A Florida teenager stands accused of murdering his own mother, a mere two years after he alleged that he killed his father in self-defence. The teen was caught on recently released bodycam footage reassuring his grandmother, “I’m not a murderer,” less than a year before he allegedly took his mother’s life.
“I was saying, ‘Mum, I’m not a psychopath,'” 17 year old Collin Griffith can be heard explaining to his grandmother in the video obtained by a deputy from the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office and aired by local Fox affiliate WFTX on Tuesday. .
During a heated argument with his mother, Catherine Griffith, 39, in November 2023, which led to police intervention and his subsequent arrest for domestic violence, he recalls telling her: “I’m not a murderer. I’m just trying to peacefully leave or peacefully coexist. She kept telling me to shut up and shut up, and when I wouldn’t shut up, she hit me.”
He detailed how she repeatedly told him to be quiet, and when he refused, she struck him.
Griffith, who now faces first-degree murder charges, was in the back of a police car conversing with his grandmother when he confessed to an officer that he constantly feels on edge, fearing he might lash out at his mom. “If I think she’s going to do something, even if she’s not, I might act. I’m not going to, like, go crazy or anything. But I’m not sure, honestly,” Griffith concedes.
Later, the officer probed: “You’re not sure if you’ll hurt your mum?” To which Collin responded: “Only if she tries to hurt me.”
At present, Griffith is behind bars in Polk County for the alleged murder of his mother on September 8, as stated in police records. The crime scene was a 55-and-over community in Auburndale, about 50 miles east of Tampa, where Griffith’s grandmother lived Notably, this was also where the bodycam footage was captured in November 2023, reports the Mirror US.
Following the alleged matricide, Griffith reportedly called the police, claiming to the dispatcher that he and his mother “had a very long fight and she fell on a knife.” However, upon arrival, officers found Catherine Griffith with multiple stab wounds to her neck. During a September press briefing, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd stated that such injuries were unlikely to be accidental.
“The medical examiner said it’s just not reasonable or plausible that she died the way that he said she did,” Judd emphasised. “It just didn’t happen.”
In February 2023, Griffith was previously accused of murdering his father in Oklahoma but managed to evade charges by claiming self-defense. When Florida deputies confronted him after his mother’s death, he remained “calm, cool, collected,” according to Judd, who also highlighted Griffith’s “zero remorse.”
Judd recalled Griffith’s words: “He looked the deputy in the eye and said: ‘I know my rights.’ ‘I want an attorney.'” In a bodycam video from November 2023, the grandmother of teenager Collin Griffith is heard telling officers that he did not want to live with his mother before her death.
“Collin did not want to come back home,” she explains to a deputy. “And I said, ‘You don’t have a choice, you have to go back home.’ And he said, ‘No, I want foster care,’ and even the corporal said that foster care isn’t good for you. You have issues you need to work on.”
Before the police were called, it’s alleged that Griffith pushed his mother to the ground and “stomped on her” after she took away his video game privileges, PCSO officials report.
Although Griffith claimed self-defence, this defence was unsuccessful, and he was incarcerated. Two months prior to this, Griffin had been involuntarily committed for mental health evaluation following a threatening statement he made: “I’ll kill myself, or I’ll kill my mother by shooting or stabbing her,” as per police records.
Polk County authorities are now urging prosecutors to charge Griffith, currently held without bond, as an adult.
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