Home where baby died ‘chaotic’ and rife with drugs, trial told

David Schindel was used to waking up to sounds of mayhem when he lived with Alison Kimberly Muise and Christopher Mattern at their Westdale townhouse.

“It’s something I heard frequently,” Schindel told a Winnipeg court Wednesday. “It was a household that was always chaotic.”

But on Feb. 2, 2022, after 20 minutes of listening to the sounds “screaming, yelling, wailing, and stamping back and forth,” Schindel emerged from the basement to a shocking sight unlike anything he had seen.

“In the living room I could see Chris crouched over (his three-month-old daughter),” Schindel said. “He was screaming, yelling, crying.”

The baby was “grey, purple… food was coming out of her nose,” he said. “I was stunned by what I saw.”

Neither Mattern, 40, nor Muise, 41, had called 911, so he did, Schindel testified.

The baby, whose name cannot be disclosed under terms of a publication ban, was rushed to hospital where she was pronounced dead.

Muise, the baby’s mother, and Mattern were both charged with failing to provide the necessaries of life.

Mattern pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced last month to 21 months of time served. Court heard at his sentencing that he and Muise struggled with drug addiction and that their daughter died with methamphetamine in her system.

Muise has pleaded not guilty to the charge and is standing trial.

Schindel said he, Muise and Mattern were all using meth daily when he lived at the home and that the home was a magnet for other drug users in the area.

“Everybody in the household would be using it, and various neighbours,” said Schindel, who is undergoing treatment. He testified he restricted his drug use for the most part to the basement, where he slept.

Schindel said the house was always in disarray: drug paraphernalia and weapons were scattered throughout, including a knife he found in the baby’s crib before she was brought home from the hospital.

“The whole house was a travesty, there was crap everywhere, all the time,” he said. “Every day was something new.”

Schindel said Muise was “more diligent” about not using drugs in the house for about a week after the baby was born, “but after a period of time again it became normal to be using in the house frequently.

“There was no dramatic lasting change,” he said.

Under cross examination, defence lawyer Tom Rees suggested Schindel planted drug paraphernalia around the house prior to the arrival of paramedics to divert attention from his own drug use.

“I’m going to suggest you were worried that you were going to get blamed,” Rees put to Schindel.

Schindel denied the allegation, testifying he used only one drug pipe, which he kept with him at all times.

The trial is set for three days.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca