McKINNEY, Texas (Court TV) — The parents of a teenager convicted of stabbing a student to death at a track meet are speaking out as their son files an appeal of the jury’s decision.
booking photo of Karmelo Anthony

Karmelo Anthony (Texas Department of Criminal Justice via ABC News)

Karmelo Anthony, 19, was sentenced to 35 years in prison after a jury found him guilty of murder in the death of 17-year-old Austin Metcalf. Karmelo Anthony never denied stabbing Metcalf following a confrontation between the two; he argued at trial that he had acted in self-defense.

“We’re in a nightmare. It doesn’t feel real,” said Anthony’s parents in their first interview following the verdict with Mimi Brown on The Breakfast Club. “We’ve been up all night crying and praying.”

“We didn’t know how cruel the world could be,” Karmelo Anthony’s father, Andrew Anthony, said. “We did everything we were advised and told to do, and look what happened.”

Both of the defendant’s parents vowed to stand by his side as they fight for justice, which they feel was lost in the trial. “We will keep fighting,” Karmelo Anthony’s mother, Kala Hayes, said. “We will not stop fighting for justice for my son.”

Hayes blamed the jury in her son’s trial, saying, “Their mind was made up already” before the case even began. Andrew Anthony took issue with witnesses in the trial, whom he accused of lying when they testified about what happened at the track meet. “The reality of this is that somebody literally walked into [Karmelo’s] life,” he said, “[Karmelo] did everything by the law and just look at where we’re at.”

But prosecutors said Karmelo Anthony went beyond the bounds of self-defense when he pulled out a knife from his book bag and stabbed the victim following a standoff when the defendant refused to leave Metcalf’s school’s tent.

Just days after the jury handed down its verdict and sentence against the defendant, court records indicate that he has filed an appeal. He also appears to have filed a notice of indigency, claiming he cannot afford an attorney and requesting that one be provided to him.

In the wake of the stabbing on April 2, 2025, online fundraisers for both the victim and the defendant brought in thousands of dollars. By the time jury selection began on June 3, the fundraiser for Karmelo Anthony had surpassed $600,000. At the conclusion of the trial, the campaign was no longer visible on the website that had hosted it.

The Collin County Sheriff’s Office told CBS News that Karmelo Anthony was already transferred out of the county jail and into a Texas Department of Criminal Justice facility after an “expedited” transfer.