CHARLESTON, S.C. – A 15-year-old boy who claimed the antidepressant
Zoloft drove him to kill his grandparents was found guilty of murder
Tuesday and sentenced to 30 years in prison.
AP Photo
Defense attorney Paul Waldner, left, waits with defendent
Christopher Pittman, 15, while the jury deliberates in Pittman's
double murder trial in Charleston, S.C., Monday, Feb. 14, 2005.
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Christopher Pittman hung his head as the verdict was read after about
six hours of deliberations. He spoke briefly to the court before the
sentence was handed down.
"I know it's in the hands of God. Whatever he decides is what it's going
to be," Pittman said quietly.
The trial was the first case involving a youngster who says an
antidepressant caused him to kill, Pittman's lawyer said. It came at a
time of heightened scrutiny over the use of antidepressants among
children.
Pittman cried Tuesday as his father and other family members asked for
leniency.
"I love my son with all of my heart," said Joe Pittman, whose parents
were the victims. "And if my mom and dad were here, I know they would be
begging you for mercy."
Defense attorneys had urged the jury to send a message to the nation by
blaming Zoloft for the killings. They said the negative effects of
Zoloft are more pronounced in youngsters, and the drug affected Pittman
so he did not know right from wrong.
"We do not convict children for murder when they have been ambushed by
chemicals that destroy their ability to reason," attorney Paul Waldner
said.
But prosecutors called the Zoloft defense a smoke screen, saying the
then-12-year-old Pittman knew exactly what he was doing three years ago
when he shot his grandparents, torched their house and then drove off in
their car.
Prosecutor Barney Giese said the real motivation for the crime was the
boy's anger at his grandparents for disciplining him for choking a
younger student on a school bus. And he reminded jurors how the boy
carried out the killings - shooting his grandfather in the mouth and his
grandmother in her head while both lay sleeping.
"I don't care how old he is. That is as malicious a killing - a murder -
as you are ever going to find," the prosecutor said. He pointed to
Pittman's statement to police in which he said his grandparents
"deserved it."
Pittman was charged as an adult in the November 2001 murders of Joe
Pittman, 66, and his wife Joy, 62.
Zoloft is the most widely prescribed antidepressant in the United
States, with 32.7 million prescriptions written in 2003. Last October,
the Food and Drug Administration ordered Zoloft and other
antidepressants to carry "black box" warnings - the government's
strongest warning short of a ban - about an increased risk of suicidal
behavior in children.
© 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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