A correction officer at a troubled Brooklyn lockup used his authority to sexually abuse an inmate inside the jail’s chaplain’s office, federal prosecutors said on Wednesday.
James Johnson, an officer at the Metropolitan Detention Center, was arrested on Wednesday morning by F.B.I. agents. He stands accused of sexual abuse of a prisoner and making false statements, according to an indictment unsealed in Federal District Court in Brooklyn.
Mr. Johnson, 36, “used his access to gratify his own sexual desires,” Joseph Nocella Jr., the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.
Mr. Johnson pleaded not guilty while appearing before a judge in Brooklyn federal court on Wednesday afternoon. He was released on a $100,000 bond. His lawyer, Richard Palma, declined to comment on the case after the hearing.
The charges represent the latest troubling development at New York’s federal jails. The Metropolitan Detention Center, one of America’s largest federal detention facilities, has been dogged by staffing shortages and other problems for years.
The arrest of Mr. Johnson comes as more than 30 inmates and guards at the jail have been charged with federal offenses related to smuggling and violence since 2024. A spokesman for the Bureau of Prisons said that Mr. Johnson was still employed as a “mentor coordinator” at the lockup’s Religious Services Department.
In May 2025, prosecutors said, Mr. Johnson instructed an unnamed male inmate to walk with him to the chaplain’s office at the jail. There, Mr. Johnson told the inmate to perform oral sex on him while the two hid behind a set of stacked chairs, prosecutors said.
Later that month, Mr. Johnson again ordered the inmate to follow him and perform oral sex on him, this time in a remote area of the jail. After the second encounter, prosecutors said, federal agents recovered Mr. Johnson’s DNA from semen on the inmate’s jumpsuit. In an interview with federal agents last October, Mr. Johnson denied having sexual relationships with inmates, prosecutors said.
The M.D.C., located in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn, is currently housing high-profile inmates such as Nicolás Maduro, the ousted president of Venezuela who was captured by U.S. forces in January, and Luigi Mangione, who is charged with murder in the 2024 fatal shooting of a health care executive.
Santul Nerkar is a Times reporter covering federal courts in Brooklyn.
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