Arthur Burton was sentenced to death by the State of Texas for the sexual assault and murder of a woman. According to court documents Arthur Burton would force a woman who was jogging into the woods where he would sexually assault her before causing her death by strangling her with a shoelace. Arthur Burton would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death.
Arthur Burton 2022 Information
SID Number: 05930655
TDCJ Number: 00999283
Name: BURTON,ARTHUR LEE
Race: B
Gender: M
Age: 51
Maximum Sentence Date: DEATH ROW
Current Facility: POLUNSKY
Projected Release Date: DEATH ROW
Parole Eligibility Date: DEATH ROW
Inmate Visitation Eligible: YES
Arthur Burton More News
A man who won a new trial to determine whether he should spend his life in prison or die by lethal injection for the 1997 slaying of a woman jogger was sentenced Friday to death.
The jury deliberated over two days before deciding that Arthur Lee Burton, 32, should return to death row for the capital murder of Nancy Adleman, 48.
After the jury was excused by visiting state District Judge Bob Burdette, Burton tearfully apologized to Adleman’s family.
“I’m sorry,” Burton said, sobbing, ” … for causing y’all so much pain that day. … I think about what she said to me, that she forgave me and did I know God. I couldn’t understand why she did that but I didn’t know God then. I looked for answers but I can tell you now I know God now, and I know I took a special person away from you, and I’m sorry for that.”
A family member replied, “We thank you for your apology. Thank you.”
Adleman, a mother of three, was raped, savagely beaten then strangled with her shoelace July 29, 1997, on a jogging trail alongside a secluded bayou near West Road and Beltway 8.
As she was dying she asked Burton if he knew God and told him she forgave him. Her body was found the next day in the woods along the trail.
Prosecutor Devon Anderson told the jury that it was a “premeditated, cold-blooded, senseless and remorseless killing.”
Defense attorney Rob Morrow argued that the jury should spare Burton’s life because he had children who needed him even if he were behind bars. Morrow said that until the day Adleman died, Burton had lived a normal, average life.
“His family wants him to pay for his crime but be able to be in his children’s lives,” Morrow said.
Prosecutor Chuck Noll responded by saying Adleman’s children will never have that luxury. He told the jury that Burton had burglarized cars as a teenager and admitted selling drugs until he was arrested in Adleman’s death.
During his original trial in 1998, Burton was sentenced to die, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturned it because his orginal defense lawyer did not object properly during the punishment phase.