Sen. Terry C. Burton, R-Newton, has been found not guilty of DUI charges stemming from a Dec. 19 arrest in Oktibbeha County.
Burton was arrested by Mississippi Highway Patrol along Highway 82 in Oktibbeha County around 9 p.m. Dec. 19. According to arrest documents, the officer smelled alcohol on Burton’s breath and requested a breathalyzer test. Burton had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .14, well over the legal limit of .08.
Oktibbeha County Justice Court Clerk Nora Goliday confirmed the verdict Friday, but said the case ended due to the arresting officer being arrested himself.
“The officer was indicted for killing someone,” she said.
Mississippi Highway Patrol officer Kyle Lee, who arrested Burton on Dec. 19., was indicted by the Oktibbeha County Grand Jury Jan. 10 on charges of culpable negligence manslaughter. The charges stemmed from and incident May 7, 2017, when Lee’s 2016 Ford Explorer crashed into a vehicle carrying Mississippi State University student athlete Kaelin Kersh, killing her.
Goliday said all of cases involving Lee were ruled not guilty after his arrest.
“Everything they had on officer Kyle Lee was dismissed,” she said. “All of it, criminal and civil. They sent us a letter. Everything he had was found not guilty.”
Being indicted himself, Goliday said Lee would not be able to testify for the prosecution. That left the court little choice but to throw out all the cases involving him, she said.
Oktibbeha County Prosecutor Haley M. Brown said the “not guilty” ruling in Burton’s case was a result of having to throw out all of Lee’s cases, not a finding based on evidence.
“It wasn’t that he was found not guilty,” she said. “We didn’t even have a trial.”
In January, Burton resigned his position as Senate Pro Tem and announced he would not be running for another term. In an address to his fellow senators, he apologized for any hardship his actions had caused and said he would seek treatment to deal with his “personal shortcomings.” He had served in the Senate since 1992.
Burton had previously been acquitted by a Scott County judge of a DUI charge in 2016 after he claimed breath spray and cough syrup had caused a false positive. Prior to that, in 2014, he plead guilty to a DUI in Brandon, Miss.
