A death sentence was carried out yesterday in Texas and another is scheduled for today in Utah: 11 executions have already been carried out this year in the United States, and tomorrow there could be 12.
Arthur Lee Burton, 54, who was sentenced to death for murder in 1997, was executed by lethal injection yesterday at the Huntsville Penitentiary in Walker County, Texas. He was pronounced dead at 6:47 p.m. local time (1:47 a.m. AEDT), and was found guilty of killing Nancy Adleman, a mother of three, who was attacked while jogging near her Houston home in July 1997 and then strangled with her own shoelaces.
Burton’s lawyers had asked the Supreme Court to stay the death penalty, arguing that the inmate was “intellectually disabled,” but the justices rejected the request. This is the third execution carried out in Texas this year and the 11th nationwide in the United States.
Another is scheduled for today in Utah, the first in 14 years. Taberon Honie, 48, is scheduled to be executed, again by lethal injection, in Salt Lake City around midnight (8:00 tomorrow morning in Italy). The man was sentenced to death in 1998 for the sexual assault and murder of his ex-girlfriend’s mother.
If the sentence is not suspended, it will be the 12th execution carried out in the United States since the beginning of 2024. The last one recorded in Utah dates back to 2010 when a convicted person was executed by firing squad. The death penalty has been abolished in 23 of the 50 U.S. states. Six others, Arizona, California, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Tennessee, have a moratorium on executions.
