TEXAS – Antonio “A.J.” Armstrong, the 23-year-old who was found guilty of killing his mother and father while they slept, has been moved to a second prison in less than a week.
On Sept. 21, A.J. was transferred from the Harris County Jail, where he had been since being handed down his guilty verdict on Aug. 16, to the Garza West Unit located in Beeville, Texas.
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The Garza Unit is responsible for the initial intake and processing of offenders from the surrounding regions into the Texas Department of Corrections and was never said to be A.J.’s permanent facility.
A few days ago, A.J. was moved to the George Beto Unit in Tennessee Colony, Texas, which is located about 170 miles north of Houston, near Palestine, Texas.
Now, the maximum-security unit, which can house 3,150 inmates, will likely be where A.J. carries out his life sentence. He will be eligible for parole in 40 years when he’s in his 60s.
In 2016, A.J. was accused of killing his parents, Dawn and Antonio Sr. inside their southwest Houston home. The case went through three trials where A.J. pled not guilty and argued his innocence in each one. The first two trials were declared a mistrial with jurors in the third trial finding him guilty of capital murder and sentencing him to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 40 years.
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For more information on A.J. and his trial watch KPRC 2′s exclusive series, “The Evidence Room: Sinner or Saint?” which features our exclusive interview with the Armstrong family. You can watch the full interview here.
Since his conviction, A.J. and his family have refused to give up the fight. Earlier this month, A.J.’s attorney Patrick McCann filed for a new trial, claiming “the verdict is contrary to the law and the evidence.”
McCann said there are three reasons why they wanted a new trial, but said he truly focused on the blood evidence found on his client’s t-shirt just days before the start of the third trial.
A.J.’s attorney also states that the Montgomery County Sergeant, Celestina Rossi, who claimed to have found the DNA evidence, has been accused of planting evidence before.
The motion will be ruled on by a federal judge, but the timeline for that ruling has not been made clear.