Trial opens for former hotel security guard accused of raping 2 guests

A former Las Vegas hotel security guard took advantage of two intoxicated women and raped them in their rooms, prosecutors said Friday.

But during opening statements, a defense attorney for Jerry Earl Johnson said that he was falsely accused both times in early 2009.

The first allegation was made in February 2009, when a woman said she returned drunk to the Wyndham Grand Desert hotel, near Harmon Avenue and Koval Lane, and a security guard helped her up to her room. She told police the guard then raped her.

A month later, another woman reported similar allegations and said her assailant resembled LL Cool J, Chief Deputy District Attorney Sam Martinez told jurors.

The woman alleged that she drifted in and out of consciousness while telling the man, “No.”

Detectives quickly recognized similarities in the two allegations, the prosecutor said.

In the midst of the second incident, the woman accidentally called her mother, who overheard her daughter struggle and a man’s voice.

Authorities later linked Johnson, now 48, to both cases through DNA evidence found in the second encounter.

But Deputy Public Defender Jeff Maningo told jurors Friday that no sex ever happened in the first incident and there would be no medical evidence to prove the woman was assaulted. In the second, he said, the woman consented to the sex.

“People come to Vegas and act out of character,” Maningo said. “Those actions, when out of character, can lead to regret.”

Johnson was originally charged with two counts of sexual assault in 2010, and the case lingered in the court system for more than seven years before going to trial.

“While two wrongs don’t make a right,” Maningo said, “two wrongful accusations could actually convict an innocent man.”

The trial is expected to continue through the middle of next week.

Contact David Ferrara at dferrara@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-1039. Follow @randompoker on Twitter.