The Texas teen accused of fatally stabbing another high schooler at a track meet has had his bond reduced to $250,000 and will be granted house arrest, a judge ruled on Monday.
A judge in Collin County slashed the 17-year-old Karmelo Anthony’s initial $1 million bond and said he may await trial at home with an ankle monitor and 24-hour supervision from his parents or an “adult designee.”
Anthony has been locked in Collin County Jail for allegedly stabbing Austin Metcalf, also 17, in the heart during a fight over a seat at a track meet on April 2. He is charged with first-degree murder.
Witnesses told cops Metcalf tried to shove Anthony, who attended a rival high school, out of a pop-up tent when Anthony grabbed a knife from his backpack and stabbed Metcalf in the heart, leaving him to bleed out in his twin brother’s arms, according to a police report.
The lowered bond came one week after Anthony’s attorney said they would ask the court to lower the “excessive” $1 million bond and also ask the local district attorney to make “a better determination” of the charges.
Even if the boy is convicted of first-degree murder, he will not face the death penalty, Collin County District Attorney Greg Willis revealed last week.
“The Supreme Court has said not only can you not seek the death penalty against someone who committed a crime when they’re 17, you can’t even get them life without parole. That would not be something we could do even if we wanted to,” Willis told WFAA.
Anthony himself allegedly told police he was acting in self-defense, and his family claimed “the narrative being spread is false, unjust, and harmful,” on a GiveSendGo.com fundraiser for their legal fees.
That fundraiser has raked in more than $415,000 so far.
Those proceeds will help the family retain two hot-shot Dallas lawyers with a history of headline-grabbing racial justice cases.
One, Kim Cole, represented black teen Dajerria Becton after a viral video from McKinney, Texas, showed a cop slamming and pinning her to the ground at a pool party.
Cole managed to win a $148,850 settlement for Becton from the McKinney police department and the officer, who resigned.
Anthony’s other attorney, Billy Clark, became a professional mediator after a 20-year career in the Air Force.
In a recent statement, the pair of attorneys directed people to the Anthony family fundraiser, but they also emphasized that a previous GoFundMe page claiming to be set up by Karmelo himself was fake.
The bogus GoFundMe page, which has been taken down, had claimed Karmelo was “jumped” and that Metcalf smashed his phone, among other salacious details.
