Posted on June 29, 2006

‘Top Gun’ Rapist Gets 50

Barbara Ross and Bill Hutchinson, New York Daily News, June 28, 2006

In a bizarre plea for mercy, an attorney for the thug who raped “Top Gun” actress Kelly McGillis more than two decades ago revealed yesterday that taxpayers paid for the sex fiend’s Viagra last year.

Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Rennee White rejected the bid for leniency, sentencing Leroy Johnson to 50 years in prison for raping two Greenwich Village roommates in 1996.

The unusual legal strategy came as defense attorney Bryan Konoski stressed Johnson’s mental deficiencies, pointing out that the married defendant was prescribed five different psychotropic drugs last year, plus Viagra.

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Advances in DNA technology helped cops link the sex attacks to Johnson, who was first convicted of rape at the age of 13.

At 15, he and an accomplice forced their way into McGillis’ Central Park West apartment and raped the then Juilliard student and her roommate in 1982.

Johnson, who is black, maintained his innocence, saying his trial was akin to a lynching.

“I’m accused of raping two white women, with a white judge and 10 white people on the jury,” Johnson told Justice White. “You’d actually hang me if you could do that.”