Jeff Metcalf, the father of slain Frisco, Texas, track star Austin Metcalf, told Fox News Digital his home was swatted Thursday night.
“I can confirm that last night our officers responded to a gunshot call in the 8000 block of Hickory Street involving the Metcalf family, which turned out to be swatting,” the Frisco Police Department (FPD) confirmed.
It happened a few hours after an incendiary press conference hosted by the spokesman for the family of Metcalf’s alleged killer, Karmelo Anthony.
Anthony is charged with murdering Metcalf after the two 17-year-olds got into a dispute under a tent at a high school track meet April 2. Anthony allegedly stabbed Metcalf, who died in his twin brother’s arms.
Swatting is when a 911 call is made, usually to report a fake violent crime, to get police and sometimes even SWAT teams, to respond to the address given by the caller. It has increasingly been used as an intimidation tactic to target high-profile individuals and political rivals.
Thursday’s press conference was scheduled after Anthony was released from the Collin County Jail Monday when his bond was reduced from $1 million to $250,000. The controversial decision led to questions about how hundreds of thousands of dollars raised for the Anthony family online were being spent.
Jeff Metcalf attended the press conference, which quickly devolved into chaos after Dominique Alexander, head of the activist group Next Generation Action Network retained to speak on behalf of the Anthony family, criticized Metcalf’s presence there at the outset of the event.
“What we’ve seen at the beginning of this press conference, of the father being at this press conference, these are my words — don’t quote anybody — is a disrespect to the dignity of his son,” Alexander said.
Metcalf arrived at the press conference at its scheduled start time but was threatened with criminal charges if he did not leave. He left with a police escort from the Dallas Police Department.
“Next Generation Action Network from the beginning has respected the loss of life, no matter our opinion of it. We have kept our opinion close,” Alexander said. “We have not attacked. We have not shared the information that was shared with us about Austin Metcalf because we respect the dignity of life and loss.”
Alexander later brought race into the discussion.
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“What [Jeff Metcalf] has felled [sic] into is the political operatives that want to make this thing a political thing of hate and yet bigotry and yet racism,” he said. “We have conservative operatives that have been posting nonstop about this case.”
Those comments largely overshadowed the purpose of the press conference, which was to set the record straight on how more than $475,000 from a GiveSendGo fundraiser raised for the Anthony family will be spent.
Alexander said none of the money has been spent, and Anthony’s mother, Karla Hayes, whose reading of a statement prepared by the family attorney was also supposed to be a focus of the conference, confirmed that.
“Our family has been under attack,” she said. “Whatever you think, what happened between Karmelo and the Metcalf boy, my three younger children, my husband and I didn’t do anything to deserve to be threatened, harassed and lied about.
“Our address and my husband’s previous employer’s address has been put on all social media platforms. My husband had to take a leave of absence because he’s afraid of what may happen to our family.”
Alexander later called Anthony’s opponents bigots.
“Because these racist bigots try to prevent us from standing up for our baby, our boy, he should be afforded the same rights that Kyle Rittenhouse had, Daniel Penny and all the people who have claimed whatever their defense was. He should be afforded the same right,” Alexander said.
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“Nobody in the public media has one video, but we got the video of Kyle Rittenhouse with an AK-47 shooting three people in the back,” he said. “We got that, and he raised more than $2 million publicly, and nobody said anything about that.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Alexander.
Metcalf has tried to tone down the political rhetoric since the April 2 stabbing.
He previously told Fox News, “I want to clarify something right off to start because I’ve already heard some rumors and gossip. This was not a race thing. This is not a political thing.
“Do not politicize this. It’s not … this is a human being thing. This person made a bad choice and affected both his family and my family forever.”