CHARLESTON, S.C. — Zoloft and other antidepressants can make people agitated and, in extreme cases, suicidal — even the company that makes it concedes that. But can Zoloft spur a 12-year-old boy to commit murder?

A jury began hearing evidence Monday in the case of Christopher Pittman, whose lawyers claim Zoloft caused a "good, decent boy" to take a shotgun handed down through three generations and use it to kill his grandparents as they slept.

Prosecutors, however, are asking jurors to focus on what Christopher did before and after the Nov. 28, 2001, crimes.

Clutching a tissue and looking down at the defense table, the now-15-year-old defendant sobbed gently Monday as prosecutor Barney Giese characterized Christopher's actions as "evil" and his attempt to cover up the murders with a fire as proof that he knew right from wrong.

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"What could be more evil ... than taking a shotgun to some 60-year-olds laying in bed asleep?" Giese said in his opening statement.

The jury of 12 and two alternates was empanelled in just a few hours Monday. The trial was moved to Charleston, some 180 miles from Chester County in north central South Carolina, because of intense pre-trial publicity.

"This case is about Chris Pittman and his actions," Giese told jurors. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is not a trial about Zoloft. Chris Pittman is on trial. The state asks you to focus on Christopher Pittman and what Christopher Pittman did that night."

The defense team is comprised primarily of lawyers from Texas and California who have experience going up against drug makers in civil suits involving antidepressants.

Defense lawyer Andy Vickery told jurors in his opening statement that he will establish Christopher was temporarily insane due to the medication.

"Zoloft triggers violence. The doctor gave a mind-altering drug to a 90-pound 12-year-old," Vickery said. "He did not have an evil mind. He had a mind that had been tampered with chemically."

Aftermath of a fight

Christopher was prescribed Zoloft for depression several weeks before the killing. When relatives noticed he was becoming more agitated and appeared "wired," Christopher went back to the doctor, who upped the dose, Vickery said.

On the day before the murders, Christopher got into a fight with a boy on the school bus and his grandparents were called to his school. Prosecutors said they will prove Christopher decided to kill his grandparents because they punished him for fighting.

"They disciplined him verbally, and [they also] possibly [disciplined him] physically with a paddle," Giese said. "Chris Pittman would not, and could not, take that discipline. Even though the state submits it was well deserved, he would not take it. He laid in his room and waited until the Pittmans went to bed. He waited and planned exactly what he was going to do that night."

According to the state, Christopher took the .410-caliber shotgun his father gave him for hunting and walked into a loft bedroom where Joe Pittman, 66, and Joy Pittman, 62, went to sleep after returning home from choir practice.

Joe Pittman was shot in the mouth. Joy Pittman was shot in the back of her head.

Christopher set the house on fire and fled in Joe Pittman's truck with cash and weapons. He was captured 35 miles away after the truck got stuck in a ditch.

Jurors are expected to hear from expert witnesses about the known and suspected effects of Zoloft use, including the fact that the federal Food and Drug Administration has not approved the use of Zoloft to treat depression in juveniles.

Just last year, Zoloft's maker, Connecticut-based Pfizer, told doctors in Canada that Zoloft has been associated with severe agitation and users possibly could feel an urge to cause harm to themselves or others.

The defense claims that since Christopher stopped taking antidepressants, he is a changed person.

"He's no danger to this society or himself," Vickery said. "He's a fine boy."

'A normal kid'

Prosecutors called three witnesses Monday — two volunteer firefighters and an arson investigator.

Fire Chief James "Red" Weir of West Chester, S.C., testified that he spent time with Christopher, Joe and Joy Pittman, and they appeared to get along well.

Christopher, who grew up in Florida, visited his grandparents often before finally moving in with them in 2001.

"They were just like a loving family," Weir testified, adding that he observed nothing unusual about Christopher when he, Joe Pittman and the boy went fishing.

"What was [Christopher] like?" defense attorney Karen Barth Menzies asked on cross examination.

"He was just a normal kid," Weir said.

Assistant Fire Chief Andy Martin, one of the first to respond to the blaze at the Pittman home, recalled meeting Joe Pittman at a grocery store several months before the killings. Pittman talked about the house he had built and was very proud of it.

"'You'll come by sometime and see it,'" Martin quoted Joe Pittman as saying.

If convicted of murder, Christopher Pittman faces life in prison. Charleston Circuit Court Judge Danny Pieper denied a defense request to transfer the murder charges to family court; a related arson charge will be tried separately in family court.

The trial is expected to last two weeks.