Court TV live carried the sentencing Thursday as Maurice Houle was ordered to serve 31-60 years in prison for his role in the 2018 murder of 3-year-old Matthew Maison. The ruling closes one chapter of a case that began with a child’s death and moved forward only after years of delay.
Houle pleaded guilty last month to second-degree murder and three counts of assaulting, resisting, or obstructing a police officer. A felony murder charge was dismissed under the plea agreement, leaving the judge to set the prison term that now stands between 31 and 60 years.
St. Clair County Sentencing
The sentence came Thursday in St. Clair County. Houle had faced a murder case tied to Matthew Maison’s death in 2018, and the plea removed the trial fight that would have tested the state’s evidence in open court.
The sentencing range matters because it locks in a minimum term before any chance of release. Houle will not be eligible to walk out after a short stretch; the court’s order sets a long prison term measured in decades.
Amanda Mae Maison in Jail
Amanda Mae Maison is still waiting for her own sentence. She was remanded to the St. Clair County Jail until 11 a.m. on Sept. 11, and she faces up to life in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree murder.
Her case runs alongside Houle’s, but her role adds a separate layer of responsibility. Court records say she admitted that Houle physically abused Matthew throughout their relationship, and that she intentionally concealed her son’s injuries from Child Protective Services and other law enforcement officials from 2016 through the murder investigation.
Seven-Year Delay
That timeline helps explain why the case still lands hard now. Houle and Amanda Mae Maison were in a relationship for two years, from 2016 until the day of Matthew’s death, and their arrests came more than seven years after the boy was found dead.
Joshua Sparling said the couple would bang Matthew’s head into the wall and lock him in his room for hours without food or water. He also said the autopsy showed that Matthew died from blunt force trauma from his injuries and possible suffocation.
Amanda Mae Maison admitted that she physically abused Matthew too, and she told the court that she and Houle came up with a plan to conceal how her son died. Her Sept. 11 sentencing will be the next major step in the Matthew Maison murder case, with both defendants now having entered guilty pleas and the court records laying out how the abuse was hidden for years.
