NARRATOR: Prisons in the
United States of America house many of the world's most
dangerous and notorious prisoners. One of those is Edward Johnson. AUDREY CONE: He was brutally
beaten beyond recognition. The guy from pretty much the
moment he entered the facility was a loose cannon. DR. LINA HAJI: He seems to
be a complete psychopath by the very definition
of psychopathy. NARRATOR: Johnson is a cold,
calculating killer who brutally murdered a female friend. LORI THOMPSON: She
was in the bathtub. And he had stabbed her to death. He had no remorse whatsoever. And he was just
proud, didn't care. We were all sobbing. And he just thought
it was funny. NARRATOR: Even securely
locked behind bars, Johnson's violence continued. Mr. Johnson is
institutionalized just by the fact that he's
been incarcerated essentially his whole adult life
and he continued to re-offend. HECTOR BRAVO: The thing that
makes maximum security prisons more dangerous is that the
inmates-- they've already made it up their minds
that they are going to live and die in prison. MARY DIVINE: And Mr.
Johnson was in a fight with another inmate here at
the prison and lost his eye. Edward Johnson is
a danger to all staff that are in his immediate
area and his fellow offenders as well. NARRATOR: Surrounded
by dangerous prisoners, it is often the prison
guards who become targets. He brutally killed
a correctional officer in Minnesota by bashing his
head in with the hammer. LORI THOMPSON: Edward? I think he's the devil. I do. [dramatic music] [typing] [dramatic music] NARRATOR: Minnesota
Correctional Facility, Stillwater, the largest
male prison in the state. MARY DIVINE: We're standing
outside the Minnesota correctional facility
in Stillwater. It's a prison that
was built in 1914. It houses about 1,600 inmates. MIKE PADDEN: You could
have guys in there that have life sentences for murder,
rape, assault, all kinds of theft crimes, extortion. Any kind of felony you
can think of on the books has guys like that
at the facility. Serial murderers are there. When it does kick off,
they go all the way. They'll attempt to kill you. MARY DIVINE: So as you're
walking down the hall, in the middle of it, you
have prisoners on this side, prisoners on this side,
three or four levels high. It's a scary place to visit. NARRATOR: Edward
Johnson is notorious within the prison as one of
the most dangerous prisoners. [dramatic music] DR. LINA HAJI: Edward
Johnson is a very dangerous criminal who has a
lengthy history of violence. He's very cunning
and manipulative. He has a lack of empathy,
a lack of remorse. All of those personality
traits points to a high level of psychopathy. NARRATOR: Behind bars Johnson
continued the violent behavior that put him there. GUY WICKLANDER: He
was the kind of inmate that even other inmates
stayed away from because of his behavior. They referred to him as
somewhat of a wacko and someone they wanted nothing
to do with because he was potential dynamite
ready to go off. DR. LINA HAJI: I would
say Johnson is probably one of the most
dangerous prisoners to exist in the United
States, absolutely. [dramatic music] [typing] NARRATOR: Edward Johnson was
born in Chicago in the 1970s into a middle class family. He was the son of two cops,
Edward and Celina Johnson, who both worked for the
Chicago Police Department. NARRATOR: Johnson and
his younger sister had a difficult upbringing. DR. LINA HAJI: There
was domestic violence between his parents,
who by all accounts were generally good
members of society, although his father
struggled with alcohol abuse. MARY DIVINE: The mother had
tried, from what I understand, to leave his father
many times and had not been successful in that. NARRATOR: Johnson's mother
filed for divorce in June 1988 and kept custody
of the children. She was scared and
knew that at some point he might kill her. NARRATOR: On the
13th of September, 1988, Johnson's father
broke into the house and attacked his estranged wife. MARY DIVINE: The kids
were home at the time. And Edward heard a
commotion, went out, and saw his father beating his mother. The father then tried to
push him out of the room. But then he could hear shots. DR. LINA HAJI: Mr. Johnson
actually witnessed it. And he described his
mother's head bouncing when she was shot multiple times. MARY DIVINE: After the
shooting, the father left the scene and the kids
went to a neighbor's house to report the shooting. They later found Edward
Johnson Sr. dead in a motel room of suicide. He shot himself in the head. [gunshot] [dramatic music] NARRATOR: 12-year-old Edward
Johnson and his sister moved to Minneapolis,
Minnesota, where they were raised by an aunt. DR. LINA HAJI: So when
it comes to Mr. Johnson, we really don't know what
were the predisposing factors to help him become this
psychopathic, violent criminal. However, the witnessing as
a young child of his father murdering his mother, that
had to be extremely traumatic. And it also painted a
narrative in his head that these are how
relationships with females are supposed to occur. This was normal. NARRATOR: By the time Edward
Johnson was 26 years old, he had accumulated a
couple of assault charges, a drug possession
conviction, and had been in prison several times. In 2002, while free,
he ran into his friend, 22-year-old e Thompson. LORI THOMPSON: My
name is Lori Thompson. And I'm the mother
of e Thompson. I was told by her
friends that she met him through one
of her past boyfriends who was related to him. He was his cousin. So she knew him as
a friend while she was dating his cousin. NARRATOR: In July, Brooke
asked Edward to help her leave her boyfriend. LORI THOMPSON: She was in
an abusive relationship. She needed to move out. And that's when
Edward said, you can crash with me for a
little while until you find another place of your own. He said she could
crash on his couch while she was looking
for another apartment. NARRATOR: Brooke and her
five-year-old daughter temporarily moved into Johnson's
apartment in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington. Brooke wanted to
become a paralegal. She had a great job
working at a law firm in downtown Minneapolis. And she was going to school
part-time two nights a week to be a paralegal. She was raising her
daughter, Taylor. And Taylor, she was
the light of her life. NARRATOR: Unbeknownst to
her mother Lori, Johnson started getting obsessed with
Brooke and acting possessive. She had told her
friends, he's being creepy. And he's acting
like my boyfriend. And he's not my boyfriend. And he wants to know
where I am all the time. NARRATOR: Brooke became
frightened as Johnson became more threatening. LORI THOMPSON: There
were signs that something was wrong with this guy. And that's right around the time
she was getting ready to leave. NARRATOR: Johnson
decided he wanted to take Brooke to Chicago with him. But she refused. He took the rejection
badly and threatened to take her against her will. DR. LINA HAJI: It doesn't seem
like there's anything he will not do to get his needs met. Nothing is a
consequence for him. NARRATOR: On August 13, 2002,
Brooke planned her escape and asked her mother to
look after her daughter for the night. But, first, she
wanted to pick up some belongings at Johnson's. She said, I need you to
watch Taylor tonight for me. I have to work in the morning. And I said, absolutely,
I'd love to take her. So we waited and
waited and waited. And she never showed
up that night. I was very worried. But I thought, well,
she must have slept in, went to bed early. I didn't know. NARRATOR: The next morning
when one of Brooke's friends phoned Lori asking
for Brooke, they both realized something was wrong. LORI THOMPSON: I called
her work, her office. And they said she was not
in and had not called in. And that's when Edward reached
out to her to Brooke's friend and said Brooke had to
leave and would like me to drop off Taylor with you. So can you meet me? NARRATOR: Brooke's
friend agreed to meet Edward outside a grocery store. Lori joined them
but she also brought with her undercover police. LORI THOMPSON: We were
inside the grocery store watching for him. And she saw him pull up. So she walked out there, just
as friendly as she could be, made small talk, got
Taylor out of the car, and walked her into
the grocery store. NARRATOR: The police
immediately took Edward Johnson into custody
and started an investigation. The police transported us to
the Plymouth Police Department and just brought us
into a meeting room and asked us just to
sit tight while they were still looking for Brooke. So we waited there for
several hours knowing nothing. All we could think of was
he must have beat her up. They came in and
got me and said, we need to speak
with you privately, and took me into a separate
room and told me they found her. And I just said,
oh, God, is she OK? What's wrong? What happened? And that's when they
told me she's gone. He killed her. He ended up stabbing
her multiple times. Every parent's
worst nightmare. [dramatic music] [typing] [dramatic music] [typing] NARRATOR: Edward Johnson
had killed Brooke Thompson in his apartment. LORI THOMPSON: Taylor was in
the next room watching TV. She heard the whole thing. She said he kept hitting mommy's
head against the bathroom door. And she kept screaming,
please stop, please stop. MARY DIVINE: It was a
horrible, horrible death. But what makes it
even more tragic is, Brooke's daughter,
Taylor, who was 5 at the time, was home and heard
her mother screaming. LORI THOMPSON: She
was in the bathtub. And he had stabbed her to death. That's how they found her. NARRATOR: After being charged
with the murder of Brooke, Edward Johnson was
imprisoned to await trial. Edward Johnson
was arrested in 2002 for the murder of his roommate. He was housed in the Hennepin
County Jail in Minneapolis. HECTOR BRAVO: When a
person commits a crime out on the streets,
they get arrested, they go to the police
department to get processed, and then they'll
go to county jail. That's where they'll take
away their belongings, dress them out in inmate attire,
fingerprint them, book them. And they wait there until they
get scheduled to go to prison. [dramatic music] MARY DIVINE: While there, he
punched a deputy in the eye after he was told
that he couldn't visit a certain part of the jail. And I think it just speaks to
the violent, violent behavior that Mr. Johnson has. [dramatic music] [typing] NARRATOR: On February
13, 2003, Edward Johnson appeared in court to face
second degree murder charges. LORI THOMPSON: Edward? I think he's the devil. I do. Through the whole murder
trial in the courtroom, he turned around
and he was smiling and smirking and winking at us. He had no remorse whatsoever. And he was just
proud, didn't care. We were all sobbing. And he just thought
it was funny. That's a psychopath. [dramatic music] The only person that showed
up to support him in court was his sister. And she actually wasn't
there to support him. She was there to support us. She came over and spoke with
me and apologized on his behalf and hugged me and
said just how terrible she felt that he had done that. NARRATOR: Edward
Johnson was offered and accepted a plea bargain. He was sentenced to 29
years for second-degree intentional homicide. We were furious. We were not
consulted about that. I said, he took a life. He should be in there for life. I don't understand. [typing] NARRATOR: Edward
Johnson was sent to Minnesota Correctional
Facility, Stillwater to serve his sentence. SHANE WARNKE: Stillwater is the
focal point of the Minnesota Department of Corrections. It's historically been
the most problematic in terms of the severity
of incidents which occur. MARY DIVINE: It's an old prison. It looks like a prison that
you might see in the movies. You would see the bars. You walk through and you can
see the prisoners at the bars and the clanging of the bars. [clanging] SHANE WARNKE: We're talking
about a dangerous environment where, I mean, you've
got individuals who have, perpetually sometimes,
committed violent acts against their peers,
their neighbors, their families, corrections
staff, police officers. This is where Edward Johnson
was sent in 2003 after he was sentenced to 29 years
in prison for the murder of Brooke Thompson. He was not a model prisoner. He spent a lot of his time while
he was here in the segregation unit over 1,700 days,
which is really quite a high number for an inmate. SHANE WARNKE: My
name is Shane Warnke. I'm a corrections sergeant
with the Minnesota Department of Corrections. I've been in
corrections since 2005. The Stillwater
facility at its peak was housing a lot
of offenders, like up into the 1620 offenders. MIKE PADDEN: You'll
have guys that'll be in there for five years. And you'll have guys that
will be in there for life. There is conflict between gangs. You'll have skinheads,
for example, white gangs, and then gangs of color,
Black gangs, Hispanic gangs, that type of thing. And inmates assaulting
each other are common. NARRATOR: Edward Johnson
was no different. While inside, he continued
his violent behavior. In 2004, he was involved
in an incident at the prison where another inmate stabbed
him in his right eye. SHANE WARNKE: Ironically,
Edward Johnson tried to attack another offender with a shank. That offender got a hold
of Edward Johnson's weapon and returned fire,
so to speak and ended up stabbing him
in the eye, which he ultimately lost his eye. Having lost an eye as
the result of a fight with an inmate, whether or not
he was responsible for starting it, was completely irrelevant. This was going to fuel
more anger in Mr. Johnson, fuel more rage,
and justify to him that further acts of
violence were necessary because this is all he knows. SHANE WARNKE: And there is just
this hatred by Edward Johnson. He had just a great
disdain for the people that he deemed to be responsible
for the loss of his eye. I would say the
general consensus was that it wasn't just all staff. It was one particular staff
who he felt was responsible because a gate was accidentally
opened, when in turn, he was the one that, gate opened
or closed, took a weapon and went and assaulted
another offender. So I think it just goes to
illustrate his way of thinking, which is absolutely irrational. MARY DIVINE: Edward
Johnson had a lot of anger against the prison and
against correctional officers after that incident where he
lost the vision in his eye. DR. LINA HAJI: Very
early on Johnson probably had this mixed idea
about authority. Are they good? Are they bad? Are they supposed to
serve and protect? His father, who was a police
officer, murdered his mother. HECTOR BRAVO: An inmate
might want to attack a guard for numerous reasons. They could feel disrespected. They can be angered. They could be enraged,
having a psychotic episode, and just have total
disregard for life. And they don't
really need a reason. He had articulated that
he was going to get revenge for the loss of his eye often. NARRATOR: Having lost an
eye within the first year of being incarcerated, Johnson's
record did not improve. He was constantly in trouble. SHANE WARNKE: When I look
at his disciplinary record, Edward Johnson doesn't look
like he was somebody that was trying to improve his life. GUY WICKLANDER: His criminal
activities within the prison system, which involves
assaults, threats, weapons, disobeying, orders,
being in an unauthorized area. SHANE WARNKE: I see possession
of tobacco and alcohol too. So he was probably
using substances throughout his
incarceration as well, adding more fuel to the fire. NARRATOR: Edward Johnson had
a growing desire for revenge. Prison staff believed he
was a danger to everyone in Stillwater and
should be transferred to a higher security facility. HECTOR BRAVO: Some of
the threats in prison for correctional officers and
for the inmates is the threat of being violently attacked. You can get stabbed. You can get slashed
with a slashing weapon. You can get what's called
gassed, where they will throw some type of substance on you,
whether it's urine, feces, blood, and they attempt
to get you in the face or just jumped by 100
or 200 individuals in a riot or staff assault. MIKE PADDEN: When an inmate was
labeled a problem person who really was a loose
cannon, a significant risk to other inmates or COs, they
would be transferred to the Old Park Heights facility,
which is a facility that had closer scrutiny of inmates. NARRATOR: Rather than
being transferred, Johnson was put to work inside
the prison with the hope of rehabilitation. The industry program at
the Stillwater facility, it's just like you'd walk
into an industrial complex. They've got a wood
shop where they can make wood products, steel,
office furniture, upholstery. MIKE PADDEN: If an inmate has a
history of disciplinary issues, especially threats exacted
against prison personnel, they should not be
in industry ever. They had access to tools like
hammers, sharp tools, the kind of tools that you would
expect in a mechanic's shop or in an industry facility
where they make products. SHANE WARNKE: You're talking
about potentially people with violent histories
that are in possession and using tools that can inflict
great bodily harm or death. GUY WICKLANDER: Why is this guy
out in an environment where he can have access to these
weapons and the opportunity to use them? It makes no sense, none at all. NARRATOR: Johnson
had been looking for an opportunity for revenge. And he found one. GUY WICKLANDER: This
inmate had been planning the attack, in
fact, sent letters to his family telling them,
much the same, that he was going to assault somebody. They'd be reading about it soon. NARRATOR: Johnson
went in for the kill. He murdered him with a hammer. He attacked him from the back
and bludgeoned him to death. [dramatic music] NARRATOR: Edward Johnson was
at Minnesota Correctional Facility, Stillwater. Stillwater prison has got
a Gothic, Victorian look. GUY WICKLANDER: It's the image
most people have of a prison with the bars and
open cell blocks. MARY DIVINE: They're
behind these metal bars. And you can often
hear them yelling or cat calling as
you're walking through or banging on the metal bars. There had been
lots of assaults that have occurred over the
years and vicious assaults on staff. I mean, I'm talking people
have been hospitalized and had to retire early or
never came back to work. Multiple offenders fighting,
that amplifies the situation. MARY DIVINE: I talked
with many different union officials who represent
the correctional officers in Minnesota. One of the things
that they stressed was, there aren't enough
correctional officers, working staff,
staffing the prison. SHANE WARNKE: The ratio
from offenders to guards is unsafe across the agency. I mean, you might have four
corrections staff in a unit of over a 200 offenders. Now, you do the math on
that, and the odds are not stacked in your favor
if they were to choose to do things a certain way. NARRATOR: By 2018,
Edward Johnson had spent almost 1,700
days in segregation but was allowed to
join the industry program to learn new skills. GUY WICKLANDER: With the record
that Johnson had in prison, the time he spent in
segregation, which is the jail within the prison-- in other words, he's not
turning his life around. He's not changing his behavior. He doesn't deserve to
be out in industry. That industry should be
reserved for those inmates that are proving that they want
to change their lifestyle, change their choices, and
become a productive citizen. SHANE WARNKE: There's
really not what I consider to be a solid vetting process
for determining who is the best candidates for these positions. [sad music] NARRATOR: The prison officers
working at Stillwater were very aware of the
potential problems in industry and the prison as a whole. One correctional
officer, Joseph Gomm, ensured new recruits
understood the situation. SHANE WARNKE: I remember
when I first met Joe Gomm, I was probably within the
first few weeks of my career in corrections back in 2005. And I was, just like any
other rookie, scared. You hear all these stories. Stay away from this person. This person's cool. GUY WICKLANDER: Joe
was the kind of officer that would be respected by
inmates, staff, and the public. He did his job. He did his job appropriately
and respectfully. He was the kind of officer
that if there was something that the inmate requested,
and he could do it, and it was within the
guidelines of the SOP, he would do it,
where others may not. They might say, I don't
have time to deal with you. Joe would take care of that. SHANE WARNKE:
Throughout his career, he bounced around to different
places throughout the facility, working in the education
unit where the offenders go to school and then as well as
out into the industry area too. He was just always that
guy that you could go to. But he also wasn't afraid to
stand up for what was right. MIKE PADDEN: He was very
concerned about himself and his fellow employees. And he had actually
said, and I quote, "it's going to take one of
us to die before there's any significant change." NARRATOR: Since losing
his eye, Edward Johnson had been searching for an
opportunity to get revenge. And he found one. On July 18, 2018-- and
I was working that day-- I cover the Minnesota
Correctional Facility. Correctional Officer Gomm
was working there that day. He was in the industry building. NARRATOR: Edward Johnson was
also in industry that day. Still blaming the
prison system and guards for the events which left
him blind in one eye, he targeted Officer Gomm. Edward Johnson just carried
himself in a different way. He was quiet, almost like in
a Pink Panther, sneaky, kind of way and just always gave me
goosebumps a little bit because of the way he carried himself. MARY DIVINE: Mr. Johnson
came up behind him and really unprovoked
just started-- smashed him on the
head with a hammer. Joseph Gomm, he was alone. There were no other CEOs there. And Johnson got access to him
and then proceeded to bludgeon him to death with a hammer. And then he stabbed him
to death with a tool that he had made in industry. [dramatic music] SHANE WARNKE: I knew
something bad had happened. But I wasn't exactly
sure what that was. But then probably a
half hour of that-- some administrators started
pouring into my office, like they normally
would at any other day because we just talk
and joke around. But there was just a
different look about them. A lot of them were
looking at the floor. And I knew something
didn't feel right. Well, one of them, God bless his
soul, pulled me out of the room and told me what had happened. MIKE PADDEN: Other inmates
did try to step in. But by the time
they got in there-- this was very quick, you see. He was killed quickly. And then he fled and
barricaded himself in a room. GUY WICKLANDER: The officers
that responded, first they had to get through the barricade. And one officer stated that
he didn't recognize Joe. SHANE WARNKE: I think
I found out that it was Johnson that murdered Joe-- it was a few hours after when
everything started hitting the media knowing who
Johnson was my entire career up until that point. So I definitely recognized him. I knew the name and
everything like that. MARY DIVINE: It was shocking. This was national news. This was the first time
in the state of Minnesota that a correctional officer
had been killed by an inmate. So it was just unheard of. I mean, it was just very
upsetting and very disturbing. NARRATOR: Shortly
after the attack, Johnson was charged and later
pleaded guilty to the murder of Joseph Gomm. MIKE PADDEN: I don't think
I need to tell you that when Joe died, he was all alone. Something MINNCOR staff knew
and something the criminal who killed Joe knew also. NARRATOR: According to the
2018 investigation file, an inmate told investigators
that Gomm should not have been left alone in
the prison's metal shop with dozens of prisoners. Officer Gomm had only a radio,
pepper spray, and handcuffs when Johnson attacked him. He's a coward. He attacks from behind. He attacks the weaker, and-- very difficult to talk about-- I like many other people would-- I'd like to go toe
to toe with that man. Put it that way. SHANE WARNKE: There
should never be a staff that's by themselves
in a shop with inmates with potential weapons. That to me is a no-brainer. [sad music] NARRATOR: As far as Edward
Johnson was concerned, he had taken out his revenge. On the exact day
that Joe was murdered was the 14 year
anniversary of the date that this man had been
assaulted by another inmate and lost the vision
in his right eye. It wasn't just a
coincidence that the day that he killed
Joe-- it seems clear that this man had a vendetta. NARRATOR: After a turbulent 16
years in prison for the murder of Brooke Thompson,
42-year-old Edward Muhammad Johnson
had been planning to attack prison staff. GUY WICKLANDER: Why was Joe
the target when there's staff that are not liked by inmates? Why not one of them? Well, then you come to realize
inmates are opportunists. They take an opportunity
of the situation. And Joe was in that situation. He was in that uniform. That made him the target. MIKE PADDEN: There
was no evidence that Joe Gomm had any issues
with Johnson, nothing, nothing, zero, no evidence whatsoever. DR. LINA HAJI: When you think
about psychopaths and people who engage in this
high-level violence, they don't have what we
call consequential thinking. They typically engage in what
serves them in the moment. So if Johnson wanted
to kill that officer, if he was angry, if this is the
only way he knows how to deal with emotions, he was going
to deal with those emotions by murdering. NARRATOR: The family and
friends of Officer Gomm were devastated. Anyone you talk to about
correctional Officer Gomm will tell you what
a kind soul he was. And I'm not sure
you would hear that about every
correctional officer. But certainly, in this
case, it just makes it incredibly heartbreaking. I was mad, as
well as grieving. I was really mad. I still am. I still am mad. It should have never happened. [typing] [dramatic music] NARRATOR: In 2018, immediately
after murdering Prison Officer Joe Gomm, Edward
Johnson was finally transferred to high security
prison, Oak Park Heights. HECTOR BRAVO: So in the
case of Edward Johnson utilizing a hammer to brutally
murder a correctional officer, that's fairly rare because
inmates that have access to those type of weaponry,
whether it's a hammer, behind the work change
wall, or knives inside of a culinary kitchen,
the inmates in there are usually privileged to
be working in that area. So they don't want to mess
up their opportunities. MIKE PADDEN: When an inmate was
labeled a problem person who really was a loose cannon, they
would be transferred to the Oak Park Heights facility. Oak Park Heights facility,
which is our supermax facility, which when it was built, it
was to mirror the supermax facility in Florence, Colorado. MARY DIVINE: The Oak Park
Heights prison, which is just about five miles from
the Stillwater prison, is a very different experience. When you are there,
it's very quiet. Each inmate has their own cell. And the cells are-- there are big, metal
steel doors that slide and slide into place. So it's a very different
experience from visiting the Stillwater prison. NARRATOR: Edward
Johnson had committed the worst possible crime in
prison, murdering an officer. Now all the officers
feared for their lives. SHANE WARNKE: We
always knew that there was a possibility
that any one of us could be killed in
the line of duty. But it was never on the
forefront of our thinking. I was in complete shock, a
little bit of denial at first until it started hitting
the waves of the media and it was a reality. And, yeah, it's still hard
to believe that it happened. GUY WICKLANDER: Officer Gomm was
the first correctional officer killed in the
state of Minnesota. Most of the staff that worked
with him and most of the staff throughout the department
were infuriated because it could have been prevented. The reports that officers
had written for concerns of the safety in
that environment that Joe was killed in
were not considered. Well, the governor
was very responsive. And it was obvious he felt
terrible about what happened. The commissioner for the
DOC was responsive also. Their own agency went
after them really hard. But the DOC fought that
claiming, in essence, that they didn't do anything wrong. SHANE WARNKE: After
Joe Gomm was murdered, the prison went into lockdown. I believe it was three weeks. And that was definitely
one of the most struggling times
when the offender population was locked down. And some of the things that we
had to listen to them saying-- there were some offenders
that were legitimately upset about it too, which
at that point in time, I found it pretty-- I guess I never looked at
them as having empathy. But I think I've seen
some empathy after that even from the
offender population. There were other guys that
would sit there and yell stuff at us from their cells. We call them cell warriors, the
guys that are way up on a tier off to the side and they're
yelling stuff at you. And you guys should [bleep]
learn from your friend. And this [bleep]
can happen again and things like that
that they would say. So we were working in that. NARRATOR: On July 26, 2018, a
funeral was held for Joe Gomm. Thousands of correctional
officers and dignitaries came in from all over the
United States and Canada to be there present. It was a moving ceremony. [sad music] [camera shutter] Joe Gomm's funeral was
like nothing I had ever seen. It was full police
honors, so 21 gun salute. There were agencies from
around the country that came. It was a media spectacle. There were helicopters
flying over the cemetery. There was just a lot going on. It was a lot to process. Our chaplain from the facility
officiated his service. So there was just a lot of
emotion with just seeing how shattered everybody was. And just the
outpouring of support that the agency and the people
in the agency and his family and everybody received, it was
just completely overwhelming. [sad music] MIKE PADDEN: Joe was
not married at the time. He had a girlfriend in Chicago. But the state really
had some really nice ceremonies for his death. I remember being at one where
they handed his mother a flag, which was really poignant. The family took it really hard,
especially when they found out the circumstances and learned
about the history of this guy and that his death easily
could have been prevented. [sad music] [dramatic music] NARRATOR: In 2018,
before Johnson went to trial for the
murder of Officer Gomm, a hearing was held. MARY DIVINE: I covered Johnson's
first appearance in court at the Washington
County District Courthouse in Stillwater. It was a few weeks after
the murder occurred. He appeared behind
bulletproof glass. He was flanked on both sides
by deputies from the Washington County Sheriff's Office. He normally wears an eye
patch to cover his eye because he's missing an eye. But he did not wear his eye
patch that day and just stared directly into the
public gallery area, basically, throughout
the entire proceedings. And it was just-- it
just was unsettling. [camera shutter] MIKE PADDEN: This guy's
a Major League criminal. He's a psychopath. He's probably a
misogynist, a narcissist. I mean, this guy
has the whole gamut SHANE WARNKE: I would say
that Edward Johnson had a look about him,
something that I remember even from when I was brand new. And I think part
of it was the fact that he didn't have an eye. One of his eyes were missing. So he was always
distinguishable in that respect. But he just had a
certain pose about him in the way that he
carried himself. He just had this look
to him like I've never seen with anybody else before. Dozens of friend's of Gomm
and correctional officers attended all of the court
hearings through the months after. And they all wore matching
t-shirts that said Joseph Gomm, 7/18/18, end of
watch, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will
be called the children of God." It was just incredibly moving. SHANE WARNKE: After
Joe Gomm was murdered I designed a t-shirt design,
which is the State of Minnesota with a silver line
through it and then a scripture on the back of it. And I collaborated with
a local t-shirt design company in the Twin Cities. And they agreed to give a
percentage to the proceeds raised to his family. And I think we raised $35,000. MARY DIVINE: Johnson was
charged with first-degree murder of a correctional
officer and first-degree premeditated murder. He was indicted by a grand
jury in August of 2018. [dramatic music] [thud] NARRATOR: While he awaited
trial Johnson continued to be held in Oak Park Heights. MARY DIVINE: The murder
happened in 2018. But the case actually
wasn't slated to go to trial until 2020. And, in fact, toward
the end of 2020, there was a lot of legal
wrangling on both sides. It sometimes just
does take that long to go to trial in Minnesota. But in this case, right
before he was to go to trial, Mr. Johnson decided
to plead guilty. NARRATOR: When Johnson
killed Officer Gomm, he was just four years short
of being released on parole. But now he would remain
securely behind bars. We are so incredibly
sad for that family. My heart breaks for them too. They went through
what we went through. He was not a changed
man for the better. That's for sure. I am absolutely relieved
he'll never be out. The world's a safer place
with him behind bars. That's for sure. MIKE PADDEN: He would be a
really bad threat to society if he ended up back. There's no question
in my mind he would re-offend and kill somebody. Sure, no question,
especially a woman. LORI THOMPSON: I will never
ever, ever forgive him. I will never forgive Edward. She was a vibrant,
beautiful, wonderful person with a kind heart. And he took her away from us. And he took her away
from her daughter. [sad music] NARRATOR: In October
2020, Johnson was given a sentence of life
in prison without parole and was transferred to a
supermax federal prison in Colorado known as the
Alcatraz of the Rockies. MARY DIVINE: Joe's sisters
attended every hearing. They never missed one. They had to take time off
work and make arrangements. But they would never, ever
miss one of the court hearings. They were right there. And every hearing was emotional. To bring it all up again
and then to still-- it took a long time before there
was finally justice served. So it was a very, very
difficult period for the family. I feel like Joe's been
pushed under the rug. Everybody's sorry
for what happened. Nobody wants to
take responsibility. And for us, we're still
fighting for justice for Joe. He was brutally beaten
beyond recognition. And for somebody
to finally admit that somebody
didn't do their job and it cost Joe
to lose his life-- DR. LINA HAJI: After Mr. Johnson
was convicted of murdering this innocent
correctional officer, he ended up being transferred
to a supermax prison. The reason that's interesting
is because supermax prisons really house the absolutely
most dangerous inmates in the country. And so it just points to
how Mr. Johnson was not somebody who was
just going to engage In crimes in the community. He displayed that he
was not only going to engage in crimes in prison. But odds are that even after
he was convicted of murdering the correction officer, he was
going to continue to engage in crimes, which required him to
be housed in a supermax prison. There was no other option. SHANE WARNKE: I heard
he was at Florence. And that's it. That turned the page
on that whole thing once he was sentenced
and he was out of here. --what I've read and
seen over the years, Florence is the epitome
of supermax prisons within the United States. GUY WICKLANDER: He'll be in
prison the rest of his life. And he'll always be a threat,
wherever he's at, to whoever has interaction
with him, whether it be the nurse, the minister,
the staff, visitors. He'll always be a threat. [dramatic music] [clinking] [dramatic music]
