Prosecutors, defense attorneys and nine doctors agree Russell Maze shouldn't have been convicted in the 2000 death of his infant son, Alex.
Maze was convicted on a since-questioned diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome, and even after everyone gathered and multiple people testified in a 2024 post-conviction hearing,Judge Steve Dozier wasn't swayed.Neither was the Court of Criminal Appeals, even when the medical examiner who performed the infant's autopsy said his opinion on the case had changed.
But Maze and his team of attorneys could get one more shot.
The Tennessee Supreme Court thinks the lower court erred and ruled Aug. 27 that Maze and his attorneys can try to pursue relief again based on the affidavit from Davidson County Medical Examiner Dr.
Bruce Levy.
Maze was sentenced to life in prison after a jury convicted him of first-degree murder.
Attorney Jason Gichner filed two motions Sept. 11. They ask Dozier, who presided over the initial trial, to reopen post-conviction proceedings in the case, and to vacate the conviction and grant a new trial.
"The State provided Mr. Maze with the affidavits of Deputy District Attorney Amy Hunter and Assistant District Attorney Jeff George," the filing said. 'In substance, these affidavits inform this court that Dr. Levy's affidavit, especially when corroborated by Dr. Mileusnic's independent review, would result in the dismissal of Mr. Maze's case in a pre-trial posture today."
What happened to Alex Maze?
Alex was born premature on March 25, 1999. He weighed 3 pounds, 12 ounces at birth and spent 13 days in the neonatal intensive care unit.
Maze and his wife, Kaye, took Alex to the hospital seven times for persistent medical concerns, Gichner's filings said. Just five weeks after birth, Alex stopped breathing while Maze was home alone with him. The infant had also been running a fever and couldn't keep food down.
Maze called 911 and began CPR on the infant. Paramedics revived Alex and took him to Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Dr. Suzanne Starling diagnosed Alex as a victim of abusive head trauma.
Maze denied shaking his son, but later said it was possible he may have jostled the baby when trying to revive him. Alex had bleeding around the eyes and brain. The infant was placed in foster care.
Alex ended up in the hospital again in October 2000 after he became unresponsive at daycare, the filing said. He died six days later. Doctors diagnosed Alex as a victim of shaken baby syndrome. Levy at the time concluded Alex's cause of death as a severe brain injury "due to a seizure disorder, due to shaken-baby syndrome," according to court documents.
Levy recanted that opinion.
"If called to testify now, he would assert Alex's brain, at the time of his death, showed no indication, to a reasonable degree of medical certainty, of trauma or abuse," the filing said. "Instead, the residual brain lesions viewed at autopsy more likely than not resulted from a natural disease process."
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Attorneys for man convicted in baby's death ask for relief
