OAKLAND — Anthony Burton claims he was scared for his girlfriend’s safety when he shot into the car of “the love of his life” multiple times, seriously injuring her and a friend inside. But the prosecution alleges it was attempted murder in a jealous rage.
Burton, 47, is accused of the attempted murder of his girlfriend, and a girlfriend’s male friend who was in her car with her on March 15, 2016, on Tremont Street in Berkeley around 1:15 a.m.
Burton used a tracing device on his phone to track his girlfriend to the location, said Deputy District Attorney Glenn Kim during his closing statements Monday. Burton had also followed her to a Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant in San Jose the day before, where he found her talking to a male friend.
Kim said Burton’s manhood was threatened, and his girlfriend called him “controlling.”
Burton continued to call her that day, repeatedly, but she didn’t answer, the prosecution said. His attorney, Richard Ortega, said he was concerned for her safety — she was an Uber and Lyft driver. So he went searching for her.
When he found her car, with another man inside, Burton claimed when he testified on his own behalf last week that he saw a shiny object in the car, which he believed to be a knife. He said he believed the man moved, as if reaching for the object.
Fearing for his safety, and his girlfriend’s, he said he fired into the car at the man inside, not her. His girlfriend, who he called the love of his life, was leaned back in her chair, he claimed.
“It’s a very convenient story,” Kim said, who also argued that Burton knew that bullets couldn’t bend to avoid hitting his girlfriend. A knife was not found at the scene, Kim said. Burton wasn’t arrested until about a month later, in Sacramento.
“Someone lied to you on the stand,” Kim said, addressing the jury.
Six shots were fired into the car and both people were struck: The girlfriend was shot in the eye, and her friend in the cheek, his jaw broken. Both survived the shooting and testified during the trial.
Burton took his girlfriend to the hospital after the shooting, but left her there without waiting.
Burton said in his testimony that he was “not at all” jealous, and knew his girlfriend had male friends.
Kim argued that it was not self-defense, and that deadly force was not needed in that situation. He also argued that it was not in “the heat of passion,” which if the jury found true, could reduce Burton’s charge to the lesser charge of attempted voluntary manslaughter.
“I want to go out there to prove to you that I can find you,” Burton said in a cellphone video he made after the shooting for his girlfriend, shown to the jury Monday.
Besides the two counts of attempted murder, Burton is also facing charges of assault with a deadly weapon, corporal injury to a relationship partner, shooting at an occupied vehicle and being a felon in possession of a firearm.
The 12-person jury began deliberating Tuesday.
