By John Lyon
Arkansas News Bureau

LITTLE ROCK — A Benton County judge did not err when he allowed evidence about the 1998 Jonesboro school shootings to be admitted at a sentencing hearing for Mitchell Johnson on unrelated charges, the state Court of Appeals ruled today.

A three-judge panel of the court upheld a 12-year sentence Johnson received after pleading guilty in 2008 to felony charges of financial identity fraud and theft by receiving and a misdemeanor charge of possession of a controlled substance.

Johnson argued on appeal that prosecutors should not have been allowed to present evidence at his sentencing hearing about his involvement in the Jonesboro school shootings. Johnson was adjudicated delinquent on five counts of capital murder and 10 counts of first-degree battery in the shootings.

Johnson, now 26, was 13 when he and Andrew Golden, then 11, opened fire on teachers and students at Westside Middle School on March 24, 1998, killing four students and one teacher and injuring nine students and one teacher.

Appealing his sentence in his more recent case, Johnson claimed his juvenile record should not have been considered at his sentencing hearing because it was sealed.

The judge at the hearing ruled that Johnson’s record would be unsealed only if the defense opened the door to questions about it. Johnson argued that the door was never opened.

The Court of Appeals disagreed, noting that Johnson’s mother testified at the hearing that she believed the state’s action against her son was “a persecution, not a prosecution.”

“This action allowed the prosecution to ask about why she though Johnson was being persecuted rather than prosecuted,” Judge Waymond Brown wrote in the appeals court’s opinion.

The court also pointed out that Johnson could have been sentenced to up to 30 years in prison instead of 12. Even if the judge did err in considering Johnson’s juvenile record, Johnson failed to show any resulting prejudice against him, so the error would be considered harmless, the court said.