05/04/2026
Anthony Johnson, Jr., nicknamed AJ by his family, was the second youngest of five. He was a 31-year-old Marine veteran whose parents describe him as a kind person that never gave them issues.
Instead, Johnson Jr. struggled with a schizophrenia diagnosis.
“There’s two parts of Anthony,” Jacqualyne Johnson said during an interview with KERA News. “There’s an Anthony before the Marine Corps and there’s Anthony after the Marine Corp.”
Jacqualyne Johnson said she tried to get Johnson Jr. admitted to a mental health facility on April 19, 2024, but said the staff turned him away because he wasn’t a threat to himself or others. Johnson Jr. ended up leaving their home. The next day, his mother said she received a call from him saying he had been arrested, but did not know what he was being charged with.
Johnson Jr. had only been in custody for a day when he died at the county jail on April 21, 2024.
While in custody, [jailers failed to engage properly with Johnson Jr., which] ended with him in handcuffs lying face down on the ground. An officer pepper sprayed him in the mouth and another officer, Rafael Moreno, kneeled on his back for about 90 seconds. Johnson Jr. could be heard saying he couldn’t breathe in partially released phone camera footage recorded by Lt. Joel Garcia. Johnson died, and his death was ruled a homicide by asphyxiation.
Two years later, his parents are still navigating that grief.
“I shed tears this morning,” Anthony Johnson said in an interview with KERA News. “Usually, it happens on Fridays because of the area I drive by where AJ and I always were. Just driving around in the Fort Worth area. It saddens me. I’m not going to be resolved until we receive accountability.”
“After seeing that video, we will never be the same again,” Anthony Johnson said. “They killed a kind man that had a mental illness.”
Read full article in stories and at: keranews.org/news/2026-05-04/i-shed-tears-this-morning-anthony-johnson-jr-s-family-navigates-grief-2-years-after-his-death
