Jay Burlison

DALTON, Ga. — The trial of a man accused of a murder in 1984 is scheduled to start Monday in Whitfield County Superior Court.

Jay Thomas Burlison, 75, is accused of the shooting death of Ernest Griffin, 44, and of shooting his wife, Mary Burlison, who survived, and pointing a gun at a store clerk in November of 1984 in Rocky Face. Mary Burlison is now known as Mary Mealer. Jay Burlison has been in the county jail without bond since July 2 following his arrest in Lawrenceburg, Tenn.

Micah Gates with the public defender’s office is representing Burlison. Scott Minter is the presiding judge.

Burlison, 75, is charged with murder, two counts of aggravated assault with a gun and failure to appear, according to the sheriff’s office’s website.

According to a sheriff’s office incident report dated Nov. 29, 1984, on Nov. 12 of that year the sheriff’s office received a call of a shooting at the Golden Gallon at Rocky Face at three minutes after midnight. Mealer told the Daily-Citizen News shortly after Burlison’s arrest that that is where she worked. The location is now home to a Kangaroo convenience store.

Officers found Griffin lying in the parking lot with a gunshot wound to the head. Mealer was inside the store; the report said she had been shot three times but she said it was four times.

Both Griffin and Mealer were taken to Hamilton Medical Center. Griffin was declared dead on arrival and Mealer was treated there.

In a statement outlined in the incident report, Mealer said she and Griffin were walking out of the store when Burlison, then 41, pulled up behind Griffin’s car as he was getting in it. She ran to her car and saw her husband shooting at Griffin. She said he then came to her car and shot her through the window.

He chased her into the store, hitting her with a pistol. He “snapped the gun” at the store clerk, who then called the sheriff’s office. Burlison left in his car, the statement said.

Mealer, who lives in Rocky Face, said she still had one bullet from that night in her body, so close to her spine that doctors have been afraid to take it out because “it could move either way and paralyze me.”

Asked how she felt when she learned that Burlison would now face trial for that night, Mealer said, “I was numb. I can’t express how I felt. I started praying that the Lord would do us right, give us justice this time, me and the Griffin family.”

She told the newspaper that the night of the shooting Burlison called and left a message at her home: “Before they catch me you will be a dead woman.” She said that was the last time she heard from him.

Mealer said she and Griffin were “seeing each other” — “Jay and I had been separated for months and the divorce was going to be final two days later (Nov. 14, 1984).”

She said she told Griffin, “Ernest, I hope that nothing happens, Ernest, I’m afraid, we’re going to get hurt,” and “he would say ‘Don’t worry about that.'”

Mealer said in March of this year, Glenn Swinney, who investigated the shootings and who now works for the district attorney’s office, told her Burlison had been located.

Eric Griffin, the son of Ernest Griffin, told the Daily Citizen-News shortly after Burlison’s arrest that he was glad to see that justice will finally be served. He said his father was his best friend.

“He wasn’t just my daddy, he was my buddy,” he told the newspaper. “To this day, I can get to talking about my dad and think about the night he was killed and start to cry. Jay Burlison took away my whole world. I’ve got a 4-year-old son who’ll never get to know his grandpa.”

He said the Burlisons had already separated when his father met Mary Burlison, but Jay Burlison still blamed him for the breakup.

“He’s (Jay Burlison) going to spend the rest of his life in prison. Even if he gets a plea deal and gets only 10 years, that’s probably going to be a life sentence,” he said.