Ramona Franklin Admonished

Ramona Franklin, judge of Harris County's 338th District Court in Texas, was admonished by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals after she withdrew the execution warrant for death row inmate Arthur Lee Burton — convicted in the 1997 rape and murder of a Houston jogger — over concerns about clerical discrepancies in copies of the death warrant (a court clerk had signed multiple copies with slight variations in the placement of the Harris County seal). At prosecutors' request, the Court of Criminal Appeals reviewed Franklin's decision and found she had overstepped her authority and violated her ministerial duty in withdrawing the warrant. The appellate court ordered Franklin to rescind her ruling just days before Burton's scheduled August execution.