Karmelo Anthony was convicted in the 2025 stabbing death of 17-year-old Austin Metcalf, sentenced to 35 years with parole possible after 17, and has filed an appeal while claiming he is indigent despite substantial crowdfunding for his legal defense. The appeal will challenge issues like venue, jury selection and jury instructions, and it has already drawn sharp reactions about race, money and the criminal justice process.

Karmelo Anthony was found guilty in the fatal stabbing at a Frisco high school track meet in 2025. The jury returned a conviction that led to a 35-year sentence, with parole eligibility after 17 years. He has now filed a notice of appeal from state custody.

The case attracted national attention largely because of the racial identities involved, and that attention fed strong reactions from across the political spectrum. Some commentators focused on the facts of the crime and argued that the sentence fit the verdict. Others flagged concerns about how the trial was handled.

The appeal paperwork includes a statement that Anthony is “penniless, destitute, and indigent person, too poor to employ counsel to represent me on the appeal.” That claim comes even though family fundraising and online donations were widely reported after the shooting. Media accounts note millions raised on crowdfunding platforms and a separate report that a GoFundMe-style effort tallied significant sums for living expenses and defense.

Convicted killer Karmelo Anthony has claimed he’s “penniless” and can’t afford a lawyer for his appeal — despite his family collecting $625,000 in crowdfunding for his legal defense and “living expenses,” according to a report.

Anthony, 19, made the assertion in a notice of appeal filed after he was found guilty of fatally stabbing 17-year-old Austin Metcalf and sentenced to 35 years behind bars, according to a report by ABC WFAA.

Anthony — who was moved to a Texas state prison Wednesday — is “penniless, destitute, and indigent person, too poor to employ counsel to represent me on the appeal,” reads the appeal form.

Anthony’s defense attorney, Mike Howard, said the defense has “several important issues for the appellate courts to consider. An appeal is the next part of the legal process and a right afforded every American.”

Those fundraising details raised eyebrows because they complicate the indigence claim. Reports said one crowdfunding page that had collected over a million dollars was shut down after the conviction. The apparent tension between donations and the indigence claim is one reason public interest remains high.

The legal team has flagged several appellate avenues to pursue, and some experienced appellate lawyers say the strongest arguments may focus on procedure rather than the evidence the jury heard. Procedural errors, if significant, can warrant reversal or a new trial even when the underlying facts are damning.

Dallas appellate attorney David Coale, who was not involved in the case, said the strongest issues on appeal may have little to do with the evidence jurors heard and more to do with whether the trial was conducted properly.

“The first is, are we in the right county or should we be in Collin County?” Coale said. “Then we go to the race issue because before we even start the trial, we’ve got to have a jury. Did we do that right? And then once we got the trial going and heard all the evidence, did we tell the jury what to do correctly?”

Coale said one issue likely to resurface is the defense’s claim that Black jurors were improperly removed from the panel during jury selection, potentially violating what’s known as Batson law, which prohibits attorneys from excluding jurors solely because of race.

“And the argument is, it’s not so much that the jury pool is all white,” Coale said. “The problem is when the jurors were struck … the Anthony argument is that the prosecution used it to get rid of the black jurors.

One central appellate claim will be the Batson challenge, which argues prosecutors struck jurors because of race. Batson law exists to prevent racial discrimination in jury selection, and courts take such claims seriously. If the defense can show improper strikes, that can trigger a reversal or new trial on limited grounds.

Another procedural angle critics point to is whether the case was tried in the proper county, and whether judges gave correct jury instructions. Those technical issues are often the bread and butter of appellate success or failure. Appeals courts focus on whether the trial process respected rules, not on whether jurors believed witnesses.

From a Republican perspective the core questions are straightforward: did the system run fairly, and is the appeal an effort to relitigate guilt through procedure? Conservatives who prioritize law and order will say the evidence and the sentence need to stand unless a genuine, substantial legal error is proven. The integrity of verdicts matters for victims and for public confidence.

Practical realities matter too. Anthony was moved to a state prison after sentencing and will face the appeal from custody. Appellate work is specialized and can be expensive, which is why the claim of indigence drew attention when substantial public donations had been reported. Courts will sort out indigence claims and appointment of counsel if warranted.

The public debate will keep circling money, race and process, because all three are explosive topics in criminal cases. The appellate filings will lay out the defense’s legal theory and give judges the chance to weigh whether trial errors require remedy. For now the sentence remains in place as the appeal proceeds through the system.