BATH — A man accused of killing his ex-girlfriend’s toddler in Edgecomb three years ago is on trial for a second time in a new county.
Tyler Witham-Jordan, 31, is charged with depraved indifference murder in connection with the death of 3-year-old Makinzlee Handrahan in late 2022.
The girl’s mother found her dead in her bed that Christmas morning, according to prosecutors, who have alleged Witham-Jordan beat the girl with a hairbrush, dragged her into the bedroom and left her in the bottom bunk, where his 9-year-old daughter slept on the top bunk.
Witham-Jordan pleaded not guilty and his attorneys have pointed to the girl’s mother, Faith Lewis, as a possible suspect. Prosecutors have said they consider Lewis to be a victim and that her DNA was not found on crime scene items, including the hairbrush.
Witham-Jordan’s first trial in Wiscasset ended in a mistrial after Lewis broke down while testifying after being shown photographs of her daughter’s body. Attorneys told the jury on Tuesday that Lewis will testify later in the trial, which is scheduled to take more than a week.
During opening statements in Sagadahoc County Superior Court on Tuesday, a prosecutor said the jury will also hear from several emergency responders and investigators who were in the apartment on Christmas morning in 2022, and observed Makinzlee Handrahan’s small body “beaten from head to toe.”
“Her injuries were screaming what her silenced voice could not — that she had been murdered,” Assistant Attorney General Lisa Bogue told the jury. “All 27 pounds killed quietly, killed discreetly.”
Bogue showed the jurors, mostly men, a smiling picture of Makinzlee in a pink shirt and crown. She told them they would be seeing photographs of the girl’s injuries later in the trial.
Bogue also said the prosecution would show texts between Lewis and Witham-Jordan. She argued they will show Witham-Jordan had been irritable leading up to Makinzlee’s death after buying drugs from someone, only to discover later that day that they were fake.
Defense attorney James Howaniec said the state had no direct evidence tying Witham-Jordan to the girl’s death.
“There are no witnesses who saw him perpetrate this crime,” Howaniec said. “He had no motive whatsoever to perpetrate this crime. No one saw or heard him, at all that night, acting irrationally.”
Howaniec said that included Witham-Jordan’s 9-year-old daughter, who was sleeping in the bunk above Makinzlee on Christmas Eve.
Howaniec told the jury Lewis was unreliable and he raised doubts about her story to police that she had spent Christmas Eve sick in bed without checking on her daughter, even though, he said, a baby monitor warned that the temperature had dropped in Makinzlee’s room.
Police reported the next day that the girls’ bedroom was “freezing cold,” with the window left open and a box fan running at its highest setting.
Makinzlee’s death was one of several that led to criticism of the state agency charged with responding to alleged child abuse. Her home had been investigated for abuse and neglect by the state Department of Health and Human Services in the fall of 2022, after daycare workers reported seeing several concerning scratches and bruises on Makinzlee.
