Did Karmelo Anthony's family purchase a Cadillac Escalade for $150,000 and rent a $900,000 home after receiving $500,000 in donations to pay for the teen's criminal defense in April 2025? No, that's not true: Instagram photos from before Anthony, 17, was charged in the stabbing death of Austin Metcalf, 17, showed the family had the luxury car and were living in the house in 2023. Anthony's father did say the family planned to use some of the funds to relocate because of threats received after their address was made public.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) shared on April 16, 2025. It read:
Karmelo Anthony's family has purchased a Cadillac Escalade worth $150,000 and begun renting a $900,000 home after receiving half a million in donations for his defense.
This is what the post looked like at the time of writing:
(Source: X.com screenshot taken on Wed Apr 16 21:14:23 2025 UTC)
Another X account -- @MissInfo__ (archived here) -- was quick to point out that photos of the Cadillac and house were posted on the Instagram account of Karmelo's mother Kala Hayes in 2023.
The mother's account is now set to private, but it was indexed by Google (archived here):
At least $453,000 had been donated in an online fundraiser (archived here) at the time of writing:
Andrew Anthony, the teen's father, said in court that the family would use some of the donations to "survive" and relocate from their current rental home. News reports and social media postings have included the Zillow page for the Frisco, Texas, house.
The New York Post's April 16, 2025 article quoted an unnamed neighbor saying the family bought a new car after the killing, but it did not include any details or confirmation.
