My son was sentenced to prison. Reports about my wife are wrong | Opinion

The painful experience of our son's recent sentencing was made all the more painful by reading about it in the county's Crimewatch report, where some media glean information for their stories.

Our son, Colin Petroziello, now 26, was sentenced to 15-30 years in state prison on a laundry list of charges, including the attempted murder of a police officer. His attorney pleaded no contest but mentally ill.

Colin was acutely paranoid at the time, Aug. 18, 2021. He fired a shotgun at a door believing "bad men with guns" were trying to break in.

What's troubling about the Crimewatch report is the damage it does to my wife, Ann. It reports that she knew Colin was armed and "never gave that information when she called for assistance from probation. Petroziello’s mother also texted (PO) Viviano, asking if she was still on her way while never mentioning her son was armed.” 

This is factually inaccurate and, more critically, libelous. I left a message for DA Matt Weintraub about this and spoke twice to county communications representative Manuel Gamiz Jr. He insists it is accurate. It isn’t.

My issue is the damage it does to Ann’s character and reputation. News organizations go to this site and retrieve information from it for their sites or publications. 

Here’s an accurate first-hand accounting. If you're not aware of the full story leading up to the day of the shooting, our son was in an acutely paranoid state. Still, we had to get him to a hearing in Philadelphia related to a car accident. The plan was for Ann to take him to the hearing and I was going to let the downstairs neighbor’s HVAC contractor in to our condo to service her mechanical equipment in the attic. Access was through a ceiling panel. We had bought the condo several months prior so Colin wouldn't be homeless.

Colin had previously refused to allow the contractor in, stating it was a plot to plant listening devices. We were in separate cars that day. I remained outside because as the "tough love" parent I could be a trigger for Colin and we didn’t want any complications. We had arranged with probation for help because Colin believed the hearing also was a plot to institutionalize him and he was refusing to go. We hoped the presence of a probation officer would force compliance.

We asked the PO to arrive at 11 a.m. The hearing was at 12:30. Ann texted the PO from her car at 10:58. Are you here yet, she asked, thinking the PO might be inside the condo. Two minutes later the PO texted back that she was just pulling in to the parking lot. Ann presented screen shots of those messages and testified under oath at the sentencing that this was her last contact with the PO.

Point is, Ann couldn’t possibly have known Colin was armed because she wasn’t even in the condo yet. When she got the text back from the PO, she let herself into the condo with a key. Would she have just walked through the door if she knew Colin was armed, especially being aware of his acute paranoia?

When she went in, Colin was sober but in an agitated state raging at her that he wasn’t going to court, that there are men with guns hiding in the bushes who we paid to be there. When the PO knocked on the door, Colin stormed down the steps, slammed the door and dragged a loveseat down as a barricade. Ann said he paced around the living room saying he didn't want to hurt her or anybody else but this is the day "you’re going to watch your son die." He went into the bedroom and called her in. He had a gun in his mouth.

This is the first time she saw a gun.

She calmly, bravely talked to him about how important he is to her, how she couldn’t live her life without him being part of her life. She told him there are people he hasn’t met yet who will benefit from knowing him, people he has to live for. She inched forward, reached out and gently pulled the gun out of his mouth.

That was heroic. Without regard for her own life, she saved our son's life. She went back to the living room where her purse was with her cell phone. That’s when police Chief Kelly knocked on the door and Colin appeared with a shotgun at the top of the steps.

Ann heard it before she saw it.

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At the sentencing, Schorn scolded that eight minutes passed between the time Ann entered the condo and Kelly knocked. “Why didn’t you call 911?” she asked.

How was she supposed to accomplish that? With her agitated, mentally ill, suicidal son standing in front of her – with a gun in his mouth!?

After he did what he did, Colin gulped down anxiety pills and guzzled four cans of beer in an attempt to OD. That’s what he told the presentence investigator, saying his mom didn’t want him to shoot himself. When he passed out, Ann grabbed the shotgun, threw it out a second-story window and, at age 67, climbed out that same window.

That was heroic.

But instead of being heralded for her bravery and quick thinking, her character is assassinated and her reputation savaged. And it continues daily with the county’s apparent sanction.

Why?

I'm nearly 70. Ann is a year behind me. We struggled for the last 20 years trying to get a mentally ill child, teen and adult on a positive track so he could lead a productive, self-sustaining life. We frantically tried to keep him from sinking into the criminal justice system knowing the hurdles that would create for an already troubled kid beleaguered by intellectual deficits. We invested a chunk of our retirement savings in housing for him so he wouldn't be homeless. And we both suffered emotional trauma along the way, as mental health interventions were ineffective or indifferent, and our son was lost to the ravages of mental illness. Yet, we couldn't just let him die on the streets. Yes, drugs and alcohol played a role in his deterioration, as they usually do for mentally ill people searching for relief from demons and loneliness.

This has been a tragedy for our family, a tragedy now compounded by an ugly, reckless and reprehensible attack on a devoted mother who demonstrated bravery and savvy in the face of danger and chaos.

Guy Petroziello is a former editor at the Courier Times and The Intelligencer. 

This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Guy Petroziello: Reports about my wife are wrong