Wayne Burgess

2023 year of exoneration

24 years in prison

27 years saved

Wayne Burgess was released from prison on July 25, 2023, after serving more than 24 years for a crime he didn’t commit.

Case history

In August 1997, Wayne was 34 years old and dating Nacia Rivers, a single mother in Pulaski, Tennessee. On the evening of August 8, he spent the afternoon with Rivers and her 16-month-old daughter, Nakeavia — running errands, grabbing food at Sonic, stopping at a store. When they got home, Nakeavia had fallen asleep in Wayne’s lap. He carried her inside and laid her on the couch.

Moments later, the toddler was in distress. Rivers rushed her to the hospital. Despite the efforts of medical teams at two hospitals, Nakeavia died that night. The emergency room physician who first examined her noted that her condition was not consistent with a sudden traumatic injury, the child was severely dehydrated, had blood in her stool, and showed signs of injuries that had been developing over time.

That medical nuance never made it to a jury in any meaningful way. Instead, the case turned on a flawed autopsy by Dr. Charles Harlan, a medical examiner whose license would later be permanently revoked for 20 counts of misconduct.

Wayne was brought in for questioning two days after Nakeavia’s death and cooperated willingly. A second interrogation five days later is where everything unraveled. Wayne signed a statement, admitting to facts that were objectively untrue, after he was threatened with violence by the investigating officer. Wayne has consistently maintained that he never confessed; that he was threatened, physically intimidated, denied his request for an attorney, and told that signing the statement was “routine procedure.”

On January 28, 1999, a jury convicted Wayne Burgess of first-degree felony murder. He was sentenced to life in prison. His own trial attorney would later say the case weighed heavy on his heart for years.

Pictured is Wayne leaving Giles County Jail while being met with loved ones.

Mr. Burgess could not have committed the crime and is innocent of the offense.

Judge David Allen Giles Co Circuit Court

Building the case for innocence

In September 2022, TIP Executive Director Jason Gichner and Legal Director Jessica Van Dyke filed a motion for post-conviction relief, supported by evidence from four independent experts, evidence that dismantled the medical and psychological foundations of the original conviction one by one.

The heart of the original case had been Dr. Charles Harlan’s autopsy, which concluded that Nakeavia died from a liver laceration caused by a forceful blow to the abdomen shortly before she arrived at the hospital. TIP brought in Dr. Adele Lewis, Chief Medical Examiner for the State of Tennessee, who found that scenario to be physiologically impossible. Given the volume of blood present in the child’s body, the injury could not have produced sudden, catastrophic collapse in a matter of minutes. The lethal trauma had almost certainly occurred hours or even days before.

Dr. Thomas Rauth, Medical Director of Pediatric Surgery at The Children’s Hospital at Tristar Centennial, went further. What Dr. Harlan had described as a significant liver laceration was in fact a low-grade, superficial injury. Nearly all such injuries resolve without surgical intervention, and blood loss from this type of wound is slow enough that the body typically clots on its own. Dr. Rauth concluded that Nakeavia died from severe hypovolemia, a progressive shutdown caused by prior, untreated trauma. By the time Wayne carried her into that house, the child was already dying.

TIP also addressed the confession directly. Dr. Brian Cutler, a forensic psychologist and expert in false confessions, reviewed the circumstances of the interrogation and concluded that Wayne was highly susceptible to producing a false statement, particularly under a physical threat and with his request for legal counsel denied. And Dr. Brandon Baughman’s cognitive testing confirmed what Wayne’s academic record had quietly shown all along: he was extremely vulnerable to manipulation in a high-pressure interrogation.

The petition also documented the extensive record of misconduct by Dr. Harlan, whose medical license was permanently revoked in 2005 following findings that included falsified autopsy reports, false statements, negligence, and incompetence across multiple cases. His work had contributed to wrongful convictions in the cases of Joyce Watkins and Charlie Dunn as well.

The post-conviction hearing was held in March 2023, with TIP joined by Ashleigh Karnell of Bass, Berry & Sims, who had completed a six-month pro-bono fellowship with the Project in 2022.

Pictured is Mr. Burgess with family members who greeted him warmly after he walked out of the Giles County Jail doors.

Exoneration

On April 13, 2023, Giles County Circuit Court Judge David Allen vacated Wayne Burgess’s conviction. The medical evidence was so clear, the judge said, that he declined even to rule on the reliability of the confession, it was simply beside the point. “The theory presented at trial, that Mr. Burgess harmed the child just before presentation at the hospital, is not medically possible,” Judge Allen said. “The Court is satisfied that he presented clear and convincing new scientific evidence establishing that he is innocent of the convicted offense.”

On July 25, 2023, the prosecution filed a motion declining to retry the case. All charges were dropped. Wayne walked out of Hardeman County Correctional Facility that day, more than 24 years after he was convicted.