photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Jordey McTaggart appears at his sex-crimes trial on Monday, July 13, 2026, in Douglas County District Court.

A Douglas County jury has been selected to hear the case of a Lawrence man accused of sexually abusing two young girls during sleepovers at his home several years ago.

On Monday, a jury of seven men and seven women, including two alternates, heard an opening argument from prosecutor David Melton that characterized defendant Jordey M. McTaggart as a man who lusted after his children’s playmates and sexually preyed on two of them as they spent the night at his mobile home in southern Lawrence between 2018 and 2021.

Jurors also heard an opening argument from the defense team claiming that no such sexual touching had ever occurred and that the two girls who claimed otherwise had provided unreliable, inaccurate and inconsistent statements that had “changed significantly over time,” in the words of defense counsel Allyson Monson.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Public defense attorney Allyson Monson is pictured in Douglas County District Court with her client Jordey McTaggart at a motions hearing.

The two girls, who were between 7 and 10 at the time and who are now teens, are expected to testify Tuesday. Both girls also testified at McTaggart’s preliminary hearing in January, as the Journal-World reported.

McTaggart pleaded not guilty in March and was ordered to stand trial by Judge Sally Pokorny, who has since retired. Senior Judge Nancy Parrish is now presiding in the case.

Jurors were told by both the state and the defense that the evidence would consist largely of testimony. DNA, fingerprints and the like will not make an appearance since the case did not come to light until seven years after the first alleged crime occurred. Police learned of the allegations last year after one of the girls mentioned them to her therapist, a mandated reporter of child abuse.

According to Melton, that girl was 7 when she spent the night with McTaggart’s kids — a summer night that should have been “magical” for a kid, he said, but that turned into “terrible things.”

On that night the girl was sleeping in a room that had a triple bunkbed — occupied by other kids — and she was lying on the floor in the dark playing games on her cellphone. When she saw McTaggart enter the room, she pretended to be asleep, Melton said, fearing that she might get in trouble for being on her phone. McTaggart then lay down behind the girl and proceeded to touch her sexually underneath her clothing, Melton said.

The girl didn’t report the abuse, he said, because she knew she’d lose her friends if she did. At the next sleepover, though, she took the precaution of sleeping on the top bunk to avoid McTaggart — a strategy that failed, Melton said, as McTaggart entered the room, climbed the bunk ladder and again abused her.

When that girl was contacted by police after the therapist’s disclosure, police asked her if she knew of any other kids who might have been victimized by McTaggart. The girl, who had since moved away from Lawrence, told police that he might have also targeted one other girl who, along with her, seemed to especially attract McTaggart’s attention.

Melton told the jury that the two alleged victims were not random choices but shared certain physical features that McTaggart found appealing: their hair color and their slight build.

The other girl had also moved, but when contacted by Lawrence police she said that she had been abused by McTaggart too, though she couldn’t pinpoint which summer it was. Melton said the girl reported that she had been asleep when McTaggart picked her up from a bunk, placed her on the floor and raped her.

The two girls never discussed the incidents with each other, Melton told the jury, and two siblings of the second girl both will state that McTaggart was “creepy” and enjoyed tickling girls in inappropriate ways.

Defense attorney Monson immediately attacked the state’s case as implausible, saying that the evidence would show that the girls’ statements had changed greatly over time, that the bedroom in the mobile home was very small and full of four to six kids, that the allegations were only made years later and that no physical evidence existed to back them up.

“He didn’t touch them sexually,” Monson insisted, urging the jurors to critically evaluate the girls’ testimony.

“Ask yourself: If the statement changes, can it be reliable?” she said.

The trial is set to resume at 9 a.m. Tuesday.

McTaggart, who is free on a $25,000 cash or surety bond with GPS monitoring, is charged with two counts of aggravated indecent liberties with a child whose birth year is listed as 2010 and one count of raping a child whose birth year is listed as 2011. The alleged crimes are punishable by life in prison if he is found guilty.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Jordey M. McTaggart is pictured Feb. 13, 2026, in Douglas County District Court with his defense attorneys Allyson Monson, left, and Jessica Glendening.