Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - NFL Star and wife shot dead in bed. Did Silver-spoon teen son murder his parents?

Episode Date: April 10, 2019

AJ Armstrong is accused of killing his parents when he was just 16-years-old. Ex-NFL star, Antonio and wife, Dawn, were shot while sleeping at home. There were no signs of a break-in.Nancy's Expert Panel:John Lemley: Crimeonline.com reporterDr. Brian Russell: Psychologist, lawyer, and Host of “Fatal Vows” on Investigation DiscoveryKathleen Murphy: Family attorneyMichelle Dupree: Medical Examiner, author of "Homicide Investigation Field Guide" Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. It's not even the fact of just dealing with not having my parents anymore. It's the fact that I'm being accused of something of this magnitude. AJ's attorneys say he can't discuss the facts of the case, but the teen maintains he didn't kill his parents. An intruder did. I'm innocent. There was somebody else in the house that night,

and to know that this is something I'm being accused of just makes everything so much worse. Police say there were no signs of a break-in. Investigators found bullet holes on the floor of A.J.'s room in a pillow and comforter in his closet. But A.J.'s fingerprints and DNA were not on the gun that was found on the kitchen counter, along with a note that read, I have been watching for a long time. Get me. For more than two years, the case has dragged on in court. AJ spent eight months in juvie jail, junior year of high school in a cell, no football games, was very, very hard. I mean, I many sleepless nights, just not being able to be around my family. I mean, only having 10 minute phone calls a week, like it was just hard and hearing my little sister on the phone, like it was just tough to deal with.

No matter how hard things get, I know if I just get into my word, I pray, I just, I know everything will turn out okay. I know I'll feel better. I don't know how it's going to turn out okay. The son of an NFL star on trial for murdering both of his parents as they slept. The defense, of course, has got to point the finger somewhere, so they're pointing it at his brother. I'm talking about Antonio A.J. Armstrong Jr., just 19 years old, now charged with capital murder in the shooting deaths of both parents. I mean, talk about a silver spoon. It's just, your dad's an NFL star, and now you're charged with murdering him and the mom. I'm Nancy Grace.

This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. All-star panel with me, Dr. Brian Russell, host of the hit series Fatal Vows on Investigation Discovery. Renowned divorce lawyer, Kathleen Murphy, also family lawyer. Dr. Michelle Dupree, medical examiner and author of Homicide Investigation Field Guide, and John Lindley, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. Before I get all the facts, I want to go out to Kathleen Murphy, family lawyer, expert out of North Carolina. You know, Kathleen Murphy, sometimes I feel like the more you give,

the more certain children get, the more they are entitled. And then when they don't get a particular thing, they nut up. You scare me. You scare me because I have a 12-year-old. But Nancy, this case is very concerning to me. And I can jump into it at any time. But you're right. We're spoiling our children and we need, we absolutely

need to have them outside in the backyard, weeding and pulling up rocks and pulling up dirt and working hard. Generation now, I don't see hard work. I don't see no. I get what you're saying, but how often do you see, this is a slang term, but parenticide? Yeah, we see it more and more. We see it more and more. There's a trend. There's a trend. And it's concerning because I feel like these kids that I see come in and out of my court systems every day,

when the parents are going through the divorce, they want to coddle their kids. And I tell them, this is not the time to coddle your children. This is the time to hold them even more responsible. To John Limley, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. Now this kid, and I'm saying kid, but he's 19. He's about to turn 20, claims that there was an intruder in the home. I can't properly discuss the case without all the facts. I need those facts to go to medical examiner Dr. Michelle Dupree and psychologist Dr. Brian Russell. So, John Lindley, let's just start at the beginning. Sure. For our purposes, it's probably best to begin around 10 o'clock on the night of Thursday, July 28th.

This family of four is heading to bed for the night. It's the Armstrong family. Antonio Sr., his wife Dawn, his then 16-year-old son Antonio Jr. Everyone calls him AJ. The football star. I mean, this guy's an NFL star. For those of you that don't watch football every Sunday, the dad, Armstrong, big NFLer. Go ahead. Right.

He also played for the Canadian Football League in the U.S. first at Texas A&M and later with the Miami Dolphins in the NFL. Also in the household that night, there is another older son, but he's not there with them in the house that night. Also, Armstrong's youngest child, their daughter, Kara. Before turning out the lights, someone in the household turns on the alarm, and fairly soon, all is quiet. Antonio Sr. and Dawn are in their bedroom on the second floor of the house with Kara just down the hall, sort of on the opposite side of the house, but still on the same floor. AJ is in his loft-style bedroom on the third floor, so he's up there by himself on that floor. It's really just another weeknight in the Armstrong home. They're in the Bel Air

neighborhood of Houston, Texas. Within just a few hours, though, all of that quiet disappears. A.J. is on the phone with a 911 operator reporting that he's heard gunshots coming from downstairs. He thinks his parents' bedroom. A.. AJ says that he thinks there's an intruder in the house and he's hiding in an upstairs closet when that 911 call begins. Now, Nancy, the 911 call was not released to the public, but as Ivory Hecker with Fox 26 tells us, it was played in court. In court, there was debate over whether to let the jury hear the 911 call made by the teen charged with capital murder. Ultimately, the judge decided to let it play. Parts of the call are hard to hear as Armstrong is whispering. The prosecution transcribed

its interpretation. We have the video of that transcript, but the jury was instructed to listen for its own interpretation. Partway into the call, Armstrong tells the dispatcher he thinks his dad kept a gun in the drawer right next to his bed. Dispatchers then ask if he hears anything else. He says he hears a loud, high-pitched noise. The dispatcher asks where his parents' bedroom is located, then tells him that the police are on their way. The dispatcher asks, does anyone need medical? He says, I have no clue, I don't know. He tells the dispatcher he's calling from a closet

on the third floor of the home and that his 12-year-old sister is on the second floor. Later in the call, he's heard saying, how'd you get into our house? The dispatcher says, if you hear anything, it might be police because they're almost there dispatcher says, if you hear anything, it might be police because they're almost there. Armstrong says, I heard some of them. Armstrong is then heard giving further directions on how to get to the house. The dispatcher asks if police knocked

on the door yet. He responds, mm-hmm. Go ahead, John Limley. What more do we know? Well, while he's on the phone with the 911 emergency operator, the operator hears AJ go into his sister's room and wakes her up. And together, that's where they wait for police to arrive. Now, when investigators arrive at the house, from the outside, everything looks normal, maybe a little too normal if there is such a thing. Nothing appears disturbed on the outside of the home. No doors have been burst open, no broken windows. However, there's something holding the cops back from initially getting inside the house, and that's the alarm system.

It's still on. They have to wait for AJ to come and disarm it so they can get inside. Once inside, investigators check out the first floor, of course. Everything is in pristine shape, nothing unusual until they get to the kitchen. And as we heard in a clip earlier, on the kitchen counter is a gun and a note that says, we've been watching you. Oh, my goodness. It sounds straight out of like a fifth grade mystery novel. We've been watching you. And the gun laying there screaming, please find me.

But, you know, this brings it down to two people in the home. Weren't there the two parents, the football star Antonio Armstrong, the wife Dawn Armstrong, the son A.J. Jr., and the little sister? Isn't that all that's in the home? Right, just the four of them. Okay, so that's a yes. So the alarm didn't go off. There's no sign of a forced entry in any way. There's a gun lying on the kitchen counter and a note that says, We've been watching you.

But what could be the possible motive? Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. The front door was locked, and the back door was locked on the first floor. The windows, and let me back up, locked and monitored. The door to the garage, monitored. The windows on the first floor, closed. Locked. Screens on the outside, monitored by the system.

So the alarm didn't go off. There's no sign of a forced entry in any way. There's a gun lying on the kitchen counter and a note that says, we've been watching you. But let me ask you this, Lemley, what could be the possible motive? We know the little girl didn't do it because we hear him, A.J. Jr., waking her up on the 911 call, if that is to be believed. But what could be the possible motive, Lemley? Well, it appears that in the past week leading up to this date, A.J.

and his parents had had a number of arguments over school, over his behavior, really not concentrating enough on his schoolwork. And he had been grounded at one point. Uh-oh. What do you know about that, Dr. Brian Russell? Boy, do we need a shrink. Psychologist, lawyer, host of Fatal Vows on ID. What about the argument?

Well, I think all of this is indicative of what we were talking about earlier, which is that you can get kids who are feeling so entitled that when they get deprived of something, they actually feel that that is an affront, you know, and in this case, potentially a death penalty offense. And, you know, most parents who find themselves in this situation with their kids are not going to be killed by their kids. But you have to keep in mind that, you know, if you don't get this attitude under control, at the very least, you're turning your kid loose on the world. And not only to do damage to others, but also to be knocked around by others who aren't going to take their crap. We also know that there's an older

brother. He doesn't live in the home. And the suspect in this case, Antonio Armstrong Jr., AJ, is trying to point the finger at his older brother who lives in a different area. Now, Dr. Michelle Dupree, medical examiner and author of Homicide Investigation Field Guide, you've been on so many murder scenes, the home alarm was still in place. It had not alarmed. All right. So isn't it a very simple matter with the home alarm and the alarm company to look at the data? You can see if say, let's just pretend and believe me, this is pretending that the older brother came to the home, knows the code, cuts the alarm off, goes in, kills his parents, leaves behind a ridiculous note, we've been watching you and a gun, resets the alarm and leaves. Okay. There's no blood

on the doors. There's no blood on the alarm, no blood in the kitchen, no trail of blood, nothing. But isn't it true, Dr. Michelle Dupree, you can look at the history of an alarm. You can see when it's been turned on and off. For instance, cops can tell, oh, it was turned off one hour before the 911 call. Isn't that true? Yes, Nancy, that's exactly right. And depending on how the alarm is set up, if each person has their code, you may be able to tell who turned it off and when. Another issue to John Limley is they've got this alarm system.

And you can't tell me a guy that was with the Miami Dolphins, Texas A&M, then the Canadian League, they got some money. All right. I guarantee you his alarm system was totally tricked out, including surveillance cameras. And number one, they can look at the security log. Number two, that Dr. Dupree and I are just talking about. Number two, there's probably surveillance video that my guess is going to show nobody coming into that home. John Lindley, what do you know? It's amazing, Nancy, how much of this case actually hinges on that security system. One thing that investigators found out through

records from the company that monitored the Armstrong home is that when someone turned on that alarm at 9.52 p.m. on that Thursday evening, they pressed the button stay. For anyone who has a system, a security system, there are multiple ways that you can set it for security. And stay means that you want to make sure that people inside the house can move around as they want to. They can go down to the kitchen, maybe go to the den and watch some TV. Move around without setting it off. What will set it off in stay mode is if a door or a window is open. And that is the way it was set on that night. You know, I've got another issue right here.

Now, the suspect, the 19-year-old son, who's been given everything on a silver platter by his NFL dad, Antonio, and mom, Dawn Armstrong, out of love, he says a masked intruder came in the home the night of the killings. So I guess the masked intruder had the alarm code. But in his 911 call, John Lindley, does he mention a masked intruder or did that pop up later? No, well, he doesn't mention the mask yet.

He just says that he believes there is an intruder in the home, and that's when he's hiding in the bedroom before, excuse me, hiding in the closet before going to wake up his sister. So he did not mention a mask on 911. No, not at that point. On the 911 call, does he says he believes there is an intruder in the house. The gunshots that did not wake up the little sister. Okay, question to you. What do you make of this witness, Maxine Adams, who states their murders were related to the dad's alleged involvement in a prostitution ring. Yeah, that's something that has emerged just since this has gone to court, that there is some sort of

nefarious business going on, a prostitution ring, a lot of money changing hands, and that somehow Antonio Sr. is involved in all of this, and this is some sort of payback for a deal that went bad. On the second floor, windows not monitored on the second floor. Windows are 13, 14 feet up in the air. But windows when they went to bed that night closed, locked

screens on the outside on the second floor, third floor. One thing on the third floor really is the defendants room window closed screen on The defendant's room. Window closed. Screen on it. That was the safety bubble that had been set up by the Armstrongs when they went to bed that night. You know, John Lindley, you've led me all the way through the home. You've told me about the alarm system. But what you haven't told me about is the single most important thing, the dead bodies. Right, the actual murder scene, which is the master bedroom.

This is when investigators move up after finding that gun and note in the kitchen, move to the second floor of the house. They enter Antonio and Dawn's room, and what they see there could not be any different to what they had seen on the first floor, which was almost in pristine shape. Let's take a listen to Courtney Fisher with ABC 13. A.J. Armstrong sat down with police, questioned for 60 minutes. How's your relationship with your parents, detectives begin. We were all like really close. Dad was the go-to for everything. AJ described the day before Dawn and Antonio were killed, nothing out of the ordinary. He says he was still up at 1 a.m. and as he walked down from the third

floor, he says he heard two gunshots and saw an intruder run. I just like personally felt bad because I saw the guy like I feel like I should have done something. What did he look like? Asks the detective. They had it was like a mask and you could only see the eyes and the mouth, but he looked like a black guy. Later, AJ says he's never touched his dad's gun, but then changes his story when police say they found a bullet hole in the team's bedroom floor. AJ admits he shot the gun two to three weeks ago. About halfway through the interview, A.J. says, There will be no gunpowder. Nothing like that will come back on me.

I had nothing to do with this. Antonio Sr. and Dawn have been shot, and pillows are covering their heads. Dawn is already dead, and Antonio's... Wait a minute. Wait a wait a minute pillows covering their heads correct i wonder if they were shot through the pillows or if the killer covered them up after the murder because that tells me it's not a random shooting because a random shooting i mean first of all you're going to have a burglary or a sex assault neither of those here nothing was taken but a random killer doesn't take the time to cover

up the bodies they steal what they're going to steal and they get out of there prosecutors contend it was a case of both that he actually used the pillows to silence the the gunfire. And once the killings, or almost killings, when it comes to his dad, are complete, he actually covers their heads with the pillows and leaves the pillow there. And Dawn, when police arrive, she's already dead. And Antonio Sr. is barely hanging on to life and dies very soon after arriving at the hospital.

You know, John Loomis, I'm very curious about that crime scene. What other details can you give me? I'm trying to figure out, is there any way that A.J. Jr. did not do this thing? From what investigators say, the rest of the bedroom looks just as they assume the parents, Antonio Sr. and Dawn, left it before going to bed. There was nothing overturned. There was no ransacking of the room. Nothing had, you know, no drawers pulled out or anything. It is just as if there was a shooting involved and absolutely nothing else. No ransacking, no theft, no sex assault, nothing? Nothing.

Now, what were you telling me about the significance of the alarm being on stay? Because that to me is very, very probative. In other words, it proves something to me. The stay function is when a family or anyone is at home and they want to be able to move about the house. Maybe they have a dog or cat that is going to be moving around the house during the night. They want that not to set off the alarm. However, they do want the alarm to go off if a door, the front door, back door, windows are opened. And interesting in the records that investigators find is there are also these little monitors that are hooked up, motion detectors, on different floors of the house. And the only movement after that alarm is set around 10 o'clock is shortly after 1 a.m. Incidentally, the emergency call was made around

1.40. The first movement is seen on the third floor as someone will assume it's AJ is coming down the stairs onto the landing of the second floor and then the the next movement after that is a good 20-25 minutes later then there is movement detected on the first floor. Okay, where are the parents' bedrooms? The parents' bedroom is on the second floor, right there in the middle of the house. And the children are on the third floor? Well, the daughter, Kara, she's actually on the same floor, the second floor, as her parents, but at the other end of the house. A.J. is the only one that has a bedroom on the third floor.

Up in the loft. Correct. So let me understand what you're telling me. This alarm system is so sensitive, it detects movement on A.J.'s floor, then movement on the second floor, nothing for 25 minutes, then movement on the first floor where the gun and the note is found, and then what? Well, when that movement is first detected on the first floor, it's another 10, 15 minutes before A.J. makes that 911 call around 1.40, 1.41 a.m.

From a landline at the home? It's not known if it was a landline or a cell phone. So recap, you've got movement on AJ Jr.'s floor, third floor. Then you have movement on second floor where the parents are. Then you have movement on the first floor where the note and the gun are. And then before there's the first floor where the note and the gun are, and then before there's any other movement, the 911 call is made. Right, and what's very interesting is the amount of time where really no movement is detected in the hallways from the moment that someone goes from the third to second floor. There's this 20, 25 minute gap with no one in the hallways. Then this other gap after someone moves down to the first floor and between that and the 911 call.

It's not even the fact of just dealing with not having my parents anymore. It's the fact that I'm being accused of something of this magnitude, I'm innocent. There was somebody else in the house that night, and to know that this is something I'm being accused of just makes everything so much worse. Jail was very, very hard. I mean, many sleepless nights, just not being able to be around my family. I mean, only having 10-minute phone calls a week, like, it was just hard. And hearing my little sister on the phone, like, it was just hard. And hearing my little sister on the phone, like, it was just tough to deal with.

No matter how hard things get, I know if I just get into my word, I pray, I just, I know everything will turn out okay. I know I'll feel better. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. At the core of this case, when you look past the claims and evidence and opinions, are three heartbroken parents. They were amazing. They were two amazing people. Antonio's mother, Dawn's mother and father.

They are navigating the deep waters of grief, but fully support their grandson. And we're not wavering now. No. Oh, we're not wavering. No. We were standing. We know him.

We know our grandson. That's the thing, we know our grandson. We know him. We know our grandson. That's the thing. We know our grandson. Yes. We know what he's capable of doing and what he's not capable of doing. No. And we know that he's not capable of murdering his mother and his father. You know, it's amazing to me, and I want to go to you, Dr. Brian Russell, on this. You've got the dad who was an NFLer.

The only way the son could have overcome him is to attack him in his sleep. Attack him in his sleep, attack him with a firearm. And I think that's another thing that we ought to point out here, that if this kid is guilty, and I am, don't get me wrong, if anybody listens to the show regularly, they know I am a huge Second Amendment supporter. However, one thing that we know here, if this kid is guilty, is that we have yet another teenager who found access to a firearm, presumably his parents' firearm, in the home. And you got to watch that, parents. You've got to keep these things. If you're going to have them, you got

to keep them responsibly. The kid should have never had access. And to you, things. If you're going to have them, you've got to keep them responsibly. The kids should have never had access. And to you, Dr. Michelle Dupree, renowned medical examiner, what does it say to you? Why would he employ the use of pillows in the murder? Nancy, there could be several reasons. He could be silencing the noise. He could also be trying to smother them. He could also be covering them up after the fact

as a sign of remorse. Whatever was discovered about the alleged prostitution ring, is there anything to that? There hasn't been a lot. It was brought up sort of peripherally in arguments brought about by the defense, but they didn't go into depth. We've got a witness, Maxine, that is talking about it. Right. And she is the sole witness when it comes to this supposed prostitution ring. Well, wait a minute. So is she saying that the NFL star Antonio Armstrong used prostitutes or ran a ring? Nancy, let's take a listen to Courtney Fisher with ABC 13. Enter Maxine Adams, a close friend to Dawn and Antonio. Six months after the murders,

Adams spoke to police saying her husband and Antonio were involved in a prostitution ring and Antonio had received death threats. Prosecutors told AJ's attorneys about that conversation. Quote, the defense could have spoken with Adams at the time, but chose not to do so. The DA's office sent us that statement. They declined to be interviewed for this story. Couldn't you have done your due diligence and sent your PI to talk to her as soon as you knew Maxine Adams is making claims about this prostitution. We could have, and that's probably a mistake on our part. A year and a half later, AJ's attorneys were given the taped conversation between Adams and police. And it's 13 minutes of

full details, names, phone numbers, people involved, how it worked. The woman said that my son was receiving threatening phone calls. He's dead. You mean to tell me that wasn't enough for you to start investigating? She is saying that he was involved in a ring, that he didn't run it but that there was also uh some real trouble when it came to money that had changed hands or was supposed to change hands at one point and that's when the the trouble really started and someone had motive to kill him somebody that um was already hiding on the third floor okay you know it's bad enough that the guy is murdered along with his wife, but then to drag his name through the mud. Yeah, Nancy, can I weigh in on that for a second?

Yes, please. We recently spoke with the Vetrano's, and one of the things that I thought of during that conversation, this is the family, the parents of a young woman who was murdered, and it took a long time. This is the family, the parents of a young woman who was murdered. And it took a long time. There was a mistrial and then finally a verdict and a second trial. But one of the things I thought about when we were talking with them is, you know, the anguish that the survivors that loved the victims go through is sort of the price that we pay in our society for having a system that goes to such great lengths to make sure that we don't lock up an innocent person. In other words, we give

the defense all kinds, we actually stack the deck in favor of the defense. And we've decided as a society that we want to do that because it's worse to us to lock up an innocent person than to let a guilty person go free. I understand it. And I'm an attorney. But one of the things that I hate is that we allow defense attorneys to throw up these wild theories that have virtually no support. Well, maybe he was involved in a prostitution ring

and maybe somebody came in here and knew the alarm code and did this really complex James Bond-style murder and got back out and turned the alarm back on. Seriously, come on. I mean, we've got a young daughter here who survives these parents. Presumably there's other extended family

that are in anguish right now, and it just bugs the hell out of me when I hear these kinds of theories actually being entertained. Let me ask you this. Now we know the defense was told during the case, during the investigation on the son, AJ Jr., that the allegation of the dad being involved in a prostitution ring had been investigated and was not credible that the investigation was complete. So for 18 months, the defense has been claiming that there were all these recordings about a prostitution ring. And the cops are saying they investigated

those claims and that that was not true. Let me ask you this, John Lemley. A.J. Armstrong Jr. was 16 years old at the time his parents were shot dead in their sleep. Is this being tried in adult court or G.B. court? It was moved to adult court. And very interestingly about that prostitution ring, all of this for Maxine Adams, she said on the stand, began because she was suspicious about what her husband was doing. She said that Armstrong Sr. and her then husband Cecil Adams were involved in some sort of prostitution ring. There were death threats, life insurance policy changes.

At the time, Maxine said that she hired a private investigator to snoop on her husband due to her suspicions. However, in addition to not even remembering the name of the PI that she hired, Adams could only point to very vague indications of the alleged prostitution ring her ex-husband and Armstrong Sr. were supposedly involved in, mostly phone records. Adams testified she could not remember who told her about the supposed death threats or about the deceased former footballer changing his life insurance policy shortly before he was killed. Wait a minute. Let me just break that down.

I've been through this many, many times in court trying murders and all sorts of felony cases. The defense will come up with a theory like, hey, it's not my guy. There have been other break-ins and rapes in that neighborhood. That's who did it. You can't just come up, this is the law. It's not me pontificating. The law does not allow the defense to just come up with a theory and bring it into court like this woman, Maxine Adams, claiming, you know, I had a PI on my husband and he knew Antonio Armstrong and I think they were seeing hookers and they were part of a prostitution ring and that's really what happened. No, you have to have credible evidence to bring that in as a defense.

All this testimony occurred in pretrial hearings. We wait as justice unfolds. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.