By: AP via Scripps News Group

The trial judge who presided over the case of a Texas teenager convicted of fatally stabbing a 17-year-old athlete at a high school track meet was ordered removed from the case as the defendant seeks a new trial and appeals his conviction.

Karmelo Anthony, now 19, was convicted of murder and sentenced to 35 years in prison after a suburban Dallas jury in June rejected his claims of self-defense during a confrontation with Austin Metcalf in the stadium bleachers last year.

Anthony’s legal team argued Wednesday that a retrial was warranted in part because state District Judge John Roach enforced overly strict courtroom rules and gave an interview after the trial was over.

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A new judge will be assigned for Thursday’s hearing on the retrial request.

Anthony attended the hearing in Collin County wearing a green jumpsuit. His parents and Metcalf’s parents also were in the courtroom.

The case attracted attention in part because of a flood of social media posts that amplified the killing in racial terms. Anthony is Black; Metcalf was white. Lawyers on both sides, however, told jurors the tragedy had nothing to do with race.

After the order to remove Roach, Anthony supporters cheered in the courthouse hallways and outside the building.

Anthony did not testify during the trial.

During the trial, students described a heated exchange over Anthony’s refusal on a rainy spring day to leave a tent that belonged to Metcalf’s team. The teens went to different high schools.

Several schools were competing when Anthony sat under the Memorial High School tent that was perched in the bleachers. Austin Metcalf and others had repeatedly told Anthony to leave, witnesses testified, leading to an escalating confrontation.

Prosecutors said Anthony provoked Metcalf, and witnesses testified that Anthony was the aggressor.

Anthony at one point reached inside a bag and replied: “Touch me and see what happens,” according to a police report.

Metcalf pushed Anthony, according to witnesses, who said Anthony then pulled out a knife and stabbed him in the chest.