Months before he murdered a high school athlete, Karmelo Anthony fantasized about shooting his girlfriend and boasted he could blame it on ‘PTSD’, newly released court documents reveal.
Anthony repeatedly threatened to kill Valeria Perez, 18, in a series of increasingly disturbing messages in the 16 months before he fatally stabbed Austin Metcalf at a high school track meet.
The threats are contained in a 75-page trove of evidence that prosecutors and Anthony’s original defense team agreed to keep from the jury at his murder trial, in an extraordinary deal aimed at preventing the case from becoming consumed by explosive racial dynamics. The Daily Mail has exclusively obtained and verified the documents.
Anthony, now 19, was convicted in June of murdering 17-year-old Metcalf at a track meet in Frisco, Texas, on April 2, 2025, and sentenced to 35 years in prison.
The newly released messages, exchanged between Anthony and girlfriend Perez from December 2023 through the day of the killing, offer a window into the teenage killer’s state of mind.
They show Anthony describing episodes of uncontrollable rage, boasting about weapons and threatening violence against the girlfriend who is still standing by him even after his conviction.
In one of the earliest messages, sent when Anthony was 16, he told Perez: ‘When I get mad i see red. When I get mad i blackout. When I get mad i cant control myself. When I get mad my eyes change color.’
Anthony claimed at one point that he had broken into a neighbor’s house and stolen a watch. He also claimed to have taken a gun and a knife to high school.
Karmelo Anthony with girlfriend Valeria Perez, who supported him throughout his trial and retrial hearings
A month before he murdered Austin Metcalf, Anthony appeared to threaten to murder Perez
A few months earlier, he issued an even more chilling threat over the possibility that Perez might talk to another man while he was away with the Air Force
Two days before that, he told her he ‘hated’ her and wanted to kill her
By June 2024, the threats toward Perez had become increasingly violent and explicit.
On June 10, Anthony wrote: ‘how many bullets uu want coming out of ur chest’.
Six days later, he told her: ‘Imma beat ur ass’.
The threats escalated again in November.
‘U dumb b**ch i f***ing hate u i wanna f***ing kill u b**ch i swear on my f***ing life if u tell ny of my f***ing family imma get u,’ Anthony wrote.
Days later, he issued an even more chilling threat over the possibility that Perez might talk to another man while he was away with the Air Force.
‘Baby im jus lyk when im gone for the airforce if i find out uu f***ing with, f***ing, talking anythign with smb else i will take my federal issued rifle stick that rifle into ur mouth and murder you and him,’ he wrote.
He added: ‘im going to get u b**ch.’
Anthony then appeared to contemplate how he would explain the violence, telling Perez he would ‘say it was PTSD’.
It’s unclear whether Anthony attempted to enlist in the military prior to his murder conviction.
The messages were far from isolated outbursts.
An October 17, 2024 message obtained by prosecutors contained a ‘to-do’ list for Anthony’s girlfriend about how to deal with ‘weirdos’.
Among his instructions was a threat Perez could use against unwanted attention from men: ‘say sum slick like my bf kill people’.
Anthony was convicted of murder and sentenced to 35 years in prison for fatally stabbing Metcalf at a high school track meet
In February 2025, Anthony appeared to admit to physically assaulting his girlfriend
In various texts sent to Torres in 2024, Anthony expressed his desire to assault her and others
By early 2025, the relationship had become even more volatile.
In a February message, Anthony appeared to acknowledge assaulting Perez, writing that he was ‘mad cuz I wanted to talk and u was walking away from me.’
A month later, he again threatened to kill her and her friends.
‘imma f***ing murder u…yo friends go die…sho them ts,’ he wrote.
On the morning of April 2, 2025, Anthony stabbed Metcalf while the pair took shelter under a pop-up tent during a rainy high school track meet in Frisco, north of Dallas.
Anthony argued that he acted in self-defense but a Collin County jury rejected that account, convicting him of murder. He is appealing the conviction after a bid for a retrial was rejected last month.
The newly obtained material from the case also sheds light on the troubled relationship between Anthony and Perez in the period immediately before the killing.
Hours before Anthony stabbed Metcalf, Anthony texted Perez to say he was ‘lowk [low key] on the verge’. He repeated and emphasized the same message minutes later.
Perez posted a series of photos of herself with boyfriend Karmelo Anthony after he was convicted
Anthony captures a photograph of a handgun on November 23 – one of many images he took holding firearms in the months before the killing
An October 17, 2024 message contained a ‘to-do’ list for his girlfriend on how to deal with ‘weirdos’
In March 2024, Anthony appears to tell Torres that he assaulted a female
Despite the threats, Perez has remained loyal to Anthony and attended appeal proceedings last month.
After his sentencing, she broke her silence on TikTok, writing in June: ‘Hold your head high, my sweet boy. You’re not alone we’re fighting for you, always. I love you more than words.’
Contacted by phone, Perez declined to comment to the Daily Mail.
‘I’m not giving no answers to the press right now. Thank you so much, though,’ she said.
The messages were among a cache of evidence deliberately kept away from Anthony’s trial jury under what lawyers dubbed a ‘gentleman’s agreement’.
The deal was proposed by lead prosecutor Bill Wirskye, with prosecutors and defense attorneys agreeing to exclude potentially inflammatory material about both teenagers.
That meant jurors who decided Anthony’s fate never saw the full picture of either teenager’s background.
Court documents show that Metcalf was sentenced to 12 months of juvenile probation after being caught spray-painting racist graffiti.
Austin Metcalf had also been accused, while still in elementary school, of using racial slurs and bullying a black classmate.
But the same agreement that kept those allegations from the jury also kept damaging evidence about Anthony away from them.
In April 2023, Anthony told a friend he was going to ‘shoot the school up’ – but followed up by claiming it was a joke
Among other disturbing findings was a racist rant in Anthony’s Apple Notes
Anthony fatally stabbed Metcalf after the pair began arguing under a team tent (shown) during a high school track meet
A photo of the folding knife Karmelo Anthony used to stab Austin Metcalf was released after his June murder trial
That evidence included his threats against Perez, allegations that he stalked or assaulted her, claims about taking weapons to school, photographs of him posing with guns and a series of violent and racist messages exchanged with friends.
The agreement only became public after Anthony’s new defense team returned to court in August seeking a new trial.
Anthony’s lawyers have argued that the evidence should never have been kept from the jury in the first place, and that the agreement between prosecutors and his original lawyers ultimately deprived him of a fair trial.
At a hearing last month, Anthony’s appellate lawyer Russell Wilson argued that the so-called ‘gentleman’s agreement’ to keep damaging evidence about both teenagers out of court had profound consequences for the defense.
Lawyers said that concerns that prosecutors might abandon the agreement if Anthony took the stand contributed to a last-minute change in strategy and Anthony ultimately did not testify in his own defense. The defense has argued that the restrictions, along with other rulings during the trial, amounted to serious constitutional and legal errors.
The bid for a new trial was rejected by Judge Michael Chitty on August 22, after a two-day hearing in which the previously suppressed evidence was aired publicly for the first time.
Anthony’s lawyers said they would continue fighting the conviction, and the case is now headed to the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas.
Wilson did not respond to a request for comment. At a press conference last week, Anthony’s family announced they were seeking another $250,000 to offset legal costs after an earlier campaign raised nearly $634,000.
