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Burks, Letetia Shanta

Status: active

Profile written August 30, 2026

Current Position Warden 1 Lee State Prison
Salary $81,132 2025 · state payroll
Deaths Under Their Watch 12 during their tenure

This profile reflects positional accountability — this individual held the leadership roles shown during the dates shown, during which the listed deaths or lawsuits occurred. Inclusion does not constitute a legal finding of personal culpability for any specific incident.

Tenure Summary

Letetia Shanta Burks appears in GPS personnel records as deputy warden at Rutledge State Prison from January 1, 2018 through December 31, 2023; a 2024 deputy warden record lists no facility. GPS records then place Burks as Warden 1 at Lee State Prison beginning January 1, 2025, with a single-day Warden 1 record at Lee dated August 27, 2026. GPS attributes 12 deaths to facility-leader tenures held by Burks: 10 at Rutledge State Prison and 2 at Lee State Prison. No lawsuit in the structured file names Burks as a defendant.

What happened on their watch

Rutledge State Prison — Deputy Warden, 2018–2023

The 10 deaths attributed to Burks’ tenure at Rutledge span April 2020 through October 2023; decedents ranged in age from 26 to 74. GPS records identify Andrew Phillip Campbell, James Eric Mitchell, Terry Wayne Williams, Richard Hatcher, Harold Edward Brown, Curtis Mincey, Boyzie Barnes, Daniel Tyler Nichols, John Irvin Sr. Tidd, and Leonard Leroy Dillard. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation, Nichols, 26, died of asphyxia due to neck compression, and Mincey, 74, died of blunt force trauma to the head, neck, torso, and extremities. GPS flags a cause conflict on Mincey: GDC’s own coding, obtained by the UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project through an open records request, classified that death as “Natural.” The same GDC coding classified Campbell’s death as suicide and the deaths of Brown, Hatcher, Williams, and Mitchell as natural; GPS notes these are Department classifications rather than autopsy findings. The GA DOAS Risk Management settlement ledger records a State of Georgia liability payout of $395,000 tied to Rutledge State Prison for a 2020 incident, linked to Campbell’s documented death record.

Allegations and facility incidents also appear in the record. According to the AJC, a lawsuit filed by Mincey’s sister in January 2025 alleges that he had a mental illness and did not receive appropriate medical or psychological assistance before his death. GPS records also document a 2021 contraband investigation at Rutledge in which a cellphone seized from an inmate showed payments to Officer Promise Tucker, who admitted to smuggling tobacco and resigned in lieu of termination.

Lee State Prison — Warden 1, 2025–2026

GPS records attribute two deaths to Burks’ Lee tenure: Quinton Pearson, 45, on September 8, 2025, and Yancey Sullivan, 56, on July 10, 2026. Both are assigned cause category 6 in the dataset, with no further cause notes provided. A separate GPS incident record associated with facility ID 16 is dated March 8, 2026, but its title describes a gang fight at Wilcox State Prison and arrests at Lee Arrendale, which is not the same facility as Lee State Prison; the facility assignment in that record is internally inconsistent.

Sources

  • Atlanta Journal-Constitution — Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation, including causes for Daniel Tyler Nichols and Curtis Mincey and the Mincey family lawsuit allegation
  • UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project custodial mortality dataset — GDC open-records coding for deaths at Rutledge State Prison, 2020–2021
  • Georgia Department of Administrative Services Risk Management settlement ledger — open-records liability payouts
  • GPS records — personnel postings, leadership-tier death attribution, incident logs, and contraband investigation records

Synthesized by GPS Intelligence System on Aug 30, 2026 from positions, attributed deaths, lawsuits, intel reports, and news mentions in the public corpus. The supporting data tables follow below.

Positions Held

TitleFacilityTenure
Warden 1LEE STATE PRISON2026-08-27 → present
WARDEN 1LEE STATE PRISON2025-01-01 → present
DEPUTY WARDEN2024-01-01 → 2024-12-31
Deputy WardenRUTLEDGE STATE PRISON2023-11-22 → 2023-11-22
DEPUTY WARDENRUTLEDGE STATE PRISON2018-01-01 → 2023-12-31

Deaths attributed during tenure

12 people died at facilities under Burks, Letetia Shanta's leadership.

DateDecedentAgeFacilityRole at time
2026-07-10YANCEY SULLIVAN56LEE STATE PRISONWARDEN 1
2025-09-08QUINTON PEARSON45LEE STATE PRISONWARDEN 1
2023-10-11LEONARD LEROY DILLARD57RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2023-07-18JOHN IRVIN SR TIDD59RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2023-04-23DANIEL TYLER NICHOLS26RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2022-04-30BOYZIE BARNES65RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2021-07-22CURTIS MINCEY74RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2021-03-05HAROLD EDWARD BROWN53RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2020-07-09RICHARD HATCHER66RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2020-06-22TERRY WAYNE WILLIAMS61RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2020-05-04JAMES ERIC MITCHELL58RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN
2020-04-02ANDREW PHILLIP CAMPBELL28RUTLEDGE STATE PRISONDEPUTY WARDEN

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