks, you are now the jury in this

case. At the end of the trial I will give you more detailed

instructions about the law that applies to the charges in

this case. But right now I want to give you some preliminary

instructions about your role as jurors in the case.

My voice is getting better, but I know it still

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isn't great so I appreciate your patience. When you

deliberate it will be your duty to weigh and evaluate all the

evidence in the case, and in the process, decide the facts.

You and you alone are the judges of the facts.

To the facts as you find them, you will then apply

the law as I give it to you, whether you agree with it or

not. You must decide this case solely on the evidence and

the law before you. You need to perform these duties fairly

and impartially.

Do not allow personal likes, dislikes, sympathy,

prejudice, fear, or public opinion to influence you. You

should also not be influenced by any person's race, color

religion, national ancestry, gender, sexual orientation,

profession, occupation, celebrity, economic circumstances, or

position in life or anything.

This is a criminal case brought by the United States

government. The government charges Mr. Johnson with

traveling in foreign commerce and engaging in illicit sexual

conduct with a minor under the age 18 years, traveling in

foreign commerce for the purpose of engaging in illicit

sexual conduct with a minor under the age of 18 years, and

crossing a state line with the intent of engaging in a sexual

act with a person who is under the age of 12 years.

The charges against Mr. Johnson are contained in

what is called an indictment. The indictment simply

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describes the charges that the government brings. The

indictment is not evidence and does not prove anything.

Mr. Johnson has pled not guilty to the charges and

he is presumed innocent until the government can prove he is

guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. In addition, Mr. Johnson

has an absolute right to remain silent. He does not have to

prove innocence or present evidence.

So what is evidence? The evidence you are to

consider in this case consists of three things. One, the

testimony of sworn witnesses who will testify from the

witness stand, the exhibits that are received into

evidence -- exhibits are things like notes, charts,

photographs, copies of e-mail exchanges, physical things that

are brought into evidence -- and any facts to which the

parties agree. We call these stipulations. And at various

times I may read stipulations to you, and those are simply

facts that you can accept as true that the parties agreed to.

So what is not evidence? The following things are

not evidence. The statements and the arguments of the

attorneys are not evidence. Their statements or arguments

are intended to help you understand the evidence. But if

their statements are different from your own memory of the

evidence, your memory must apply.

Questions and objections are not evidence.

Testimony that I instruct you to disregard is not evidence.

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Anything you may see or hear when Court is not in session,

even if what you see or hear is done or said by one of the

parties or by one of the witnesses, is not evidence.

We talked yesterday about you deciding this case on

what you -- the evidence that is presented to you in the

courtroom. There are two types of evidence. There's direct

evidence and there's circumstantial evidence. Direct

evidence is direct proof of a fact, such as the testimony of

an eyewitness. Circumstantial evidence is a chain of facts

pointing to the existence or nonexistence of another fact.

You may base your verdict on direct evidence, on

circumstantial evidence, or on both.

At various times during the trial attorneys may make

objections to certain questions, or to the introduction of

certain exhibits. We have Rules of Evidence that apply to

testimony and to exhibits. My job is to rule on these

objections. If an attorney objects to a question or an

exhibit and I sustain the objection, the question cannot be

answered and the exhibit can not be received into evidence.

If I overrule the objection, then the question can be

answered or the exhibit can be received into evidence.

If I sustain an objection, please do not try to

guess as to what the answer might have been or about why the

objection is made. That's not relevant. Also, there's a

certain reality in the courtroom. Sometimes a question is

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asked and an answer is given faster than an attorney can say

the word objection. There may be times where I will sustain

an objection after you have already heard the answer.

Sometimes you may have heard an answer to several questions

when I sustain an objection.

I will then turn to you and ask you to disregard the

answer. This isn't Hog Warts. I can't make it fall out of

your head. It's not going to disappear. But when it comes

to deliberations, anything I have asked you to disregard, you

cannot use in determining the facts of the case.

In deciding this case you may have to decide which

testimony to believe and which testimony not to believe. You

may believe everything a witness says, or part of it, or none

of it. In considering the testimony of any witness you may

take into account the following: One, the opportunity and

the ability of the witness to see or hear or know the things

testified to; two, the witness's memory; three, the witness's

manner while testifying; four, the witness's interest in the

outcome of the case and any bias or prejudice; five, whether

other evidence contradicted the witness's testimony; six, the

reasonableness of the witness's testimony in light of all of

the evidence; and seven, any other factors that bear on

believability.

The weight of the evidence to a fact does not

necessarily depend on the number of witnesses who testify to

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it. Yesterday before we broke I already gave you some

instructions, obviously, about talking to other people about

the case, talking among yourselves about the case, looking up

any information, so please keep that instruction in mind as

well.

At the end of the trial you will have to make your

decision based on what you recall of the evidence. We have a

court reporter but that doesn't mean we have a transcript of

the case for you to read over during your deliberations. You

will not have a transcript, so you will have to pay close

attention to the testimony and remember it without the help

of a transcript to read.

You may take notes if you wish. You should have

note pads and pens. At any time you run out of paper or run

out of pen, please just interrupt and let us know.

It is important that you folks -- I mean, you are

the judges of the facts. You have to hear the facts and you

have to understand the facts. If at any time you cannot hear

a witness, please interrupt and ask the witness to speak up.

Sometimes the attorneys, especially at the end of the day,

our voices go down. Maybe you can't hear the question.

Please interrupt and ask them to repeat the question. It's

very important that you hear and understand what is being

said.

Sometimes a witness may say something, and you hear

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the words but -- we all do this -- the words come out a

little bit jumbled, and you simply don't understand what they

meant to say. There's nothing wrong with you asking them to

please repeat or rephrase what they have just said.

Sometimes they may be referring to "he" and "he" being maybe

Mr. Green or Mr. White. Please ask to clarify if you need

clarification.

You are not an independent inquisitional body. We

rely on the attorneys to ask the questions. But it is

important that you are able to hear and understand the

answers.

Now, I have been a judge for a long time. I get

tired as the day wears on, and I need breaks. Sometimes my

breaks won't coincide with your breaks, so it is important if

you are tired and you need a break, or to use the restroom,

you need a glass of water, or you need to stretch in order to

be able to better hear the testimony, please stand up and

say, Judge, we need a break. Any one of you can ask for a

break at any time, and we will take a break.

There will be times during the trial in which the

attorneys need to speak to me about evidence. For instance,

an objection may be made and I may need to talk to the

attorneys before I know how to rule. We call these bench

conferences. You see them on TV when the attorneys come up

and talk to me at the bench, but sometimes you can overhear

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us because I have a microphone right there. There may be

times where we will step into the hallway if it's a brief

conference. There may be times we will ask you to step into

the jury room so we can have a discussion about the evidence

and about the law.

We're still working in here. We're not ignoring

you. So there will be times where we're working, and you

will have to wait for us.

Language other than English will be used for some

evidence during this trial. When a witness testifies in a

another language, the witness will do so through an official

court interpreter. If the recorded evidence is presented in

another language, there will be an official court translation

of the recording.

The evidence you are to consider and on which you

must base your decision is only the English language

interpretations or translations provided through the official

court interpreters or translators. Although some of you may

know the non-English language used, you must disregard any

meaning of the non-English words that differ from the

official interpretation or translation. You must not make

any assumptions about a witness or party based solely upon

the use of an interpreter to assist that witness or party.

So generally speaking, we will be in trial from 9:00

to 5:00. There may be times where we have a shortage of

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witnesses and we break early. There may be times we need to

finish up a witness so they don't have to come back the

following day and we may go a little bit over.

Generally, we take a break at noon for an hour to an

hour and a half for lunch. We will take a 15-minute break in

the morning. We will take a 15-minute break in the

afternoon, and certainly any other breaks that we need to.

We're now going to go into opening statements of the

attorneys. The opening statements are not evidence, but is

intended to be a guide that will help you understand the

evidence that will be presented.

Following the opening statements, the government,

who has the complete burden of proof in this case, will begin

to call witnesses and begin to take testimony. So with that,

the government will go first, and I will turn it over to

them.

MS. BRITSCH: Thank you, Your Honor.

OPENING STATEMENT

MS. BRITSCH: Control and abuse. This case is about

control and abuse. This case is about the defendant,

Mr. Daniel Johnson's persistent sexual abuse of Cambodian

boys who lived in an orphanage that he ran, and about his

trips from the United States to Cambodia to accomplish that

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abuse. This case is about SO XXX, LS X, LT XXXXXXX, ES XXX,

CC X, BT XX, VS XXX, RT XX, SESX, SS XX. These are some of

the boys who resided at Daniel Johnson's orphanage.

Some of these boys are young men now, and you will

get to see and hear their testimony. You will get to hear

them tell you about the sexual abuse, the breach of trust,

and the pain they endured at the hands of Daniel Johnson.

That pain and sexual abuse lasted until Mr. Johnson

was arrested in 2013. Daniel Johnson is an American citizen

and he resides in Oregon. And about the early 2000s he began

traveling to Southeast Asia to do Christian missionary work.

He began traveling between the United States and Cambodia,

and he started an orphanage called Hope Transition Center.

This case is about the control Daniel Johnson had

over that orphanage. He was the director and he controlled

all of the money that funded the orphanage. All of the money

flowed through him. But most of all, Daniel Johnson

controlled the boys who lived there.

He controlled them by slapping them and hitting

them. He controlled them by threatening to kick them and

their siblings out. He controlled them by threatening to

falsely accuse them of crimes and call the police. He

controlled them by giving them money, food, and gifts when

they did what he wanted them to do. And what did Daniel

Johnson do with all of this control? He used it to

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systematically sexually abuse these boys.

Now Hope Transition Center moved to about three

different locations in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, from about 2008

to 2013. And you are going to hear about sexual abuse here,

sexual abuse here, and sexual abuse here. Different

locations, same sexual abuse.

Now, this case is about SO XXXXXXX. SO XXX moved to

Daniel Johnson's orphanage when he was 13 years old. SO XXX

began sleeping in Daniel Johnson's bedroom and giving him

massages.

You are going to hear a lot about massages in this

case. And that's because Daniel Johnson used massages as an

entree to sexual abuse. For SO XXX, massages escalated to

Daniel Johnson touching SO XXX's penis. And then it

progressed to oral sex, and attempted painful anal sex.

This abuse happened to SO XXX nearly every night he

spent in Daniel Johnson's bedroom, and sometimes when he

spent time in that bedroom, SO XXX received gifts like candy

or ice cream.

But SO XXX was not Daniel Johnson's only victim.

This case is about LS X. LS X moved to Daniel Johnson's

orphanage when he was only eight years old. At one point,

Daniel Johnson summoned LS X to his bedroom and there he had

LS X touch Daniel Johnson's penis and Daniel Johnson

performed oral sex on LS X. This happened countless times.

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Daniel Johnson would apologize to LS X, but he continued to

take LS X to his bedroom and continued to sexually abuse that

boy.

This case is also about ES XXX. ES XXX is LS X's

older brother, and he was 13 years old when they arrived at

the orphanage. Daniel Johnson began sexually abusing ES XXX

only one week after ES XXX arrived. And that abuse lasted

for years, until 2013, the year Daniel Johnson was arrested.

This case is also about BT XX. BT XX was sexually

abused by Daniel Johnson for many years. This included oral

sex and attempted anal sex. That abuse only stopped when

BT XX stopped living and sleeping in Daniel Johnson's

bedroom, at which Daniel Johnson replaced BT XX with another

victim, SO XXX.

You are going to hear similar stories from other

boys in this case, other boys who lived at Daniel Johnson's

orphanage. CC X and VS XXX were also sexually abused by

Daniel Johnson. This included oral sex and anal sex. VS XXX

was only 12 years old.

LT XXXXXXX and RT XX are brothers. They moved to

Daniel Johnson's orphanage after their father died, because

they wanted to relieve their mother of the burden of raising

six children on her own.

LT XXXXXXX and RT XX were each summoned to Daniel

Johnson's bedroom separately where he attempted to touch

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their genitals. LT XXXXXXX actually left the orphanage after

this happened the second time, and he cried because he was so

scared about leaving his little brother RT XX behind with

Daniel Johnson.

Now, Daniel Johnson was arrested in December 2013 by

the Cambodian National Police. At that time these boys were

interviewed by the Cambodian police, and later interviewed by

the FBI.

Now some of these interviews are old, and these boys

were interviewed multiple times. They didn't always

immediately open up about the sexual abuse they suffered, and

they didn't always tell the whole truth. But these were hard

things for these boys to talk about. Sexual abuse by their

guardian, by a man they loved, and a man they considered

their father.

These boys were poor, they were desperate. They

were frightened. They longed for a father figure. And they

had, and still have, conflicted feelings about Daniel

Johnson. And they were dependent on his orphanage. Without

that orphanage they had practically nothing.

And you will get to see these boys for yourselves.

You will get to hear their story with your own ears and

decide for yourselves.

Now the sexual abuse that these boys will tell you

about was confined to Daniel Johnson's bedroom. But his

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attempts to control and manipulate the boys were not. Daniel

Johnson consistently preached a message of silence and

forgiveness to these boys. He played on their religious

devotion and he played on their love of God, and their love

of Daniel Johnson.

What does this sound like? Here's an example. I

don't understand why Christians cannot see they hurt all

Christians when they speak bad and make more problem.

Daniel Johnson wrote that exact message in broken

English to SO XXX, and asked SO XXX to post that message on

his Facebook wall. And to BT XX, Peace upon you and your

tongue. Daniel Johnson requested silence and forgiveness in

an attempt to continue to control these boys even after he

was in jail.

You may also hear evidence in this case about

benefits that these victims have received, or hope to receive

for testifying. But again, you will get to see these boys

and you will get to hear them tell you about the sexual abuse

they endured. And you are also going to hear evidence about

expensive gifts and money that flowed from Daniel Johnson in

jail to the victims and their families in Cambodia.

For example, Daniel Johnson offered BT XX's family

$10,000 for BT XX to recant and move back to Cambodia where

Daniel Johnson could better control him. You will get to see

these messages, these messages of silence, and these offers

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of money and gifts in an attempt to control these victims,

even from jail.

Control and abuse. This case is about Daniel

Johnson's persistent sexual abuse of boys under his care.

Control and abuse of many boys over many years. Now that

abuse stopped when he was arrested by the Cambodian National

Police, but the control and manipulation persisted even after

he was in jail.

After you hear all of the evidence in this case, the

evidence of damage, control and abuse, we will ask you to

return a verdict of guilty on all counts.

THE COURT: Thank you, Counsel.

OPENING STATEMENT

MR. WEINERMAN: May it please the Court, Counsel for

the government, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, good

morning.

Why did Daniel Johnson go to Cambodia and what did

he do while he was there? That is what this case is about.

Did he go there to help or did he go there to harm? Did he

go to do good, or did he go to do bad? Were his intentions

charitable or were his intentions criminal? The evidence

will show that Daniel Johnson is an Evangelical Christian.

It's not a dirty word. He traveled to Cambodia to further

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the goals of his ministry, which was to help under-privileged

kids by housing them, feeding them, clothing them, and

educating them.

And his purpose and intent to go to Cambodia was to

serve the poor, to build churches, and to spread the gospel.

This purpose and intent in traveling to Cambodia was not to

harm the kids, but to help them.

He did not sexually abuse anyone in Cambodia. And

the evidence will show that witnesses who are falsely

accusing Daniel Johnson of sexual abuse, has -- have betrayed

him in order to obtain the benefits of a better life in the

United States. In other words, the privilege of immigrating

to the United States.

And the evidence will show that the witnesses who

are going to be testifying against Daniel Johnson are

forgetting and casting aside all the good things he did for

them in order for a ticket to escape the poverty and

corruption of Cambodia, and obtain the privilege of

immigrating to the United States.

By way of background, Daniel Johnson grew up in a

Christian family in Oregon. His mother was devout and took

him to church. But when his mother passed away when he was

14 years old, his heart hardened and he moved away from his

faith. He dropped out of high school, and took a job at

Georgia Pacific, an entry level position. Eventually worked

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his way up to being the head sawyer, but the work was not

satisfying and he heard a higher calling, and he wanted to

serve the poor through his faith.

So he searched for an outlet to further his desire

to help people. And he found a program, Youth With A

Mission. The acronym is YWAM, Y-W-A-M. And he signed up for

their discipleship training school in Taiwan. It was a

six-month program with an immersion into scripture, devotion

to Christian fellowship building, establishing a relationship

with God through Jesus Christ, and missionary work.

In Taiwan he taught English, he engaged in Coffee

House Ministry, and we'll talk about that a little bit, and

he performed service work through two churches he was

assigned to.

After five months in Taiwan, YWAM sent Daniel to

Cambodia for five weeks, for the final weeks of his training

to perform outreach and service work. We all now know where

Cambodia is. It borders Vietnam and Thailand. And in

Cambodia Daniel met Pastor Sinai through the YWAM program.

And in this photo that will be coming up, Pastor Sinai is the

gentleman in the front row to Daniel's right. Not to his

right -- to your right, standing next to Daniel.

Daniel performed outreach and ministry work with

Pastor Sinai in his organization called New Hope for Orphans,

in the Cambodian countryside and villages, and other

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hard-to-get-to places in Cambodia.

They did service work, such as removing land mines.

This all occurred in 2002. After five weeks in Cambodia,

Daniel returned to Taiwan for the final weeks of his

training. But he had lost a significant amount of weight.

He got sick in Cambodia. He picked up a staff infection,

dysentery and malaria, and he vowed never to return to

Cambodia.

And while recovering in Taiwan he received a

telephone call from Pastor Sinai who asked Daniel when he was

going to return to Cambodia, and Daniel told him never.

Pastor Sinai asked him to pray on it, and Daniel did and

eventually changed his mind, and he felt it was his calling

to return to Cambodia.

He returned to Cambodia after recovering from his

illness. And he worked with Pastor Sinai doing outreach

missionary work, and he got to know a man named ** Ban Born

who worked for Pastor Sinai. And Ban Born is to the left of

Daniel, to your right in the back row. And Daniel met him

doing outreach for Pastor Sinai.

And towards the end of his stay in Cambodia, and

this is now 2002, he knew that his future lay in being a

missionary in Cambodia, and he vowed to return. But he had

no funding source, so he had to return to Oregon and looked

for a funding source, hoping to find one so he could return

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to Cambodia and do missionary work.

And he was able to find a funding source through his

family, through his brother, and through his father, and in

late 2002 he returned to Cambodia and stayed there until

approximately May of 2003. And he was there to help Pastor

Sinai's ministry, New Hope for Orphans.

Daniel worked with Ban Born who we talked about a

few minutes ago, who worked at Pastor Sinai's church called

the Fellowship Word of Life Church, FWLC. Daniel lived with

Ban Born and his wife from approximately 2003 to 2006. He

hosted missionary teams, he did local outreach, and he helped

Pastor Sinai's ministry by preparing vision statements,

marketing material, website design and helping Ban Born

around the office.

But during these months with Pastor Sinai, Daniel

got around to Phnom Penh, and was haunted by the plight of

people living in garbage dumps. This is where people lived

in huts that they built out of tires, plastic, garbage

material, mostly widows, many with children. And he was

horrified by what he saw. He saw a garbage truck pull up and

dump a fresh load of garbage, and saw swarms of people

searching for food and recyclables.

He saw children eating food with maggots. So he

started what he called the Garbage Dump Ministry, finding a

way out for widows, helping them find work in the city as

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housekeepers or cooks in people's homes. He also became a

host for other missionary groups visiting Cambodia for which

there were many.

He started his first Coffee House Ministry in 2005.

We're going to call it the WORD House. And WORD stands for

Widows and Orphan Relief and development. What is a Coffee

House Ministry? It's a place to gather outside the four

walls of the church, and it's an outreach to expose people to

Christianity and religious dialogue, and to provide a

welcoming environment to spread the gospel.

What happens in coffee houses? That's the WORD

house, that is the coffee house. That's the first place.

What happened there? Community outreach for young people,

Bible study, English classes, computer labs, and cooking

classes, actual feeding children in the community, fun,

singing. And this started in 2005. This is what Daniel

Johnson was doing for the Cambodian community, with hopes

that the people who attended these ministries, these meetings

would accept Christianity as their faith.

In 2008 Daniel met a man named Pilot Nat. Pilot

attended one of the Bible studies at the Coffee House

Ministry. Pilot had a license to operate a transition center

or orphanage, place where kids could reside, for kids who

were orphaned or whose parents were too poor to raise them.

And through Pilot's ministry, which was called

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Widows and Orphans Relief and Development, hence we're

calling the first place WORD, Daniel obtained funding for

Pilot through a ministry in the United States called Wings of

Faith Ministry out of Texas. And he found other funding

sources in the United States.

So Daniel had the funding, Pilot had the license,

and Pilot moved into the WORD house. And he moved in with

some of the kids who are going to wind up testifying, or will

testify before you during this trial.

So with the license and with house parents, because

Pilot had a wife, and they were going to act as the house

parents for this first orphanage or setup, Pilot moved in and

this arrangement lasted between 2008 and 2011 when Pilot

decided to leave.

And he took his license to operate the center with

him, but he left the kids. He left the kids with Daniel and

the other adult, Pastor Sopheak, another witness that you

will hear from.

So Daniel decided he was going to start his own

orphanage center. And at first, he took the name, Hope

Transition Center, HTC, you will hear that name frequently

during this trial. And he was going to operate it under

Pastor Sinai's license, New Hope for Orphans. And that was

the arrangement at the beginning. Daniel worked hard to

create a vision statement, a mission statement, and a board

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of directors structure for Hope Transition. He made numerous

trips to the United States to raise money for this ministry,

for this entity.

But he ran into a problem when he was in the United

States. The house lost its lease. The house was sold and

they had to move to another location while Daniel Johnson was

in the United States. So they moved to a second house around

July of 2011, and remained there until about August 2012.

And there were two separate parts of this NHO house, New Hope

for Orphans house. There was housing for boys, and there was

a separate house for the girls.

But as it turned out, it was too small to

accommodate all the kids, and all the demand. So late 2012,

around September 2012, they moved to another location, which

we're going to call the Hope Transition Center house, and

they arrived there sometime in the fall of 2012 and stayed

there until December of 2013. That's when Daniel Johnson was

arrested.

At Hope Transitions, Daniel had his own room, slept

in his own room, and the boys lived dormitory style in their

own residence. And the girls did, as well. During this

time, Daniel is trying to keep everything going, he needs

funds, so that need took him back to the United States on

occasions to go to churches all over the United States,

mainly in Texas; the Calvary Baptist Church in Oregon; Coos

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Bay, the Shoreline Church and Skyline Church; California, the

Tranquility First Southern Baptist Church; the West Park

Baptist Church; Wings of Faith; Church of Fresno.

Going there for fund raisers. In this particular

slide Daniel is making the presentation, and the boys at Hope

Transition Center are there via Skype. So the people who are

attending these fund raisers can see what is going on at Hope

Transitions Center.

He also went to churches in Oklahoma, California,

and basically how the funding worked is people in the United

States would donate money through either these ministries,

these churches, or directly to Daniel and deposit money in

Daniel's Oregon-based credit account.

And the donors would sponsor events, like the

ministries. We will talk about some medical things that were

available. They would sponsor individual children,

individual kids. And that worked by providing a monthly

stipend to the kids, and that also involved the kids getting

gifts at various times of the year, including Christmas.

But Daniel did more than helping kids, feeding them,

clothing them, educating them. Daniel started ministries.

One of the most important that he started was the well

ministry. Using donations from various funding sources,

Daniel's ministry dug hundreds of wells in remote provinces

of Cambodia to make everyday life better for the average

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person, no matter what their faith or their religion.

And these wells were funded by individuals, by

ministries, by families, by churches. And when wells were

built, whoever was responsible for the funding would lay a

stone. And these wells improved people's lives. Didn't have

to walk long distances to obtain clean water, and make

people's lives that much easier.

Daniel also was instrumental in building churches in

different parts of Cambodia. We will talk about two. He

built the churches in two of the more remote areas of

Cambodia. Kampot and Prey Veng. Let's talk about Kampot.

He obtained an abandoned church in Kampot, and he remodeled

it, and eventually finished the remodel which resulted in a

flourishing congregation in Kampot, with a community center,

teaching English, and a Bible study.

He also built a church, really a whole community

area with a church in Prey Veng. This is how it started, raw

land that had to be cleared. This is the jungle so they have

to clear the land. And then he drew up plans for this

center, most of which was completed. As you will see in a

minute, there's plans to build a church that was built,

waiting area, dining area, bathroom adjacent to student

housing, that was all built. A sport court play area, that

was built and completed. A medical clinic that was in

progress at the time Daniel was arrested, a school and a

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pastor house, which was not started.

So the church was called the Faith Mover Mountain

Church. There's the completed church. There was a waiting

area, student housing, dormitory rooms, the area adjacent to

the church play area where kids could play and play sports,

dining, waiting area adjacent to the medical clinic, other

parts of the bathroom, garden area, and then the medical

clinic. That's how the medical clinic started, courtyard

next to the church. And the community took advantage of it.

This is in a fairly remote area of Cambodia.

More things that Daniel did for the people of

Cambodia: He started clinics, fitting people for glasses,

called it the eyeglass ministry, which was in Prey Veng and

other locations. That's the eyeglass clinic. There was a

medical support, medical clinic, did things like

immunizations, urgent care, deworming. That's a problem

there. And this photo is a woman who had a growth on her

neck that was constricting her breathing. She had surgery

that successfully removed it.

And on your right, the eye clinic, and there's

someone who had surgery to try to restore the person's

vision. So these -- this infrastructure was built in

Cambodia. And then there were baptisms, water baptisms.

Another ministry that Daniel started for those who chose to

engage in that.

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Daniel had shortcomings. Daniel Johnson had

shortcomings, and we have to talk about that. His intention

in going to Cambodia was to do more of the building, the

ministries that would affect many people's lives, building

the wells, building infrastructure, building churches. He

never really wanted to raise kids. He never wanted to be in

the business of disciplining kids. He had no experience. He

did not have children himself, and he had no experience or

training to be a parent. He had no training to be a

caregiver.

He wanted to support and host missionary groups and

not run orphanages. He wanted to raise funding for building

projects. He didn't want to be a house parent. And that was

lost after Pilot moved out with his wife in 2011, and then it

fell on Daniel to be the house parent, the surrogate parent

for the kids.

And he was a bad disciplinarian. Imagine being a

house parent with maybe one or two people helping, you have

over 20 kids in a house between the ages -- boys between the

ages of 8 and 15, 16. Any parent would know what a nightmare

that is.

So he wasn't a good disciplinarian. He was

frustrated when kids did not behave. And boys, sometimes as

they are, do bad things. They break things and lie and

steal. And he was too strict with the boys, and he believed

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in spare the rod, spoil the child so he did engage in

corporal punishment from time to time. And that was a

shortcoming.

And he wasn't a very good financial manager, either.

He didn't always use the money the way it should be. And he

had to constantly go back to the United States to keep

everything going, to get fund raising to keep the orphanage

going, and do these projects because it all costs money to

build, and get doctors involved.

So he was constantly going back and forth. So he

was an absentee parent in many ways. So he made mistakes and

we acknowledge that.

So the last topic I want to talk about is the

government witnesses, and why we believe the evidence will

show that they should not be believed. And there are many

reasons. I will get into a few with you. First, they made

many, many inconsistent statements over time. They have made

statements falsely accusing Daniel Johnson of sexual abuse,

and then they recanted. Some of them have -- not all of

them, but many of them have done that. Made an accusation of

the sexual abuse and then recanted. And then they recanted

their recantations.

And then many have alleged sexual abuse, years,

years after it allegedly occurred. Daniel Johnson was

arrested in December of 2013. Many of these kids didn't come

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forward until 2016, three years later. And many of them --

and I will name some names -- CC XXXXXX, BT XXXXXXX, SO XXX

XXX, ES XXXXXXX, and others, kept communicating with Daniel

Johnson on Facebook while he was in custody, in Cambodia,

from December of 2013 until he was brought to the United

States in December of 2014.

They communicated with him on Facebook. They told

Daniel Johnson they loved him. These are people who are

claiming that they were sexually abused by Daniel Johnson.

They refer to him as a parent. Some took on Daniel's last

name. SO XXX, we heard his name mentioned, he referred to

himself as SO XXX Johnson. Others did, as well.

Many who communicated with him on Facebook closed

every message with "love you." That's inconsistent that they

would communicate with someone who they now claim sexually

abused them.

Some of them were visiting Daniel Johnson in the

Cambodian jail or prison when he was being held. PE XXXXXX,

CC XXXXXX, LT XXXXXXX and others, visiting Daniel Johnson who

they now claim was sexually abusing them. Visiting him in

prison to try to raise his spirits.

But the main reason they should not be believed is

what they stand to gain by testifying in the way they are

going to testify. The benefits that they have received, that

they expect to receive, or will be seeking, and that's the

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eligibility to obtain legal status to live in the United

States. And I think counsel used the word a few minutes ago

that they are desperate.

They are desperate, but for a different reason.

They are desperate to leave one of the poorest and most

corrupt countries in the world to live in the United States.

And we believe the evidence will show that they will do or

say anything to be able to live here, to be able to immigrate

to the United States.

And one way of doing it is to get a visa, called a T

visa, which you can get if you cooperate in the investigation

and prosecution of sex abuse. As we stand here right now,

we're aware that at least one has obtained such a visa and

that's BT XXXXXXX. BT XXXXXXX has been in the United States

since August of 2013, almost five years. And he has not been

back to Cambodia since.

And during that time, he has applied for and

eventually obtained the T visa in 2016. And that enables you

to stay here, it enables you to work here, it enables you to

go to work here. And we believe the evidence will show that

other witnesses who have never been in the United States

until very recently when they were brought over here to

testify in the case, are seeking or will be seeking the same

thing, the ability to stay here, to get the type of visa that

enables them to stay here and eventually get a green card or

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permanent residence status, which makes them eligible to

eventually become US citizens, if they apply.

And we believe other witnesses besides BT XXXXXXX

are doing the same thing, or will be doing the same thing.

Many of them have lawyers, even before they came over here,

they obtained lawyers.

So again, we don't know what the witnesses are going

to say in that regard, but we believe many of the witnesses

are seeking the same benefits that BT XXXXXXX has obtained.

So I agree that you need to listen to all the

evidence carefully, and you need to judge the credibility of

witnesses, which is very important. So just as important as

what a witness says, you have to think about why they are

saying it, and what they stand to gain by saying it.

So we believe after you hear all the evidence, that

you will not be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that

Daniel Johnson sexually abused anybody in Cambodia, and you

will not be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that he

traveled to Cambodia with the intent and dominant purpose of

hurting Cambodian kids. Thank you.

THE COURT: Folks, let's take a morning break and we

will get set up to testify.

All rise for the jury.

(JURY OUT.)

(END OF EXCERPT at 10:01 a.m.)

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STATE OF OREGON )

)ss

COUNTY OF YAMHILL)

I, Deborah L. Cook, RPR, Certified Shorthand

Reporter in and for the State of Oregon, hereby certify that

at said time and place I reported in stenotype all testimony

adduced and other oral proceedings had in the foregoing

hearing; that thereafter my notes were transcribed by

computer-aided transcription by me personally; and that the

foregoing transcript contains a full, true and correct record

of such testimony adduced and other oral proceedings had, and

of the whole thereof.

Witness my hand and seal at Dundee, Oregon, this

2nd day of January, 2018.

/s/ Deborah L. Cook, RPR, CSR

__________________________

DEBORAH L. COOK, RPR

Certified Shorthand Reporter

OREGON CSR #04-0389

CALIFORNIA CSR #12886

WASHINGTON CSR #2992

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