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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF TENNESSEE AT KNOXVILLE
January 3, 2001 Session STATE OF TENNESSEE v. SCOTT HOUSTON NIX
Appeal by permission from the Court of Criminal Appeals Criminal Court for Knox County No. 67,069 Ray Jenkins, Judge

No. E1999-02715-SC-R11-PC - Filed February 20, 2001

AND STATE OF TENNESSEE v. RALPH DEAN PURKEY
Appeal by permission from the Court of Criminal Appeals Criminal Court for Cocke County No. 25,376 Rex H. Ogle, Judge

No. E1999-01864-SC-R11-CD - Filed February 20, 2001

We granted permission to appeal to consider an issue of first impression: what is the standard of mental incompetence that a petitioner must satisfy before due process requires tolling of the postconviction statute of limitations. We agree with the Court of Criminal Appeals that due process requires tolling of the statute of limitations only if a petitioner is unable either to manage his or her own personal affairs or to understand his or her legal rights and liabilities. We also agree with the intermediate appellate court that, taken as true, the allegations of these petitions are insufficient to make a prima facie showing of incompetency. Accordingly, we affirm the judgments of the Court of Criminal Appeals which upheld the trial court judgments that dismissed these petitions as time-barred by the statute of limitations.

Tenn. R. App. P. 11; Judgments of the Court of Criminal Appeals Affirmed FRANK F. DROWOTA, III, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which E. RILEY ANDERSON, C.J., ADOLPHO A. BIRCH, JR., JANICE M. HOLDER and WILLIAM M. BARKER, JJ., joined.

Mark A. Brown, Knoxville, Tennessee, for the appellants, Scott Houston Nix and Ralph Dean Purkey. Paul G. Summers, Attorney General and Reporter; Michael E. Moore, Solicitor General; and Jennifer L. Smith, Assistant Attorney General, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

OPINION I. Background A. Scott Houston Nix Scott Houston Nix was convicted of attempted first degree murder, especially aggravated robbery and aggravated robbery on November 19, 1993. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed Nix's convictions on November 21, 1995, and this Court denied his application for permission to appeal on May 6, 1996. Accordingly, the post-conviction statute of limitations expired one year after this Court's denial of the application.1 More than one year after its expiration, on December 18, 1998, a "next friend" petition for post-conviction relief was filed on behalf of Nix. Citing this Court's decision in Watkins v. State, 903 S.W.2d 302 (Tenn. 1995), in which we held that due process requires tolling of the statue during mental incompetence, the petition alleged that the action was not barred by expiration of the one-year statute of limitations because Nix had "never been and is not currently competent." The trial court disagreed and summarily dismissed the petition as time-barred. Nix appealed the dismissal. B. Ralph Dean Purkey On September 26, 1986, Ralph Dean Purkey was convicted of grand larceny, concealing stolen property, and of being a habitual criminal. Purkey's motion for new trial was dismissed on October 31, 1986, and no appeal was taken. Therefore, the post-conviction statute of limitations in effect at that time expired three years after Purkey's motion for new trial was dismissed.2 Thereafter, Purkey filed several petitions for habeas corpus and post-conviction relief, but each of these actions was dismissed as untimely. The "next friend" petition giving rise to this appeal was filed on behalf of Purkey on November 10, 1998, more than eleven years after Purkey's conviction had become final and almost nine years after expiration of the applicable statute of limitations. Also relying upon Watkins, the "next friend" petition asserted that the action should not be dismissed as time-barred because Purkey had "never been and is not currently competent." The trial court summarily dismissed the petition

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