Collin Griffith, 17, stabs mother Catherine to death in Florida, one year after killing his father: police

Police say a 17-year-old boy in Florida stabbed his mother to death, just a year after shooting his father in Oklahoma.

Collin Griffith called 911 Sunday night and claimed that his mother, 39-year-old Catherine Griffith, was stabbed in the neck during an argument after she came at him with a knife and fell on top of him, according to the Polk County Sheriff's Office.

Police rushed to the house and found Catherine dead.

Officers asked Collin what happened, but he was “uncooperative” and demanded to speak to an attorney. Investigators quickly determined that the evidence at the crime scene did not match the situation the teen had described to police over the phone.

Witnesses told investigators that Collin and his mother were yelling at each other outside the house when they saw the boy grab his mother by the hair and drag her into the house while she repeatedly pleaded, “Let me go.”

“He opens the door and there's some arguing. I don't know exactly what the words were because I was sitting on my porch. Next thing you know, he grabs her and pulls her into the house,” Nancy K. Jones, who lives across the street, told WFLA. “He just grabbed her – it looked like he grabbed her by the hair.”

Collin's grandmother – who was not present at the stabbing but owns the house where it happened – told police that the teenager had been in physical and verbal altercations several times in the past, WFLA reported.

The grandmother had reportedly previously told Jones that Collin was “having problems.”

The medical examiner's autopsy revealed that Catherine Griffin died from a deep, penetrating knife wound to the neck. The stab wound was not consistent with an accidental injury.

The teenager is now an orphan because he allegedly killed his father as well.

Collin shot his father, Charles Robert Griffith, during an altercation at their Oklahoma home on Valentine's Day in 2023, claiming self-defense, according to an affidavit. He was 15 years old at the time.

The teenager told police that his father cornered him in the bedroom of the house, so he took a gun and shot him twice – once in the chest and once in the head.

Collins' mother paid $50,000 bail to get him out of jail, records show. The charges were later dropped because self-defense could not be ruled out, according to the Lincoln County, Oklahoma, district attorney's office.

Exactly one year after he shot his father, he was reunited with his mother through the Florida Department of Children and Families.

At the time, he first threatened to kill Catherine before allegedly killing her on Sunday.

“Collin Griffith is a violent offender – he has now killed both his father and mother,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said in a statement. “We will hold him accountable in Polk County – we will do everything we can to keep him out of civil society.”

The 17-year-old is accused of premeditated murder, kidnapping and violating a restraining order.