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Inside the Collin County courthouse in Texas, Jeff Metcalf said Anthony, 19, refused to meet his eyes while he spoke about the loss of his son. He repeatedly demanded that the defendant look at him, telling him \u201cdon\u2019t look down,\u201d during the tense courtroom moment, according to WFAA.<\/p>\n
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As emotions escalated, Jeff raised his voice and addressed Anthony directly, shouting, \u201cWe were robbed!\u201d while urging him to face the family.<\/p>\n
Anthony kept his head lowered throughout the statements and avoided eye contact with the Metcalf family, including Austin\u2019s mother Meghan and twin brother Hunter, who were also present in court.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy boys weren\u2019t bullies,\u201d Jeff Metcalf said, responding to allegations tied to the confrontation at Kuykendall Stadium in Frisco, Texas, where Austin was fatally stabbed on April 2, 2025, after an argument involving a school tent.<\/p>\n
He described the impact of his son\u2019s death in devastating terms, saying, \u201cMy son\u2019s death destroyed the person I used to be,\u201d and explaining that Austin \u201cdoes not exist anymore\u201d in his life.<\/p>\n
At one point, Jeff became visibly overwhelmed, striking the table as he spoke and describing grief as something far beyond sadness. \u201cPeople think grief is sadness, it is not. It is rage. Pure unfiltered rage,\u201d he said, according to the report.<\/p>\n
He also directed harsh words at Anthony, telling him, \u201cYou failed your parents, you failed yourself, and you failed society \u2026 You don\u2019t belong in this community,\u201d and adding the depth of his personal loss: \u201cA piece of me died with my son, and I\u2019m expected to keep living.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jeff further said he had forgiven Anthony on the day of the killing but could never forgive what happened, stating, \u201cYou\u2019re going to prison. I forgave you the day it happened. I don\u2019t forgive what you did,\u201d before adding, \u201cYou can\u2019t look me in the eyes but you can stab my f\u2013king son!\u201d<\/p>\n
Anthony was later seen in his first mugshot following the guilty verdict on June 9, 2026, in the same case.<\/p>\n
Austin\u2019s mother, Meghan Metcalf, also delivered a powerful statement, expressing the family\u2019s grief and loss in court.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will never know what our future could have been,\u201d she said. She continued, \u201cFor journalists, activists, this is a story. For our family, this is our reality.\u201d<\/p>\n
She described how her son\u2019s absence changed everything, adding, \u201cThere was a part of him you can never take from me, the strength I still get from him every day, because I know what it was like to be loved by him. My son was murdered. He didn\u2019t just die. He was taken from us. Just as he was starting to live,\u201d Meghan said.<\/p>\n
She also criticized the sentencing outcome and reflected on the lifelong impact of the loss, saying, \u201cYou may have just been given a sentence of 35 years, you should feel lucky because I\u2019ve been sentenced to a life without my son.\u201d<\/p>\n
Austin\u2019s twin brother Hunter also spoke in court, grieving his sibling\u2019s death and the future that was taken from them.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou took a son, a brother, a friend, and my best friend, from this world. You took someone from me who was supposed to be an uncle, godfather to my kids. Now I want everything taken from you,\u201d Hunter choked out.<\/p>\n
After the sentencing, Anthony\u2019s mother Kala and his brother strongly rejected the outcome, calling it \u201cracist and biased\u201d while supporters outside the courthouse chanted, \u201cFree Karmelo.\u201d<\/p>\n
The jury deliberated for around three hours before returning the guilty verdict, then spent additional hours deciding on a 35-year sentence after weighing arguments related to \u201csudden passion,\u201d which can reduce punishment under Texas law.<\/p>\n
Source: New York Post<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Austin Metcalf\u2019s father calls the killer \u201cdespicable\u201d in emotional courtroom moment as silence fills the room Austin Metcalf\u2019s father, Jeff Metcalf, confronted Karmelo Anthony in court with an emotional … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11364"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11364\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11366,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11364\/revisions\/11366"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heightshowtime.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}