Mother charged with stabbing daughter's boyfriend

Sharon Burton was watching from a window while her teenage daughter and boyfriend slapped each other during a quarrel over a food stamp and public assistance card outside her West Side apartment Monday afternoon.

Without saying a word, the 56-year-old, 119-pound grandmother walked outside and allegedly stabbed her 16-year-old daughter’s boyfriend in the chest with a pocket knife she had retrieved from a tote bag seconds before.

He was identified by the Cook County Medical Examiner as Teddance Steele, 32, who died later that day at Norwegian American Hospital.

Burton, of the 3600 block of West Franklin, was ordered held in lieu of $150,000 bail on a charge of first-degree murder Wednesday.

Burton, who wore gold and black sandals and a long yellow floral dress, turned back a few times to look at half a dozen family members who were in court. She softly said, “Yes, sir” when Judge Israel Desierto asked her if she understood conditions of the bond.

Assistant Cook County State’s Attorney Ericka Graunke said Burton admitted to police that she had stabbed the victim. Burton also was identified by her daughter and her daughter’s friend, who witnessed the alleged attack, Graunke said.

Assistant public defender Caroline Glennon maintained that her client was only trying to protect her child.

“Her daughter was being physically assaulted,” Glennon said.

This wasn’t the first time Burton was picked up for a stabbing.

In 2007, she was arrested for knifing someone in the shoulder but that victim did not pursue the charges, Graunke said.

On Monday, the victim, Burton’s daughter and the daughter’s friend had left the apartment to cash out the Link public assistance card. But as they were driving, Steele and Burton’s daughter started arguing, so they returned to the residence.

The couple continued arguing outside the apartment, and at one point, Burton’s daughter started waving a glass juice bottle at Steele, who was unarmed, Graunke said. That’s when the altercation allegedly became physical and the couple started slapping each other, sending Burton into a silent rage, prosecutors said.

Burton, the primary caretaker of several grandchildren, told authorities she put the knife back in the tote bag after the stabbing, Graunke said. The weapon was recovered.

Burton’s relatives declined to comment after Wednesday’s hearing.