Northern California man sentenced 6 months for assault on two Southwest flight attendants
A Yuba City man has been sentenced to six months in prison for assaulting two flight attendants in December 2019, federal prosecutors announced this week.
Alton James Johnson, 43, was sentenced May 26 in federal court after pleading guilty this January to two misdemeanor counts of assault, the U.S. Attorney’s Office of New Mexico said in a news release this week.
According to Johnson’s plea agreement, the incident took place on Dec. 23, 2019, on Southwest Flight 1086 from San Diego to Albuquerque.
Johnson admitted to repeatedly touching a female flight attendant “up and down the back of her legs,” and then, after she asked him to stop, grabbing her buttocks, according to a copy of the plea agreement filed in federal court. When a male flight attendant approached him to ask him to stop touching the other flight attendant, Johnson “forcefully” grabbed his arm, according to the plea agreement.
“Although I was voluntarily under the influence of alcohol on this flight, I was in control of my actions and I knowingly and unlawfully touched both (flight attendants) without their consent,” Johnson wrote, according to the court filing.
Johnson was arrested in California in May 2020 and arraigned the following month, court records show.
The case was investigated by the FBI, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office news release.
