LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A Louisville Metro Police detective pleaded guilty to a perjury charge for knowingly giving false testimony after arresting a woman he claimed stole from the McDonald's where she was employed in 2018.
Former Detective John Green was sentenced earlier this month to one year incarceration, which will be probated for five years as long as he follows several conditions, including staying out of trouble and not owning a firearm.
A second perjury charge in that case was dismissed.
If he follows these conditions, his guilty plea can be set aside and eventually expunged, or erased, from his record.
Green entered an Alford plea, meaning he maintains his innocence but acknowledges prosecutors have enough evidence for a jury to convict.
Attorney Steve Schroering, who represented Green, declined to comment Tuesday.
Green was actually charged in two separate cases with perjury, but both were rolled together for the March 8 sentencing hearing.
Initially, a Jefferson County grand jury in 2021 indicted Green for charging Shayla Simpson with theft in 2018 and then falsely testifying there was surveillance video showing she stole from her employer, McDonald's, even though the video clearly showed it was another employee.
"Once the case had been indicted and the surveillance video reviewed by the defense, it was obvious that a different employee had committed the theft," Commonwealth’s Attorney Tom Wine said when announcing Green was being charged.
"While Green believed he had charged the correct person, it is alleged that Green charged the employee without actually having watched the store surveillance video as he had testified and had he actually watched the video he would have known that he had charged the wrong person."
Prosecutors said Green gave false testimony during an October 2018 probable cause hearing in Jefferson District Court and during a November 2018 presentation to a grand jury. The detective "stated that he had watched hours of store surveillance video which showed that the person charged was responsible for the theft," according to court records.
In January 2022, Simpson, who lost her job, was paid $150,000 by the city to settle a federal wrongful arrest lawsuit.
In addition, Green was indicted in another perjury case in December 2021 after prosecutors say he misrepresented statements of a victim that ultimately led to two women wrongfully being charged with assault.
The two women, Jorian Stigall and Christian Murphy, were charged with assault after Green wrote and testified that the pair jumped another woman and "stomped" on her until her leg broke in March 2017 at an apartment complex off Breckinridge Lane. However, according to prosecutors, the victim in the case actually told Green that she had no idea how her leg was broken.
Green was accused of repeating the lie during a probable cause hearing and during testimony to a grand jury. The grand jury chose not to indict Stigall or Murphy.
Those charges against Green were dismissed and combined with the other perjury case.
A federal lawsuit filed by Stigall and Murphy is still pending.
Green retired from LMPD in 2021.
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