ATHENS, Ala. — An Alabama teenager has been convicted of killing five family members, including three young siblings, when he was 14 years old.
A jury deliberated for two hours Thursday before finding Mason Sisk, now 18, guilty of multiple counts of capital murder for the 2019 slayings. All five were shot in the head at their home in Elkmont. The youngest, Colson, was just 6 months old.
Sisk faces life in prison because of his age at the time of the killings. He'll be sentenced on July 24.
Sisk initially told police he was in the basement playing video games when he heard gunshots and ran outside to see a vehicle pulling away, but he later told investigators he’d killed the five, prosecutors said.
“Yeah, they argue a lot, and I got fed up with it,” Sisk said in a video recording of the questioning. “And the kids were going through a lot.”
His defense attorneys argued the sheriff used manipulative interrogation tactics on a child who was fatigued, sleep deprived and traumatized by what happened, WAAY-TV reported.
John Wayne Sisk, age 38; Mary Sisk, age 35; Kane, age 6; Aurora, age 4; and the infant Colson were killed on Sept. 2, 2019.
The first attempt to prosecute Sisk ended in a mistrial last September after new evidence from Mary Sisk's cellphone became available.
The Limestone County district attorney said he was pleased with Thursday's verdict.
“Any life that is lost is horrific, but Mason Sisk killed three children and we wanted to communicate that," District Attorney Brian C.T. Jones told WHNT-TV.
Defense attorney Shay Golden told the Huntsville TV station that he thinks there were mistakes in the trial, including, “information that we believe to be relevant was never really allowed to be discussed and considered.”
“We just feel like it's inevitably going to have to be tried again,” Golden told the station.
The slayings rocked the quiet community of Elkmont, a tiny town of 500 residents just northwest of Huntsville and not far from the Alabama-Tennessee border.