Adam Johnson trial: Images of teen in bikini and Johnson’s ‘groin area’ found on footballer’s phone

Harry Readhead

Johnson has already pleaded guilty to two charges (Picture: Ross Parry)

A forensic expert has told Bradford Crown Court that he found a picture of the teenager in a white bikini as well as a photo of Adam Johnson’s ‘groin area’ on the footballer’s phone.
Johnson, of Castle Eden, Co Durham, admitted to one charge of sexual activity with a child and one charge of grooming last Friday, but denies two further counts of sexual activity with a child, counts prosecutors say are ‘more serious’.

Today, on the sixth day of the former Premier League player’s trial, forensic expert Dr Paul Hunton has told the court that he found images on Johnson’s phone including a picture of the teenager in a white bikini.
The picture was dated 16 February, 2015.
He also recovered messages including one from the night of 17 January, when the teenage met Johnson for the first time, which read ‘OMG Bae here’.

Johnson has already pleaded guilty to two charges (Picture: PA Wire)

The jury of eight women and four men was presented with a photograph of the former Sunderland winger’s ‘groin area’ which was also downloaded from his mobile phone.
Dr Hunton said data was wiped from the teenager’s phone between February and April and deleted data cannot be recovered from Blackberry handsets.
Yesterday, the second school friend to give evidence at Bradford Crown Court said she doubted the girl’s account until she was shown ’20 times’ messages on her phone from the 28-year-old father-of-one.
She called Johnson ‘a bit of a paedophile’.
‘At first I thought it’s definitely not Adam Johnson because he is however old he is,’ she said.

Johnson was described as ‘a bit of a paedophile’ by the friend (Picture: Getty Images)

‘He must have known she wasn’t 16, he asked when she was 16 and said “ages away then.”‘
She said the girl told her while they were in the school dinner hall about her second meeting with Johnson in his car and alleged sexual activity, which Johnson denies.
‘She told me she sucked him off, which is oral sex I believe, and he fingered her three times. It was over in half an hour, I think she said.’
The friend said that the girl was ‘worried to tell her mam’ and thought she ‘wasn’t going to be believed’ if she came forward about Johnson.

Johnson was described as the teenager’s ‘idol’ (Picture: File)

She also ‘didn’t want to get him in any more trouble than she was going to have to,’ she added.

The court heard last week how the 15-year-old girl at the centre of case initiated contact with Johnson on Facebook, and the pair later agreed to meet so he could sign her Sunderland football shirt.

They met some time later in his Range Rover after he told her: ‘You owe me for this’ and ‘Am I going to get a thank you kiss?’. It was revealed that the teenager, who is now 16,felt ‘compelled’ to perform oral sex on the man she described as her ‘idol’.
Yesterday, she told the court that she decided she would no longer protect the former Premier League winger when he made her out to be a liar.
She said, via video link and with tears in her eyes, that Johnson ‘did nothing to protect me.’ She said that she ‘wanted to kill herself’ as rumours circulated online and she told her father about the footballer.