Angela Patty said she had a feeling of foreboding when she went to bed the night of Sept. 2, 2019, Labor Day, so much that it gave her nightmares. She arose at 4 a.m. to try to find out why.

Angela and her husband, John Matt “Gator” Patty, had hosted the six-member John Sisk family that holiday weekend in their Gulf Breeze, Fla., home. The days were marked with cooking out, dining out, crabbing, splashing in the gulf, frolicking in the sand and concluding with the frantically search for Gator’s missing Smith & Wesson 9mm.

They were to learn later in the morning of Sept. 3, that five members of their guest family, John and Mary Sisk, and their children, Grayson, 6; Aurora “Rory,” 4, and 6-month-old Colson, had been shot to death in their beds the night before as they lay sleeping in their Elkmont home. Only one was left alive: Mason Wayne Sisk, 14.

Beginning Monday, April 17, Mason went on retrial for capital murder in the killing of his entire family. The first trial ended in September 2022 when newly accessed messages from Mary Sisk’s cellphone were finally available just before the case was set to go to the jury, Circuit Judge Chad Wise declared a mistrial.

This time, a jury of 10 men and four women — two of their number designated as alternates — heard testimony from both Angela and Gator Patty as they described the days leading up to the shootings.

Good and bad weekendGator said John seemed distracted and troubled the entire weekend.

“We went crab hunting Sunday night and he just seemed to be staring out into no-man’s land,” said Gator. “Something was obviously on his mind. He must have stood there like that for 20 or 30 minutes.”

He said John confided to him that he didn’t believe that the infant Colson was his natural child. Gator acknowledged that the Sisk couple had allegedly been “stepping out.”

“I told him the baby looked just like him,” said Gator. “He also said the baby looked like his brother (Lance Sisk.) He didn’t come right out and say it was Lance.”

Also on Sisk’s mind was missing drugs that Mary, a special education teacher, had found in their Ridge Road, Elkmont, home and destroyed for fear that discovery of the drugs could jeopardize her teaching job. John might have still owed his unnamed supplier for the missing drugs.

Out of the jury’s hearing, Gator said that John said he had to “take care of some things” when he returned home.

Point of lawUnder questioning by defense attorneys Shay Golden and Michael Sizemore, John’s testimony was repeatedly interrupted by Assistant District Attorney Kristen Clemmons’ objections that much of the testimony was based on hearsay evidence. After a conference at the bench between state and defense attorneys where Golden and Sizemore complained of the frequent interruptions, saying the testimony was relevant to the “third man” motion granted to the defense. Wise granted the defense more leeway in their questioning.

Missing gunGator testified that on the morning of Sept. 2, Sisk family members packed up their van for the 6- to 7-hour drive back to North Alabama, while John, a part-time hairdresser, applied bleach to Angela Patty’s hair. Meanwhile, Gator went into the master bedroom and discovered his gun was not in its usual holster on the nightstand.

“My wife and I searched the house while they unpacked the van and dumped the suitcases in the middle of the living room floor,” said Gator. He said Mason, whom he’d always found respectful and trustworthy, helped bring the luggage back in.

Angela testified that while Mason was helping carry the bags back in, she witnessed him down a hall carrying a backpack, which he then carried with him into a bathroom.

“I told Mary what I saw and she looked like she was kind of panicking and she went into the bathroom after Mason came out and she searched everywhere, the cabinets, even behind the toilet, and she didn’t find anything,” said Angela.

Angela said the Sisk family departed between 1 and 1:30 p.m. for the long drive home.

“We received one text from them that they were stopping to eat and feed the baby.”

John had told Gator that he would again search for the missing gun when they arrived home in Elkmont.

“He said if he found it, he would personally drive the gun back to me,” said Gator.

The Patty couple did receive a call from John when the family arrived home, but nothing was said of the gun. John just said that the family was tired from the long drive and they were going to shower and go right to bed.

Troubling dreams

When Angela finally left her bed after a restless night, she tried to call both Mary’s and John’s cellphones.

“They just went to voicemail,” she said. Next, she visited Facebook and learned that five members of an Elkmont family had been found shot to death in the Ridge Road, Elkmont, home. Her feelings of foreboding increased. She and her husband had met the Sisk family seven years before through their membership in a motorcycle club. She said they had visited the home numerous times for cookouts.

Next, she called the Limestone County Sheriff’s office and reported that her husband’s gun had been stolen. When a deputy returned her call he asked her to describe the gun and she turned the phone over to her husband to describe the Smith & Wesson 9mm. It was confirmed that the Sisk family were the victims of the shooting.

“He asked me if we were coming up for the funeral and I said we were and he said to bring the box the gun came in and everything we had about the gun,” said Angela. “We did everything they asked.”

Bodycam video

Jurors also viewed the responding deputy’s body cam video as he made the first walk through the house. Deputies converged on the scene after Mason made a 911 call and reported that someone had shot his entire family and fled the scene in what looked like a Chevrolet pickup truck.

Mason said he had been playing video games in the basement when he heard five shots and heard someone running, the door slamming and the truck fleeing. He said he found all of them shot.

Testimony was to resume Wednesday, April 19, at 8:45 a.m.