Testimony heard from woman in fifth Ewing case

The question of whether what allegedly happened between Jacob Ewing and a Holton woman in January of 2015 was “Fifty Shades of Grey or 50 shades of illegal” would be best answered by a jury, Jackson County District Court Judge Norbert Marek said during a preliminary hearing for Ewing on Wednesday.

During the hearing, centered on the fifth of six sexually-related criminal cases against Ewing, 21, Marek bound Ewing over for trial on the charges of aggravated kid­napping, rape and aggravated criminal sodomy. Marek also set an arraignment date of Nov. 10 for all six cases involving Ewing.

The charges against Ewing stemmed from an incident that re­portedly occurred sometime during January of 2015 with a woman, now 20, who said on Wednesday that what allegedly occurred be­tween her and Ewing was not an act of rape. She also said repeatedly during the hearing that she “didn’t want to be involved in this.”

But despite the woman’s insis­tence that what allegedly occurred between her and Ewing wasn’t rape because she went to Ewing’s house of her “own free will,” Jackson County Attorney Shawna Miller contended that the opposite was true.

“She said, ‘because I went over there, I was not raped,’” Miller said. “But if she goes over there and gets murdered, is that not mur­der?”

Defense attorney Kathleen Am­brosio of Topeka countered that since the woman was an adult, she was capable of competently telling people her side of the story.

“Focus on what was said today, and that was her saying she was not raped,” Ambrosio said. “She’s told law enforcement officers and nu­merous others that she wants no part of this.”

The woman was first called to talk with law enforcement officers in August as part of the investiga­tion of another incident involving Ewing, according to Mark Malick, a special agent with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

The incident in question, Malick said, was a January 2015 party at Ewing’s home attended by the woman and another woman who has accused Ewing of being sexu­ally aggressive with her. At that time, he said, “I didn’t consider her to be a victim,” even though she later said she “wasn’t going back” to Ewing’s house.

Malick and the woman had a follow-up interview in which she told him about the alleged incident between her and Ewing, in which she said she did not want to have sex with Ewing and was unsuc­cessful in fighting him off.

The incident, Malick and the woman said, reportedly involved Ewing dragging the woman by her hair and legs to his bed after she told him she only wanted to “hang out.” It also allegedly involved the use of a sex “toy” that the woman later said was “big” and “hurt really bad.”

The woman, who said she was “close to dating” Ewing, said she stopped going to his house to see him “one on one” but went to the house a few more times when par­ties were being held. She added that the two of them would talk “every now and then” at work or on social media.

When the KBI contacted her about an investigation against Ew­ing, she said she went because she was “intimidated” by the nature of the call. She also testified that in spite of what she would tell Malick about the alleged incident, she “didn’t want to be involved” in the investigation.

“You don’t like to be in the spotlight, do you?” Ambrosio asked the woman.

“Never,” she replied.

She also continued to tell Am­brosio under cross-examination that she “really wouldn’t consider” what allegedly happened between her and Ewing to be rape — a statement she said she made to other people “face to face” — be­cause “I went over there on my own free will.”

Marek sided with Miller in the end, saying that the State of Kansas had established “probable cause” in the case. However, he added, the matter was best left in the hands of a jury.

The sixth case against Ewing was also scheduled as part of Wednesday’s hearing, but Marek reset the preliminary hearing in that case to Thursday, Oct. 27 on a mo­tion filed by Ambrosio. Discovery in the sixth case had only been re­ceived by Ambrosio’s office the previous Monday, she said, and she was therefore unable to “adequately prepare for a preliminary hearing in a day and a half.”

The sixth case involved a girl who was reportedly 13 years old at the time of her alleged incident with Ewing, although it has been suggested by those close to Ewing that the girl told Ewing that she was 16 at the time of the alleged incident. He is charged with aggra­vated criminal sodomy and aggra­vated indecent liber­ties with a child in that case.

Ewing will face arraignment in all six cases at the Nov. 10 hearing, Marek said. Arraignment on the first four cases had originally been set for this coming Wednesday, it was reported.

Marek also modified Ewing’s bond to allow him to have contact with his mother, grandmother and other “lady relatives” while he is being held at the Jackson County Detention Center. Previously, he was barred from contact with any woman during his incarceration.

Ambrosio said that Ewing’s current girlfriend is also seeking contact with him while he is in jail. Marek cautioned against allowing the girlfriend to see him, saying that he “may get upset,” but agreed to allow supervised visits as long as the jail’s policy on visitation is en­forced.

Defendants in all criminal cases are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law.