Home News Feed Adam Braseel argues new evidence shows wrongful conviction. Prosecutors say so what?

Adam Braseel argues new evidence shows wrongful conviction. Prosecutors say so what?


Attorneys for Adam Braseel, left, serving a life sentence for murder, say eyewitnesses mistook him for Kermit Bryson, right, a felon who died after killing a police officer in 2008.

https://www.knoxnews.com/story/news/crime/2019/05/13/adam-braseel-new-trial-life-murder-wrongful-conviction-grundy-county-malcolm-burrows-kermit-bryson/1157712001/

Adam Braseel says new evidence shows he’s serving life for a dead man’s crime.

Grundy County prosecutors say too little, too late.

Braseel, 36, has spent 12 years in prison so far for the killing of Malcolm Burrows, 60, on a rural roadside near Tracy City. A judge could hear his bid for a new trial next month.

‘No objective similarity’

Burrows’ killer beat him to death the night of Jan. 7, 2006, after a man showed up at Burrows’ home asking for help with a car that wouldn’t start. Burrows offered the man a ride in his Chrysler and never came back.

Fingerprints found on the Chrysler’s passenger door handle at the murder scene belong not to Braseel, but to Kermit Eugene Bryson, a local felon who killed himself two years later while on the run for gunning down Shane Tate, a Grundy County deputy.

Revelations of the prints have led to calls for a new trial, including from the current Grundy County sheriff.

So what? say prosecutors. Burrows — a small-time politician, shade-tree mechanic and convicted drug dealer — was well-known in Grundy County and drew visitors at all hours. Read more>>