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Robbery trial sees insanity defense

By CHRIS TISCH
Published January 11, 2006

LARGO - Over the last two years, Steven Aitken has repeatedly admitted committing a series of brazen bank robberies over an eight-month period in 2003.

Numerous witnesses have identified him. Surveillance cameras clearly captured his face. He left fingerprints behind as evidence, even a shoe print on a bank counter he vaulted.

But Aitken also has called himself a maniac and a madman. He claims he was insane during the robberies and remains so today.

It's this argument, the insanity defense, that Aitken hopes will prompt a jury to find him not guilty of all 23 charges against him. Aitken's trial began with opening statments Tuesday morning.

"The evidence will show Steven Aitken is a sick individual who suffers from a mental disease ... and didn't know right from wrong," Jim Martin, Aitken's attorney, told jurors in his opening statement.

But prosecutors say Aitken's hold-ups were too well-planned and sophisticated to have been committed by someone unsure of wrong from right.

In early 2003, local detectives noticed a pattern of bank robberies in which the suspect stole vehicles, often taking them on test drives from auto dealerships, just minutes before the stickup.

After finding one of the getaway cars abandoned, investigators culled a fingerprint from inside. An examiner ran the print through a database and matched it to Aitken, whose prints were on file after he served 10 years in prison for child sex abuse.

Detectives got a copy of Aitken's mug shot and showed it to tellers who were robbed. They said it was him.

Aitken continued to rob Pinellas banks and get away. He fired shots into a drawer during one holdup and pushed an old woman down during another. His threatened to kill tellers, jumped over counters and grew more bold with each stickup, police said.

Eventually, the television show America's Most Wanted broadcast a story about Aitken, which led to a tip that he was living in a hotel in Daytona Beach.

Authorities arrested him there. Aitken initially wouldn't answer questions, then admitted to the robberies. However, a judge later ruled that some of those statements were not admissible in trial.

After his arrest, Aitken kept running his mouth, which any attorney would have told him not to do. With cameras running, Aitken admitted to the crimes, but disputed peripheral facts, such as how he had spent $40,000 or so stolen from the banks. He also denied an accusation that he had shot at a police officer during one of the robberies.

"I could have easily gunned people down," Aitken said. "I don't have it in my heart to hurt people."

Then Aitken's behavior became more bizarre.

He admitted to his crimes in court hearings and in phone calls to reporters. He threatened every attorney appointed to represent him.

In court hearings, he seemed to brag. "I am guilty of these bank robberies 10 different ways to the end of the month," he said.

At one point, he tried to represent himself, though the court eventually appointed Martin, with whom Aitken refused to speak. He also won't talk with a doctor who could testify he was insane.

On Tuesday morning, jailers had to forcefully remove Aitken from his cell and put him in a restraint chair to get him to the courthouse.

Aitken was brought into court in shackles but without the chair. There were two cuts on his neck.

"This individual who is shackled, chained, scarred up ... is not guilty by reason of insanity," Martin told the jury.

Aitken faces life in prison if convicted. Testimony could run until Friday.

[Last modified January 11, 2006, 00:40:10]