Burrows was last seen driving a Honda 250 motorcycle on Alabama 21 near the Midway community in Calhoun County, Alabama on August 23, 1990. He left home at 8:00 a.m. and has never been heard from again. Over a year later, his motorcycle was later found submerged in a bog within 300 yards of an abandoned brickyard, three miles south of Piedmont, Alabama.

In 1991, David Ronald Chandler was convicted of drug trafficking and ordering Burrows's death. He was also convicted of having a role in several other killings, including the death of Jeffery McFry, who disappeared less than two weeks after Burrows did. Chandler was a marijuana dealer and Burrows and McFry were also involved in the drug trade; investigators theorized that Chandler had murdered two men murdered because he believed they had stolen marijuana from him.

Chandler was sentenced to death. After his conviction, however, the man who said Chandler had paid him to murder McFry recanted his testimony, and several other witnesses in the case also claimed they had lied. In 2001, Chandler's death sentence was commuted to life in prison. He is presently incarcerated in Hazelton, West Virginia.

Burrows and McFry's remains have never been found, but foul play is suspected in their disappearances due to the circumstances involved.