Christopher McCullough, Raleigh, North Carolina man who attacked his parents during drug bender sentenced to life after killing mom. How years of addiction, struggle and not knowing how to deal with tormented son led to tragedy.
A North Carolina man who claimed going on a drugs bender and not having slept in six days leading up to the beating death of his mother and injuring of his father has been sentenced to life behind bars, with no chance of parole.
Christopher McCullough, 31, of Raleigh was found guilty of first-degree murder Friday in the 2023 slaying of his 75-year-old mother Mary McCullough. The son was not convicted of other charges, including the attempted murder of his father and larceny of a dog, WTVD reported.
The son was convicted after just 7 hours of deliberation.
The defendant’s father, John McCullough, testified against his son. According to a courtroom report from WNCN, the father told jurors ever since his son was seven, he was ‘uncontrollably violent’ and had ‘superhuman-like strength.’
The parent told of trying everything to treat his son’s issues from sending him to boarding school along with stays at mental health hospitals. None of it worked. Eventually, he and his wife obtained a domestic violence injunction and forbade their son from entering their home.
But he ignored that order and arrived at the home unannounced on Aug. 8, 2023. He reportedly told jurors he was high on Adderall and other drugs and hadn’t slept in six days. He said he asked his parents for gas money. When they refused, he proceeded to beat his parents, including his sickly mother, who used an oxygen tank and weighed just 100 pounds.
‘Me and my dad got in a fight, I struck him twice to the ground, I noticed that my mother was face down,’ he said, according to WRAL.
The younger McCullough then took his son and fled. Cops rushed to the home to aid the elder McCulloughs. There was blood everywhere and both victims were unconscious, cops testified.
Mary McCullough was rushed to the hospital where she died nearly a week later.
Christopher McCullough’s son, now 6, was not physically injured in the incident but has experienced post-traumatic stress disorder from ‘witnessing his nanny and poppy, hurt.’
Defense attorney, Ricky Elmore said his client did not mean to kill his mother and just wanted gas money.
‘John came at him the wrong way,’ Elmore reportedly said during closing arguments. ‘His flight-or-fight clicked in and he started assaulting John.’
But no matter his state of mind, prosecutors argued, there was no excuse to kill a woman whom he supposedly loved.
‘If that is a momma’s boy that left his mom for dead that way, God help that mom,’ prosecutor Melanie Shekita told the jury during her closing arguments.
