photo by: Chris Conde/Journal-World

Chastleton Jordan Malone during a trial where he is charged in Douglas County District Court with three counts of rape on Jan. 10, 2023.

A man accused of raping two women in 2020 after a New Year’s Eve party told a detective that everything he did was consensual and he was being falsely accused, jurors heard Tuesday in Douglas County District Court.

Jurors also heard the detective’s interview with one of the women, who said she had been drinking all night and couldn’t remember what had happened after the party.

The trial for Chastleton Jordan Malone, 24, of Lawrence, began Monday in Douglas County District Court. Malone, a former KU student who graduated in 2021, is charged with three felony counts of rape of a person who was unable to give consent due to alcohol or drugs, according to charging documents.

Malone’s charges stem from an incident on Jan. 1, 2020, just after a New Year’s Eve party. He was arrested on Oct. 14, 2020, and was released a few days later on a $50,000 surety bond.

photo by: Mugshot from the Shawnee County Sheriff’s Office

Chastleton Jordan Malone pictured in 2019 with the Douglas County Judicial and Law Enforcement Center in the background.

On Tuesday, jurors heard two recorded interviews conducted by Detective Lance Flachsbarth, who’s worked with the Lawrence Police Department and the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office — one with Malone on Jan. 3, 2020; and the other on Jan. 2, 2020, with one of the women whom Malone is accused of raping.

The latter interview took place in Flachsbarth’s patrol vehicle, just after the woman had gotten a sexual assault exam at LMH Health. In the audio recording, she tells Flachsbarth what she remembers from the party that night.

The woman said she and her friend — the other woman whom Malone is accused of raping — came to the party at the Nest, 3345 Magnolia Circle, just before midnight after attending another party earlier in the evening. She said she was drinking at both parties and had been to a restaurant and a bar beforehand. Over the course of the evening, she said she’d had a margarita, a beer, four hard lemonades and shots of cinnamon schnapps, as well as a glass of a mixed drink she referred to as “jungle juice.”

When she arrived at the Nest, she said the party was full of people she didn’t know — including Malone, who she said introduced himself less than 10 minutes after she got there. She said she and her friend kissed each other at midnight and that Malone filmed them and asked to post it on Snapchat, which she allowed. She also said she kissed Malone a few times as well after he asked her to, and that Malone followed her around “like a little puppy” for the rest of the night.

The woman told Flachsbarth that she didn’t remember what happened later that night. She said she woke up at around 10 a.m. without any pants on.

At that point, “I didn’t think anything had happened,” she told Flachsbarth. “I put some shorts on and went back to bed.”

That afternoon, the woman said she noticed a bruise near her bikini line, which prompted her to call her sister, who is a nurse. She said that her sister advised her to get a sexual assault exam, but that she waited a day to do it because she didn’t feel “physically or emotionally prepared.”

She also said she spoke about Malone with her roommates and the other woman she’d been at the parties with. She said they remembered Malone coming to the house when they were dropped off, but that they didn’t remember him going inside the house or leaving the next morning.

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When Flachsbarth interviewed Malone the next day, Malone said the allegations against him were “completely ridiculous.”

In the video recording of his interview with Flachsbarth, Malone said he had called police after he heard about the women’s allegations because he wanted to “dispel these lies.” He said he’d heard that the women were saying he sneaked into the house without their permission, raped them and then left.

“Girls can’t do this,” he told Flachsbarth.

Throughout the interview, Malone didn’t deny that he had sex with the women, but he maintained that everything was consensual. He said that before he had sex with each of them, he asked them for permission and whether they were on birth control.

When the three of them were at the party, Malone said, he didn’t think the women were drunk because they weren’t stumbling or slurring their speech. He said that when his ride was getting ready to leave, he asked the women if he could go home with them instead of with his ride, and they agreed.

Malone said the three of them went to another party after that, and he said the woman he’d kissed earlier that night hugged him several times while he was playing beer pong. Eventually, he said, they all got a ride back to that woman’s house, where both women changed into pajamas and they all got in bed together.

Then, Malone said he had sex with the woman he’d kissed earlier that night, and she later fell asleep. After that, he said he noticed the other woman making eye contact with him and he began rubbing her shoulder. He said he then asked her to have sex, she accepted, and they had sex twice.

Malone told Flachsbarth that he left the house at around 9:30 a.m., and that both women were awake and he told them goodbye. He said he sent the woman he kissed at the party a Snapchat message that said “I had a great time, Happy New Year,” and that she responded with “Happy New Year.”

Flachsbarth also asked Malone why he thought the women were accusing him of rape. He first said it could be that they thought he was “ugly,” and he mentioned a small deformity on his lip. But he also speculated that the first woman he slept with might have accused him because she was unhappy that he’d had sex with her friend as well. He asked Flachsbarth whether he could file a report accusing the women of making false allegations, and Flachsbarth said it wouldn’t be possible until the investigation was over.

District Attorney Suzanne Valdez and Deputy District Attorney Joshua Seiden are prosecuting the case, and Malone is being represented by defense attorney Michael Duma. The trial is expected to last through Friday.