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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF TENNESSEE AT NASHVILLE
October 3, 2012 Session PAUL DENNIS REID, JR. EX REL. LINDA MARTINIANO v. STATE OF TENNESSEE
Tenn. R. App. P. 11 Appeal by Permission from the Court of Criminal Appeals Circuit Court for Montgomery County No. 38887 John H. Gasaway, III, Judge

No. M2009-00128-SC-R11-PD - Filed January 24, 2013

AND

PAUL DENNIS REID, JR. v. STATE OF TENNESSEE
Tenn. R. App. P. 11 Appeal by Permission from the Court of Criminal Appeals Criminal Court for Davidson County Nos. 97-C-1836 & 97-C-1834 Cheryl Blackburn, Judge

Nos. M2009-00360-SC-R11-PD & M2009-01557-SC-R11-PD

This appeal raises the question of whether a prisoner facing the death penalty has the mental capacity to abandon the pursuit of post-conviction relief in his three murder cases. After the prisoner decided not to seek a new trial in any of these cases, one of his sisters, in cooperation with the Office of the Post-Conviction Defender, filed a "next friend" petition in each of the prisoner's three murder cases, requesting the courts to declare the prisoner incompetent, thereby enabling her to pursue post-conviction relief on his behalf. The Criminal Court for Davidson County and the Circuit Court for Montgomery County conducted separate hearings in 2008. Each court denied the petitions after determining that the prisoner's sister and the Office of the Post-Conviction Defender had failed to establish by clear and convincing evidence that the prisoner lacked the capacity to make rational decisions regarding the pursuit of post-conviction relief. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed both of these judgments. Reid v. State, Nos. M2009-00128-CCA-R3-PD, M200900360-CCA-R3-PD, M2009-01557-CCA-R3-PD, 2011 WL 3444171 (Tenn. Crim. App. Aug. 8, 2011). We granted the prisoner's Tenn. R. App. P. 11 application. We have

determined that both trial courts employed the correct legal standard for determining whether the prisoner possessed the mental capacity to rationally forego seeking post-conviction relief and also that the prisoner's sister and the Office of the Post-Conviction Defender failed to prove by clear and convincing evidence that the prisoner lacked the capacity to make rational decisions regarding the pursuit of post-conviction relief. For the sake of consistency, we further hold that, in all future cases, Tennessee's courts should employ the mental competency standard of Tenn. Sup. Ct. R. 28,

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