A Stillwater man found an 18-year-old woman passed out drunk next to a telephone pole in St. Paul late at night, picked up her limp body and sped away from the neighborhood in his pickup truck back to his home, where he raped her, according to charges.
Jeremiah D. Johnson, 26, was charged in Washington County District Court with kidnapping and third-degree and fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct. Johnson appeared in court and remains jailed in lieu of $100,000 bail with conditions.
"Stranger rapes are by far the most difficult to prove in most circumstances," County Attorney Pete Orput said Tuesday in a statement. "Our office will do all in its power to bring justice to the victim."
Under questioning by police, Johnson said he was drawn to the teen because "I always wanted to do an Asian girl," the criminal complaint read. "Now that I pick one up, I get arrested."
According to the complaint:
On Sunday around 12:30 a.m., Johnson found the woman intoxicated and passed out next to a telephone pole at Edgerton Street and Case Avenue near a playground. He got out of his truck and picked her up, with her arms dangling "limp and lifeless," a witness told police.
Johnson put his victim in his truck and "drove away fast [and] almost hit another vehicle," the complaint read, citing a witness account.
With information from another witness about the truck's license plate, St. Paul and Stillwater police officers went to Johnson's apartment 16 miles away in the 1500 block of Greeley Street and found the woman in a common hall. She didn't know where she was and seemed frightened.
