A Labor Day 2019 weekend began with beach time, grilling out, and crab hunting but ended with the bloody massacre of five Elkmont family members. Tuesday was opening testimony in the capital murder trial of 17-year-old Mason Wayne Sisk who is charged with using a stolen 9mm handgun to shoot his parents and siblings each in the head as they slept.

Sisk, who was just 14 at the time of the crime, was indicted in January 2021 by a Limestone County grand jury on four counts of capital murder in the death of his father, John Sisk; stepmother, Mary Sisk; Grayson “Kane” Sisk, 6; Aurora “Rorrie” Sisk, 5; and Colson Sisk, 6 months.

In opening remarks, Assistant District Attorney Bill Lisenby Jr. described the scene in the Sisk home as “horrific.” A body cam recording played for jurors contained minutes of the frantic search by Limestone County sheriff’s deputies for bodies.

The infant Colson’s body was discovered with two gunshot wounds to the head nestled between the bodies of his parents. Both John Sisk and 6-year-old Kane Sisk were still breathing and transported to the hospital, where they later died.

Meanwhile, Mason Sisk was being detained in a deputy’s car, but not arrested or read his Miranda rights, according to statements of defense counsel.

While the gruesome scenes from the body cam footage flickered in the courtroom monitor, Mason Sisk sat mostly stoic, but on occasion rubbed his eyes.

Jurors heard remarks on the body cam of seasoned law officers expressing profane reactions of horror as their flashlight beams illuminated the bodies of yet one more victim. Sobbing could be heard from spectators in the courtroom. At the beginning of Tuesday’s session, Circuit Court Judge Chadwick Wise cautioned that accounts of the murders of three children would be presented and if someone felt he or she could not react inaudibly, they should leave.

Mason Sisk said in his 911 call to report the slayings that he was in his basement bedroom playing video games when he heard what he thought were five gunshots. When he climbed the stairs to investigate, he found the bodies of his parents and siblings and heard someone fleeing out the front door. He said he heard a vehicle that sounded like a Chevrolet and saw taillights quickly leaving the driveway.

Defense attorneys Michael Sizemore and Tray Golden worked to weave elements of doubt in the state’s case against Sisk through testimony of a Sisk family friend. John Matt “Gator” Patty said that the elder Sisk possessed a large amount of drugs in his home and owed his alleged dealers a significant amount of money.

In further testimony, Patty and his wife, Angela Patty, said that the Sisk couple were at odds over alleged infidelity on the parts of both John Sisk and Mary Sisk. John Sisk had expressed his suspicions to Patty that the couple’s youngest child, Colson, was not his child, but rather that of his brother, Lance Sisk.

Assistant District Attorney Bill Lisenby called an Elkmont High School special education assistant to the stand to describe what the state tried to show was a foreshadowing of the tragic events of Sept. 3, 2019.

Lisa Watkins said she was taking her five special education students for a daily physical education class in the Elkmont gym when she saw a lone teen seated in the bleachers.

“I had a gut instinct to stop and talk to him,” said Watkins.

Watkins said she could see by his “body language” that he needed someone to talk to. In the course of their conversation, she learned that his name was Mason Sisk. She said she recognized him then because she was friends with his stepmother, Mary Sisk, when she taught at Elkmont when Mason was a small child.

“I told him I was glad to see him back,” said Watkins. “He said it was ‘not going to matter because he wasn’t going to be there next week.’”

Watkins, who had had contact with Mason’s father, John Sisk, several years prior, said she became worried about Mason because she knew John Sisk to be a verbally abusive person.

Watkins described a baby shower for Mary Sisk when she was pregnant with Grayson “Kane” Sisk. She said John was present at the shower and he “made inappropriate remarks” to his wife.

• “I told him those remarks were inappropriate to Mary who was carrying their first baby together.” As the conversation escalated, Watkins said she called John an ae. “After my interaction with Mason in the gym, I was concerned with his safety,” said Watkins.

The Sisk family had spent that Labor Day weekend as guests of the Pattys in their Gulf Breeze, Fla., home near Pensacola. They’d known the Sisks’ since 2014 when both couples had been members of a family-friendly motorcycle club. Both testified that their guests seemed tense and uncomfortable, with them as hosts and each other.

However, the Patty couple said that on that Labor Day weekend when the Sisk family visited, Mason appeared to be happy and played in the sand on the beach with Angela’s grandchildren and that he and his father seemed to be getting along fine.

When the Sisk family were packing their vehicle to leave, Gator Patty discovered that his black Smith & Wesson 9mm handgun was missing from its holster on his nightstand. He said he didn’t accuse or suspect anyone of taking the gun, but he and his wife Angela searched their home to no avail. He said John Sisk insisted that all of his family’s packed bags be brought in from his vehicle and the contents dumped in the middle of the floor.

Meanwhile, Mason Sisk entered the house with a book bag slung over his shoulder and went into a bathroom alone. He came out a short time later and his book bag was searched. None of this searching turned up the missing gun.

When Angela Patty learned of the killings in the early morning hours, she immediately informed Limestone County sheriff’s investigators of her suspicion that her husband’s stolen gun was used in the killings.

“I wish we would have patted everyone down before they left and called the police right then” said Angela Patty.

Testimony was to continue Wednesday at 9 a.m. in Judge Wise’s Limestone County second floor courtroom.