Opening arguments began Tuesday morning in the case of a Stockton Springs mother accused of killing her 3-year-old son last year.
The prosecutor said that Jessica Trefethen, 36, was solely responsible for the death of 3-year-old Maddox Williams last year while her attorney said police and the Maine Department of Health and Human Services should have considered other suspects.
Trefethen was charged in June 2021 with the depraved indifference murder of Maddox, after an autopsy showed he had suffered a fractured spine; bruises on his arms, legs, belly and head; bleeding in his brain; a ruptured bowel; and other injuries, according to a police affidavit.
The mother of six, including Maddox, has pleaded not guilty to the charge.
The Maine medical examiner’s office determined the cause of death to be multiple blunt force trauma that was inflicted non-accidentally, also known as battered child syndrome.
Assistant Attorney General John Risler told the jury of 10 men and six women, including four alternates, that Trefethen inflicted the many injuries the boy endured. He had bruises all over his arms and legs and cuts on his face covered by stick-on tattoos.
Although Trefethen brought the boy to the hospital on June 20, 2021, telling staff he had been knocked down by a dog leash and kicked by his older sister, she stayed with him just 10 minutes before she left with her mother, Sherry Johnson. Trefethen stopped using her phone and debit card and went into hiding.
“She was at her mother’s home hidden from those investigating her son’s death,” Risler said in his opening statement.
The injuries he suffered weren’t consistent with being dragged by a dog, kicked by a sibling or falling off a trampoline as Trefethen claimed, Risler said. The prosecutor also said that Maddox’s blood was found on washcloths, towels and chairs in the home and on his clothes at the hospital.
“The evidence in this case will point to one person and one person alone, Jessica Trefethen,” the prosecutor said.
Defense attorney Caitlyn Smith of Bangor told jurors that the evidence, especially the photos of his injuries, would be difficult to see.
“There is no greater tragedy than the death of a child,” she said. “While this will be difficult for you to see, it will be most difficult for Jessica to see and hear this evidence.”
Smith said that Trefethen rushed her son into the emergency room and begged staff to continue efforts to revive him. The defense attorney admitted that the mother did not make herself available to the police for three days.
“She was devastated,” the defense attorney told the jury. “She needed time to grieve her child but she didn’t get that time because police and the Department of Health and Human Services decided that Jessica murdered her son and looked at no one else.”
Smith said that the prosecution could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trefethen is guilty of murder.
Maddox was one of four children allegedly killed by a parent last year, prompting a fresh round of scrutiny for the state’s child welfare system and an outside investigation into the deaths. Trefethen is the first of those parents to go on trial. Hillary Goding of Old Town pleaded guilty last week to manslaughter in the 2021 death of her 3-year-old daughter Hailey.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in Augusta have been attempting to gain access to Department of Health and Human Services records on Maddox, Hailey and the two other children to evaluate the child welfare system’s involvement with their families. A legislative committee last month voted to subpoena DHHS for the records.
The killing of Maddox happened in the same town as the 2018 beating death of another child, 10-year-old Marissa Kennedy, who was killed by her stepfather, 56-year-old Julio Carrillo, and mother, 37-year-old Sharon Kennedy. That case also sparked intensive scrutiny of Maine’s child welfare system, which received 25 reports concerning Marissa and her family in the 16 months leading up to her death, but didn’t confirm her stepfather and mother were abusing her until she was dead.
Kennedy was convicted by a jury of murder and sentenced to 48 years in prison. Carrillo pleaded guilty to a murder charge and was sentenced to 55 years in prison.
Superior Court Justice Robert Murray, who handled Carrillo’s and Kennedy’s cases, is presiding at Trefethen’s trial.
If convicted of murder, Trefethen faces 25 years to life in prison. She also could be ordered to pay restitution for her son’s funeral expenses.
