Inset: Dallas Scott Gilbert (Primera Police Department). Background: The street in Texas where Gilbert fatally stabbed his mother two years ago (Google Maps).
A 20-year-old man in Texas will spend two decades behind bars for killing his own mother, stabbing the 47-year-old woman multiple times before attempting to kill his father, who managed to pin his son down and call 911. Cameron County District Judge Juan A. Magallanes last week ordered Dallas Scott Gilbert to serve a sentence of 20 years in a state correctional facility for the 2023 slaying of Angela Watt Gilbert, court records show.
Gilbert, who was 18 at the time of the attack, reached a deal with prosecutors in which he agreed to plead guilty to one count of murder. In exchange for his plea, the State agreed to dismiss charges of attempted capital murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
As Law&Crime previously reported, Gilbert”s attack on his parents took place at about 11:30 a.m. on April 19, 2023, at the family’s home in the 2100 block of Stuart Place Road, which is about 250 miles south of San Antonio, Texas, and a half-hour drive from the U.S.-Mexico border.
In court documents, prosecutors said Gilbert’s episode of “sudden rage” occurred after he remembered that earlier in the day, his dad had been complaining that he was not even “in shape” enough to “throw a football.”
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A short while later, Gilbert told authorities that he went into the kitchen, grabbed a knife, and cut his mother’s hand, claiming it happened while he was “just playing around,” Brownsville, Texas, NBC and CBS affiliate KVEO reported. However, he said he then found himself in an “unexplainable rage,” and suddenly started to stab his mother repeatedly.
Gilbert’s father was awakened by his wife’s screams for help and went to investigate, which is when Gilbert reportedly said he was overcome with anger and began stabbing his father as well.
Emergency medical personnel were transporting Gilbert’s mother to a local hospital for treatment when she was pronounced dead.
Following the attack, Primera Chief of Police Manuel Trevino said that Gilbert’s mother suffered a total of six to eight stab wounds, but emphasized that she did not go down easily.
“I can say one thing, the female did fight. She did have several defensive wounds on her hands, which means she didn’t go down without a fight,” the police chief said of Angela Gilbert. “But again, this was her son attacking her. She probably had no idea what was coming.”
Following the attack, authorities said Gilbert “gave a confession to the entire incident, attributing the attack to a moment of rage that went totally out of control.”
