Man charged with killing undercover agent in drug deal
JACKSON, Tenn. — A man accused of killing a state undercover agent during a drug deal was charged Wednesday with murder.
Special Agent De’Greaun Frazier of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation had been in a car with an informant and Brenden Tyler Burns, 23, of Jackson at about 2 p.m. Tuesday when Burns, sitting in the back seat, pulled a gun and tried to rob Frazier and the informant in the front seat, TBI spokesman Josh DeVine said. It was the first-ever line-of-duty death for the state agency.
Burns is accused of firing once, striking Frazier with the bullet and fleeing. Burns was arraigned Wednesday in Jackson City Court, charged with murder in perpetration of attempted aggravated robbery and is being held without bond in the Madison County jail.
Frazier had arranged to buy cocaine from Burns in an undercover drug investigation, according to court documents.
Because Frazier was working with other state and local narcotics officers on the sting, authorities were able to capture him less than a half mile from the shooting scene, DeVine said. Frazier was taken to Jackson-Madison County General Hospital but died before he arrived.
Candice Washington, 34, who lives in the area, said Tuesday that she heard about four shots and fell to her kitchen floor. When she got up, she looked out and saw a black Navigator stopped in front of her residence.
Washington said she got close to the car and saw the agent appeared to be shot in the side of the head near his ear. She said the man standing outside the car told her to back up, telling her he was an agent. Both men were in plain clothes.
The 35-year-old agent, who lived in Cordova, Tenn., had joined the statewide police agency in February after working since February 2010 for the Millington Police Department in the Memphis suburb.
"This has been one of the toughest days in our agency's history," DeVine said at a Tuesday press conference here.
Frazier was a father of two young children and husband, TBI Director Mark Gywn said.
"We are a family at the TBI, so the loss of this agent in the line of duty hits all of us," he said.
Frazier was “exactly what we look for in a TBI agent: hardworking, enthusiastic and dedicated to making Tennessee a better place to live," the director said. "We are deeply saddened by his death and will work aggressively to investigate this case to the fullest."
Millington Police Inspector Rita Stanback said Frazier had long wanted to work for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.
"He loved doing police work. He always wanted to climb the ladder. TBI was one of the jobs that he talked about doing. He would take any kind of training that he could get that would help move forward. He wanted to work for TBI, to be a TBI agent," she said.
One of his children was less than a year old, Stanback said.
The suspect will face murder and likely additional charges, Gwyn said.
"This is very, very rough," Graves said. "With all of the police shootings that have gone on, it affects the officers."
Gwyn said the operation was no different from ones the agency conducts daily.
"Every day, law-enforcement officers in our state put their lives on the line. All we want is to make this state a better place to live," Gwyn said. "Agent Frazier's death will be our rallying point. ... I have agents all across this state every day doing what Agent Frazier was doing. All you can do is pray they go home safely."
Contributing: Tyler Whetstone, The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun; and Clay Bailey, The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal. Follow Maranda Faris on Twitter: @MarandaFaris