An 11-year-old girl took the stand Monday and told jurors about being forced to perform sexual acts starting when she was 8.
The trial of Henry Wayne Johnston, 54, of Charleston, began Monday. He is accused of first-degree sexual assault, first-degree sexual abuse, sexual abuse by a parent, guardian or person in a position of trust and possession of child pornography.
"Can I write it?" the girl asked assistant Kanawha prosecutor Fred Giggenbach, who asked her to tell the jury what Johnston would say while allegedly forcing her to perform oral sex on him.
Giggenbach handed her a red marker and a notepad. Her response was placed on a projector so jurors could see.
"He would say suck it," she had written.
Johnston lived in the basement of the home the girl shared with her mother in South Charleston. He would sometimes babysit her while her mother attended school.
Giggenbach said Johnston would show the girl pornography and, among other things, force her to perform oral sex on him.
The girl said, in response to the alleged abuse, she had conducted an Internet search to look up, "Why do guys hurt little girls?"
The prosecutor said the girl didn't initially come forward about the alleged abuse because Johnston had threatened to kill her.
"If I go to jail when I get out I will kill you," Giggenbach said Johnston told the girl. She also believed that if she told her parents, they would kill Johnston and then have to go to jail for it, the prosecutor said.
After family members caught the girl looking at pornography, she eventually told them that Johnston had told her it was OK to view such images, according to Giggenbach.
The girl was taken to a hospital where she described the alleged sexual assaults and abuse to a social worker. A doctor who examined the girl is also expected to testify for jurors during the trial about abnormalities found during an examination of the girl, Giggenbach said.
Johnston's attorney Richard Holicker told jurors they will hear from hospital staff that the girl wasn't cooperative and that the doctor's testimony won't support the prosecutor's claims.
What Giggenbach described to jurors is horrific, Holicker said, "But it never happened."
"Everything Mr. Giggenbach told you is based on the girl's claims," Johnston's attorney said.
After the girl was caught viewing pornography, she first accused someone else of showing her how to watch it. When that didn't make sense, she pointed the finger at Johnston, Holicker said.
"When little girls lie and accuse men of crimes they didn't commit ... they need to be confronted," he said.
The trial will continue today in Kanawha Circuit Judge Duke Bloom's courtroom.
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.