MCKINNEY, Texas — The trial of 18-year-old Karmelo Anthony continues today in Collin County, after last year’s fatal stabbing of 17-year-old Austin Metcalf during a Frisco ISD track meet.
Jury selection began Monday, June 1. A jury was seated Wednesday, June 3. Opening statements took place Thursday, June 4, followed by the state’s first witnesses. On Saturday, June 6, the state rested its case. The defense immediately began calling witnesses.
New to the case? Watch this overview.
WFAA will stream updates with analysis after the trial each day at 8 p.m. on our free streaming app WFAA+. Here’s how to download it for free.
Frisco track meet stabbing trial: Timeline of the case
The timeline of the case begins April 2, 2025. See a full timeline of the case here.
Anthony, a former student at Frisco Centennial High School, is charged with murder in the April 2, 2025, killing of Metcalf, a student-athlete at Frisco Memorial High School.
Background: Who is Austin Metcalf? Who is Karmelo Anthony?
Investigators say that morning, at a track meet at Kuykendall Stadium, a confrontation began under a team tent where athletes gathered during inclement weather. It ended when Metcalf was stabbed in the chest. Anthony was arrested and has claimed self-defense.
The case quickly drew intense national attention, fueled by social media debate centered on the races of the two young men, public protests, online threats and allegations of doxxing involving people connected to the proceedings.
Because Anthony was 17 at the time of the incident, Texas law allows him to be tried as an adult, and he faces a possible sentence ranging from five years to life in prison if convicted. Because the death did not meet the qualifications to be charged as a capital murder, and because of Anthony’s age, the death penalty was never an option in the case.
Trial rules
Security at the courthouse will be tight.
Judge John Roach Jr. has banned cameras, livestreams and audio recording inside the courtroom. He also designated a security perimeter around parts of the courthouse grounds barring the public — and potential demonstrators — from gathering in those areas. The judge has also issued a gag order limiting public comments about the case from attorneys, witnesses, investigators and others directly involved in the proceedings.
With public seating limited, developments in the case will come from live reporting from inside the courtroom. WFAA has a team covering the case. Collin County reporter Jobin Panicker will be inside the courtroom each day, alongside a courtroom sketch artist. Senior crime and justice reporter Rebecca Lopez will also be at the courthouse each day, both in and out of the courtroom, chronicling case developments. WFAA has also arranged for a legal expert to sit in on the proceedings each day to help provide context and analysis on the WFAA+ daily evening wrap-up.
Background: A visual tour of the actual courtroom.
Archive:
Day Six: June 8, 2026 – defense case continues
**the court is in recess for lunch**
11 a.m.
Jobin Panicker reports:
The next witness is a 17-year-old Frisco HS athlete. He walks in chewing gum. Judge John Roach Jr. told him, “Throw it out or swallow it.”
Defense attorney Mike Howard is questioning him.
“Track meets are vey social,” the witness said. He said kids from other schools would come to the tent, that wasn’t unusual. He said “everybody was standing or congregating” under the Memorial tent. He told jurors it looked to him like someone got “pushed or punched” but does not really know. According to a statement he gave to a detective a year ago, he described it as a “push or hit,” testimony today showed.
The witness said he recalls after the “kid” (Karmelo Anthony) got hit, he saw a “swing-type motion down.” The witness said he recalled hearing someone got stabbed and he ran out of the stadium and into the bus.
(We have heard now several different recollections of Karmelo Anthony’s actions with the knife that day. One witness testified he used an upward movement, and this witness said it was a downward motion.”)
The withess said he he did not want to come to court today. He said he does not know Anthony and has no personal knowledge of what happened.
Court is on a mid-morning break.
10:30 a.m.
Jobin Panicker reports:
The defense’s next witness is Frisco PD Detective Beau Riley, of the Crimes Against Children Unit. Defense attorney Toby Shook asked him if he found any deleted photos on the phone of an earlier witness, a former Memorial HS student who was friends with both Anthony and Metcalf and who testified he pretended to make a video of the April 2, 2025, confrontation. Riley told jurors he is not sure.
Shook asked him if knives with blades under 5.5 inches or pocket knives are against the law to carry. Riley said they are generally not disallowed but he said he is not aware if it against school poliy.
9:30 a.m.
The same 17-year-old witness is still on the stand. according to Jobin Panicker:
The witness told jurors “I saw a push,” referring to Austin Metcalf’s push of Karmelo Anthony. He continued: “I saw the arms go out and make contact with ‘Melo,'” referring to Anthony by his nickname.
The witness said he did not see the contact but saw the arms in the push. He admits to jurors he does not have any context for what was happening. “It got super loud and it was like, ‘Woah, what happened?'”
This witness thought it may have been a bee in the tent and that someone may have been stung. He told jurors that he did not see the stabbing. He said Anthony was standing during the push. He said the next thing he remembers, Metcalf lifted up this shirt and said he was stabbed. The witness saw Anthony go into a “light jog” and recalled he was “moving across the bleachers.”
The witness said Anthony “was crying and there was a coach comforting him,” adding that Anthony “was distraught.” The witness said he could hear Anthony crying and overheard him saying, “I told him not to touch me.”
Defense attorney Mike Howard: Do you know if Anthony was justified or not? Do you know if Anthony was provoking it? A: “No, sir.”
On cross examination, prosecutor Bill Wirskye asked the witness about them being kicked out of the nearby baseball dugout that morning.
“If someone asks you to leave, you leave, right?” “Yes, sir.”
Wirskye asks the witness questions about where he was standing when the stabbing happened.
“Have you ever brought a knife to a track event?” Wirskye asked him. “No, sir.”
9 a.m.
Jobin Panicker, who is in the courtroom for us today, filed this report:
Attorneys for both sides have entered the courtroom.
Karmelo Anthony is there, wearing a blue suit, purple shirt and striped tie.
The defense calls a 17-year-old Centennial HS student. He was on same football team as Karmelo Anthony. He told jurors that Anthony that did not play the whole last season because of a shoulder injury. At the track meet on April 2, 2025, he testified Monday that Anthony was in a “normal mood.” The team was all sitting on the bleachers. He said Anthony was there for a jumping event.
Under questioning by defense attorney Mike Howard, the witness said there is a lot of down time at a track meet and that to pass the time he’d scroll his phone. He said he hasn’t gone to another team’s tent, but said he knows that it happens.
The witness testified that there is a baseball field next to the track meet and they hung out at a dugout for a short time. He said another team’s coach said they could not be in the dugout, but they were trying to get out of the rain. They left the dugout after being told to leave. The Centennial HS coach told them to get on the field and get ready and warmup. “There was a big storm” coming, the witness said. Anthony was with them the whole time, in the dugout and out onto the field to warmup. The “rain started to pick up again,” he told jurors. He said Anthony then heads to the bleachers and he saw Anthony walking from the left side where Centennial had a tarp to the right of the stadium. He saw him again under the Memorial tent in the “top right corner.”
The witness said the Memorial tent was medium to full but getting crowded. He told jurors that “everything felt completely normal” at the Memorial tent. He was about 40 yards away. He then heard “loud noises” and “it caught my attention that something was going on,” which he described as a verbal altercation.
8:30 a.m.
The defense is expected to continue calling witnesses this morning.
