Adam Brasell
Braseel was sentenced to life in prison for the beating death of Malcolm Burrows. All along he’s claimed his innocence. He says it was a case of mistaken identity. Last month, his attorneys said there’s new evidence that will prove their client is innocent.
In a report Wednesday in the Chattanooga Times Free-Press, Sheriff Clint Shrum said that evidence identification in 2017 of a fingerprint found on the passenger door of Burrow’s car at the murder scene matching cop-killer Kermit Eugene Bryson is a reason to revisit the case.
He criticized the initial investigation, saying it appeared to be filled with issues before the TBI ever became involved. Shrum was not employed at the sheriff’s department at the time of the probe.
He qualified his remarks Wednesday by saying he was not expressing an opinion on Braseel’s guilt or innocence, but that his statement intends to “reflect a professional opinion based on a conclusion of the facts that I have been shown in this case.”
Braseel’s legal team has said the real killer was Bryson, who had been the target of a 2008 manhunt after the shooting death of Grundy County Deputy Shane Tate. Bryson killed himself as officers closed in on him at a Monteagle home.
