FLINT, MI -- A division director at the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services says she was told to lie about Flint blood lead data by Dr. Eden Wells, the state's chief medical executive, and another top health official.

Patricia McKane, director of DHHS' Lifecourse Epidemiology and Genomics Division, told Genesee District Judge Jennifer Manley of the alleged pressure from her superiors in testimony Friday, Sept. 21.

But several questions remained unanswered, including exactly when the direction was given.

Wells immediately denied the accusation in a statement issued by her attorney to MLive-The Flint Journal.

McKane said Wells, who is facing charges including involuntary manslaughter and lying to a peace officer in relation to the Flint water crisis, and Corinne Miller, a former state epidemiologist, directed her to lie to a reporter about whether an increase in elevated blood lead levels among Flint children was statistically significant.

"I was asked to lie to the Detroit Free Press," McKane said during the preliminary examination of two colleagues at DHHS -- Nancy Peeler and Robert Scott.

Asked who gave her that direction, McKane answered, "Corinne Miller and Eden Wells."

"They told me ... to say the results were not significant when they were," the division director said.

McKane said she refused to lie about the blood lead data and did not say whether she was ever interviewed by the Free Press.

Attorneys for Peeler and Scott have yet to cross-examine McKane, and they repeatedly objected to her testimony and the tactics of special prosecutor Todd Flood on Friday.

Harold Z. Gurewitz, an attorney for Peeler, called the allegation of top-down pressure "spurious," and Mary Chartier, an attorney for Scott, complained as well.

"He can't just throw mud out there and hope it sticks to these two people," Chartier said of Scott and Peeler.

Steve Tramontin, an attorney for Wells, issued a statement to MLive, saying, "This is the first we have heard of this late-breaking allegation against Dr. Wells.

"It is telling that (McKane) did not appear as a prosecution witness against Dr. Wells during her lengthy preliminary exam to make this claim and be properly confronted.

"The allegation is completely false. Dr. Wells did not lie and never instructed anyone else to lie, about this or anything else," the statement says.

MLive could not immediately reach Kristen Guinn, an attorney for Miller, who reached a plea deal with prosecutors after she was also charged with crimes related to the water crisis.

McKane was the supervisor of Cristin Larder, a DHHS epidemiologist who was asked to compare data on blood lead levels in Flint to determine whether a greater percentage of children had elevated lead in their bodies after the city began using the Flint River for drinking water in April 2014.

Although Larder's work showed what McKane said was a statistically significant spike, a chart she developed that reflected that increase's significance wasn't included in a report Peeler prepared for some top executives at DHHS just a few days later.

In her report, Peeler -- director of the Program for Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting -- said increased rates of lead poisoning during the first year the river was used as Flint's source of water were "not terribly different from what we saw the previous three years."

"We commonly see a 'seasonal effect' with lead, related to people opening and closing windows more often in the summer, which disturbs old deteriorating paint on the windows, sills and sashes," she wrote to DHHS officials including Nancy Grijava, executive administrative assistant to Director Nick Lyon.

Lyon has been bound over to Genesee Circuit Court for a jury trial on his own Flint water charges, including involuntary manslaughter -- a charge related his role in Legionnaires' outbreaks in the area during the time the river was in use.

Two months after Peeler's report, Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a pediatrician at Hurley Medical Center in Flint, announced her independent research, showing a statistically significant increase in elevated blood lead levels in children in Flint.

In response, Lyon directed his staff in an email to provide a "strong statement" that the blood lead levels were due to seasonal fluctuations like those referenced by Peeler.

Wells later praised the work of Hanna-Attisha after other DHHS officials initially questioned her study.