FROM: Jody Pickens, District Attorney General, 26th Judicial District
On March 11, 2024, around 12:53 a.m., Jackson Police Officer Antonio Diaz-Morales observed a Dodge Charger with illegal window tint and a tag that came back registered to another vehicle. He conducted a traffic stop near North Parkway and Old Hickory Boulevard.
Upon approaching the vehicle, Officer Diaz-Morales identified Wayne Pirtle, Jr., age thirty-four (34), of Jackson, Tennessee, as the driver. Officer Diaz-Morales searched the vehicle due to the odor of marijuana coming from inside and found a .40 caliber handgun under the driver’s seat with an extended magazine. There were seven rounds remaining in the magazine. Upon learning that Pirtle was a convicted felon, Officer Diaz-Morales placed Pirtle under arrest. A subsequent ballistics test linked the firearm to multiple shootings in Nashville and Whiteville.
On September 30, 2024, a Madison County Grand Jury returned an indictment against Pirtle for being a Convicted Felon in Possession of a Firearm with a Prior Violent Felony Conviction. At the time of his arrest, Pirtle had eight (8) prior felony convictions all from Hardeman County, Tennessee, including Reckless Endangerment With a Deadly Weapon (2008 and 2013), Aggravated Assault (2010 and 2017), Attempted Aggravated Robbery (2010), Auto Burglary (2010), Possession of a Schedule VI Controlled Substance with Intent to Sell or Deliver (2013), and Introduction of Contraband in a Penal Facility (2010).
On May 28, 2025, the State, represented by Assistant District Attorney Brad Champine, tried Pirtle on the indictment. The jury returned a verdict of guilty as charged.
On September 11, 2025, Circuit Court Judge Donald Allen sentenced Pirtle to twenty (20) years to serve in the Tennessee Department of Correction, the maximum sentence allowed by law. Pirtle will have to serve at least 85% of the sentence before he is first eligible for parole. Judge Allen made a finding that the defendant is a member of the Gangster Disciples street gang and ordered the sentence to run consecutive to the defendant’s ten (10)-year sentence in Hardeman County for the 2017 Aggravated Assault conviction.
“It is clear that this Defendant did not want to lead a productive, law-abiding life. In his life he continually violated the law in major, violent ways. Now he will be removed from society for an extended amount of time and he has no one to blame but the man in the mirror,” said District Attorney General Jody Pickens. “While reactive units pick up the pieces after shots are fired, in this case one patrol officer took a dangerous offender off the street before he could sow more violence in our community. It would have been better for all involved if the defendant had made different choices but as this release indicates, he did not.”
