Which court or investigation contains Katie Johnson's affidavit and docket number?
Executive summary
Katie Johnson’s civil filings — including the complaint and related sworn materials that have been circulated as affidavits — are part of a federal lawsuit captioned Katie Johnson v. Donald J. Trump, docket number 5:16‑cv‑00797, filed in the United States District Court for the Central District of California (C.D. Cal.) and available on public docket aggregators such as CourtListener and Law360 [1] [2] [3]. Separate reporting notes that related affidavits also appeared in a distinct New York civil action connected to the same allegations, where anonymous witness affidavits were attached to that complaint [4].
1. How the docket number and court are documented in public records
The principal, repeatedly cited identifier for the Johnson matter is 5:16‑cv‑00797, which several legal databases and aggregators list as Katie Johnson v. Donald J. Trump in the Central District of California; CourtListener shows the docket and case assignment information for that number [1], Law360 indexes the docket activity for case 5:16‑cv‑00797 in the California Central Court [2], and the Free Law Project’s FJC/IDB entry reiterates the citation linking Johnson to 5:16‑cv‑00797 in the C.D. [3].
2. What documents are on the docket and where an “affidavit” fits
Public artifacts tied to the 5:16‑cv‑00797 filing include the complaint and docketed documents identified as “Document 1” (the initial filing) and related pleadings; fact‑checking and archival repositories have preserved the complaint text and docket pages associated with Document 1 filed on April 26, 2016 [5] [6]. Those complaint files, and the archived docket index, are the primary source of sworn allegations in that federal action and are the document trail most commonly cited when journalists or researchers refer to Johnson’s sworn statements in litigation [7] [6].
3. The New York action and anonymous affidavits: a distinct but related record
Reporting in a published book and secondary reporting notes that a separate New York federal filing stemming from the same core allegations included affidavits by anonymized witnesses labeled “Tiffany Doe” and “Joan Doe,” which were presented as corroborating material in that New York complaint [4]. This means researchers seeking a particular signed affidavit referenced in press coverage should check both the C.D. Cal. docket (5:16‑cv‑00797) and any related New York filings, because corroborating anonymous affidavits have been reported as attached in the latter [4].
4. Where to retrieve the affidavit and supporting docket entries now
The immediate, citable location for the Johnson complaint and docket number is the Central District of California federal docket 5:16‑cv‑00797 as indexed by CourtListener and mirrored at archive.org [1] [7] [3]; commercial services such as Law360 also maintain dockets for that case number [2]. Copies of the complaint and docketed Document 1 have been preserved in public archives and fact‑check PDFs capturing the filed pages [5] [6], so those repositories are the practical starting points for anyone seeking the sworn allegations that journalists have elsewhere described as “affidavits.”
5. Limits and divergent narratives to be aware of
Public sources show a tangle of filings, mirrors, and secondary repositories (archive.org, CourtListener, commercial databases), and reporting sometimes conflates material from the California action with affidavits circulated in a separate New York filing; the primary, verifiable docket number for the federal case most directly associated with Katie Johnson’s complaint is 5:16‑cv‑00797 in the C.D. Cal., while the existence of anonymized witness affidavits is specifically attested in secondary reporting about a New York complaint [1] [3] [4]. If a researcher needs the exact signed affidavit page and signature block, the available sources here document complaints and docket listings but do not supply a definitive, standalone named affidavit image beyond what is referenced in the New York reporting and preserved complaint documents [6] [5] [4].