Jeff Metcalf is to blame for the murder of his son, according to one professor at a historically black university.

Dr. Stacey Patton, a journalism professor at Howard University, accused Metcalf of failing “to teach your boy that Black children have boundaries” in a personal Substack post on June 10, 2026, a day after Karmelo Anthony was found guilty in the 2025 murder of Austin Metcalf.

Anthony, of Centennial High School, pulled a knife on Metcalf, of Memorial High School, and stabbed him in the heart at a track meet in April 2025 moments after Metcalf asked Anthony to leave his team’s tent. Several witnesses testified that Anthony refused Metcalf’s request several times, saying five times, “Touch me and see what happens.”

According to Patton, however, Austin’s murder is a result of Jeff Metcalf’s failure as a father. She wrote, “YOU failed to teach humility, restraint, or the sacred fact that another person’s body is not your jursidiction. YOU failed to teach him that another child’s space is not a challenge to be conquered.”

She continued, “YOU obviously failed to teach your son that touching, confronting, crowding, testing, or policing another person can have consequences. And YOU failed to teach him that the same world that cheers white boys for being bold and aggressive will not always be there to save them when they mistake somebody else’s restraint for permission.”

During his victim impact statement, Metcalf asked Anthony to look at him as he spoke, which Anthony refused to do. Metcalf then stated, “You can’t even look me in the eye right now, but you can stab my fucking son in the heart.” This word choice held “power” and “refusal,” according to Patton.

“There was power in him not looking at you. There was refusal in it. There was survival in it. There was an ancient knowing in it,” she wrote. “Because Black people know what it means when a white man demands eye contact from a Black child after already deciding what that child is. We know the old ritual. We know that sometimes “look at me” is not a request for humanity. It is a demand for surrender. And Karmelo did not surrender.”

Daily Caller