First responders testify girl, 5, was thin, lifeless

Five-year-old Mackenzie Maison, wrapped loosely in a blanket, was limp and had no pulse when she was carried from her Oak Street home to waiting paramedics May 26.

“She was extremely pale,” Port Huron Firefighter Steven Conard testified Wednesday in Circuit Judge Daniel Kelly’s courtroom.

Conard was the first of seven witnesses to take the stand on the first day of the trial for Andrew and Hilery Maison, the Port Huron couple charged in Mackenzie’s death.

The Maisons are charged with first-degree child abuse, torture and felony murder in the death of 5-year-old Mackenzie. They also face first-degree child abuse and torture charges in the alleged abuse of her younger sister, Makayla Maison.

Andrew and Hilery Maison are the girls’ father and stepmother.

Senior Assistant Prosecutor Mona Armstrong told jurors Mackenzie weighed 25 pounds at the time of her death, and 3-year-old Makayla weighed 17 pounds when she was taken to the hospital the same day.

“This is a case about suffering, unimaginable suffering, that two young girls endured at the hands of the defendants,” Armstrong said.

Armstrong said Mackenzie weighed as much on the day of her death as she did when she was about two years old. She said Makayla now weighs 32 to 34 pounds.

“In the time frame since this incident in May, she has nearly doubled her weight,” Armstrong said. “Mackenzie didn’t have that chance.”

Frederick Lepley, Andrew Maison’s lawyer, urged jurors to base their verdict on facts and not emotion. Lepley described Andrew Maison as a hard-working father who loved his children.

“He’d never do anything to intentionally harm them and, certainly, he didn’t murder his daughter Mackenzie,” Lepley said.

Michael Boucher, Hilery Maison’s lawyer, said Mackenzie and Makayla’s health problems and aversion to food predated their time with their stepmother.

“Even with the biological mother, there were complaints about health problems,” Boucher said.

First responders testified Wednesday that Mackenzie Maison appeared “lifeless” when they arrived at the Maisons’ Oak Street home shortly after 8:30 p.m.

Conard said Andrew Maison appeared to be doing chest compressions on Mackenzie on the kitchen floor of the home. Firefighters quickly removed Mackenzie from the home and brought her to the ambulance.

Conard said Andrew Maison told him he’d given Mackenzie a bath and was administering liquid vitamins to her when her eyes rolled up.

Paramedics worked on Mackenzie in the ambulance, intubating the girl and giving her epinephrine and saline. She was declared dead at St. Joseph Mercy Port Huron hospital, now called Lake Huron Medical Center.

Port Huron Police Officer Andrew Teichow said, at the hospital, he noted bruising on Mackenzie’s body.

“She was extremely thin,” Teichow said. “Her bones were coming out of her skin is what it looked like.”

Port Huron Police Officer James Morgan said after Mackenzie was taken from the home, officers spoke with Hilery and Andrew Maison inside.

Morgan said he saw three children, two of whom were Hilery Maison’s biological children, sitting on a couch. He said Makayla was in a corner of the couch, partially covered by a blanket.

He said Makayla pointed toward an empty glass next to her and asked Morgan for milk.

“She seemed to have very low energy and spoke very quietly,” Morgan testified. “… She appeared to be emaciated.”

Testimony will resume at 9:30 a.m. Thursday.

Armstrong said a motion filed last week for a delay of the trial was denied prior to jury selection Wednesday morning.

Contact Beth LeBlanc at (810) 989-6259, eleblanc@gannett.com, or on Twitter @THBethLeBlanc.