Paul Dennis REID Jr.

AKA "The Fast Food Killer"

Classification: Spree killer
Characteristics: Three fast food restaurant robberies
Number of victims: 7
Date of murders: February-April 1997
Date of arrest: June 25, 1997
Date of birth: November 12, 1957
Victims profile: Employee Sarah Jackson, 16, and the manager, Steve Hampton, 25 / Employees Andrea Brown, 17; Ronald Santiago, 27; and Robert A. Sewell, Jr., 23 / Employees Angela Holmes, 21, and Michelle Mace, 16
Method of murder: Shooting - Stabbing with knife
Location: Metropolitan Nashville/Clarksville, Tennessee, USA
Status: Sentenced to death on September 22, 1999

Paul Dennis Reid, Jr. (born November 12, 1957) is an American serial killer, convicted and sentenced to death for seven murders during three fast food restaurant robberies in Metropolitan Nashville, Tennessee and Clarksville, Tennessee between the months of February and April 1997.

At the time of the murders, Reid was on parole from an 1983 conviction in Texas on charges relating to the aggravated armed robbery of a Houston steakhouse. He had served seven years of a 20-year sentence, and was paroled in 1990. Originally from Richland Hills, Texas, a suburb of Fort Worth, Reid came to Nashville to pursue a career as a country music singer. He is currently awaiting execution.

Crimes

Reid assaulted eight victims in the three robberies, killing seven of them.

Captain D's

At Captain D's on Lebanon Road in Donelson, Tennessee, on the morning of February 16, 1997, Reid entered the store before opening, under the guise of applying for a job. Once inside, he forced employee Sarah Jackson, 16, and the manager, Steve Hampton, 25, into the restaurant's cooler and bound their hands and feet. Reid forced the two to lie on the floor and then shot them execution style. Money, including large amounts of change, was found missing from the cash register. Reid used the cash from this robbery as a down payment on a car two days later.

McDonald's

At McDonald's on Lebanon Road in Hermitage, Tennessee, on the evening of March 23, 1997, Reid approached two employees behind the store after closing. At gunpoint, he forced them back into the restaurant. Reid shot three employees to death execution style in the storeroom: Andrea Brown, 17; Ronald Santiago, 27; and Robert A. Sewell, Jr., 23. Reid attempted to shoot José Antonio Ramirez Gonzalez, but his weapon failed. Reid then stabbed Gonzalez 17 times and left him for dead. Gonzalez avoided further attacks by playing dead. Reid then took US$3000 from the cash registers and fled. When the scene was discovered, Gonzalez was taken to the hospital, treated, and ultimately survived. He eventually testified against Reid.

Baskin-Robbins

At Baskin-Robbins on Wilma Rudolph Boulevard in Clarksville, Tennessee, on the evening of April 23, 1997, Reid went to the door after closing and persuaded the employees to let him inside. Once inside, Reid kidnapped Angela Holmes, 21, and Michelle Mace, 16 and forced the two to Dunbar Cave State Park. Their bodies were discovered the next day on a lake shore with their throats cut.

Apprehension

On June 25, 1997, Reid went to the home of the Shoney's manager who fired him from a dishwashing job the day before the Captain D's murders (the stated reason for his firing was Reid losing his temper and throwing a dish at a fellow employee). Reid, armed with a knife, approached the man's front door and attempted to get in, but the screen door was locked. The man's son videotaped the encounter, and the footage was subsequently released to the media following police investigation. After the kidnapping attempt failed, Reid left the home without further incident and was subsequently arrested by Nashville police, after which he was considered the prime suspect and charged in the Captain D's and McDonald's murders, and eventually, the Baskin-Robbins murders.

Trials

Reid was convicted on seven counts of first-degree murder across three trials. Jurors from West and East Tennessee were brought in and sequestered, because a judge determined that the overwhelming media coverage in Nashville would prevent the selection of an unbiased jury from Middle Tennessee.

Captain D's

In the Captain D's murders, Steve Hampton's driver's license and a video rental card were found in the median of Ellington Parkway with Reid's fingerprints on each. Reid was convicted on two counts of first-degree murder.

Baskin-Robbins

In the Baskin-Robbins murders, Reid's car was found to contain forensic evidence from the victims, as well as evidence of a credit card gasoline purchase near the location of the bodies on the night of the murders, placing him at the scene around the time of the crime in an area roughly 40 miles (64 km) from his home. Blood evidence from the victims was found on his shoes. He was found guilty on two counts of first-degree murder. The Clarksville trial took place in the time between the two Nashville trials.

McDonald's

Jose Antonio Ramirez Gonzalez, the lone surviving victim of the McDonald's robbery, identified Reid as his attacker in court. This was considered the key piece of evidence needed to convict him of the McDonald's murders. Reid was found guilty on three counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder.

In addition to his seven murder convictions, Reid was also convicted on multiple counts of lesser charges related to the same crimes, including especially aggravated robbery and especially aggravated kidnapping.

Sentences

Reid received seven death sentences for his convictions, the first two coming on April 20, 1999. Reid's execution has been stayed several times since then, including an instance in 2003 just hours before the scheduled execution. Reid eventually waived his right to an appeal. Members of his family, along with anti-death penalty activists, claim he is mentally challenged and unable to make such a decision, and have filed multiple motions (both successful and unsuccessful) to stay his execution. However, the Tennessee Supreme Court has upheld all of Reid's sentences. Reid's case has received national attention among anti-death penalty activists.

Reid currently resides at Tennessee's [Morgan County Correctional Complex] (Inmate #303893). His seven death sentences are the most ever handed down to a single person in the state of Tennessee.

His latest execution date was scheduled for January 3, 2008, but was stayed on December 26, 2007 by US District Judge Todd J. Campbell, pending investigation into the constitutionality of Tennessee's lethal injection methods. The stay is part of a larger investigation, and not directly related to Reid's case.

On April 16, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an opinion in a Kentucky case upholding the legality of execution by lethal injection. The state of Tennessee immediately began appealing stays of execution to resume death penalty cases, including Reid's.

Mental issues

Since his arrest, Reid's family (notably his sister, Linda Martiniano) has argued that he is mentally incompetent to stand trial, and since his convictions, they have argued that he is not able to make sound legal decisions. Reid has displayed erratic decision-making, choosing to appeal some verdicts and not others, and professing his will to die as sentenced after fighting to avoid such a fate earlier in his defense. At the same time, however, Reid has shown signs of paranoia, calling his defense team "actors" and claiming he is part of a United States government mind-control project called "Scientific Technology" that monitors his every move. In cross-examinations, the prosecution has attempted to counter this defense by claiming Reid is a crafty con artist using these "delusions" as a defense mechanism.

Effects

As a result of Reid's spree, several fast food restaurants in the Nashville area began closing earlier and police patrols around such establishments became more frequent. The city of Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, a Nashville suburb, began a program requiring all fast food employees to carry a decal on the rear window of their automobiles, so police could identify any out-of-place cars in late-night patrols.

Other crimes suspected

For a time, Reid was considered a prime suspect in the 1993 Brown's Chicken massacre in Palatine, Illinois due to the similar nature of the crime in relation to the two incidents in Nashville. Characteristics including shoeprints found at the scene and descriptions of the killer that matched Reid's profile. His alibi checked out, however, and Reid was later ruled out as a suspect. Juan Luna was convicted on seven counts of murder in 2007. His alleged cohort, Jim Degorski, is awaiting trial, set to begin in April, 2009.

Media attention

Reid's original trial was the first murder trial to be broadcast live in the state of Tennessee (via WTVF's NewsChannel5+ cable channel), following the allowance of cameras in the courtroom a few years earlier. His subsequent trials were also broadcast live. Ten years later, Reid's story still gets top-billing on Nashville-area newscasts when new information is revealed. His story was also the subject of a Discovery Channel documentary in 2004.

Wikipedia.org

State Supreme Court Affirms Reid Convictions, Death Sentences For McDonald's Murders

Chattanoogan.com

December 27, 2006

The Tennessee Supreme Court has upheld the convictions and death sentences Paul Dennis Reid received for the execution-style murders of three Nashville McDonald's employees who were shot to death after being forced to lie face down on the floor.

In a majority opinion written by Justice Gary R. Wade, the court rejected all of the issues raised by Reid in his direct appeal. Chief Justice William M. Barker and Justices Janice M. Holder and Cornelia A. Clark concurred in the majority opinion, which affirmed a Court of Criminal Appeals decision.

Retired Justice Adolpho A. Birch, Jr., who heard the case as a specially designated member of the court, wrote a separate opinion in which he agreed that Reid's convictions should be upheld, but called upon the governor to suspend the use of lethal injections as a "killing agent" until further study.

Jurors convicted Reid and sentenced him to death for the 1997 murders of McDonald's employees Ronald Santiago, Andrea Brown and Robert Sewell. Reid attempted to shoot a fourth employee, Jose Ramirez Gonzalez, but his gun malfunctioned. He then stabbed and kicked Gonzalez, who survived the attack by pretending to be dead. Reid took $3,000 from the restaurant and fled.

Reid has a total of seven death sentences stemming from murders he committed during robberies at McDonald's, a Baskin-Robbins in Clarksville and a Captain D's restaurant in Davidson County. All of the convictions and sentences have been upheld by the Tennessee Supreme Court.

Issues raised by Reid in his McDonald's appeal included a claim that Criminal Court Judge Cheryl Blackburn erred by finding him competent to stand trial.

"In our view, the evidence in the record does not preponderate against the trial court's finding that the defendant was competent to stand trial," Justice Wade wrote. "The trial court applied the correct legal standard: whether the defendant had 'the capacity to understand the nature and object of the proceedings against him, to consult with counsel and to assist in preparing his defense.'"

The Supreme Court also held that Judge Blackburn was not required to recuse herself because she had presided over Reid's trial for the murders of two Captain D's employees.

The court set a Jan. 3, 2008, execution date for Reid, who has state and federal appeals remaining in the McDonald's case.

Paul Dennis Reid

ProDeathPenalty.com

Reid, who moved to Nashville to attempt a country music career, was fired as a dishwasher from a Shoney's restaurant in Donelson on Feb. 15, 1997, for losing his temper and throwing a plate that hit another employee.

The next day, Sarah Jackson, 16, and Steve Hampton, 25, were slain execution-style at a Captain D's restaurant not far from the Shoney's. Reid was able to enter the restaurant before it opened by pretending he wanted to apply for a job. He robbed the restaurant, ordered the two employees into a cooler, then shot them in the head execution-style as they lay face down on the floor. Reid's fingerprint was found on a movie rental card in Hampton's wallet, which Reid had discarded along the roadway. Two days after the killings, Reid used some of the cash from the robbery to prepay the lease on a car. Reid received two death sentences on April 20, 1999.

Reid was convicted of the March 23, 1997, murder of three Hermitage McDonald's employees, Ronald Santiago, 27, Robert A. Sewell Jr., 23, and Andrea Brown, 17, and attempted murder of Jose Alfredo Ramirez Gonzalez. Reid waited until closing time at midnight to pull a gun on Gonzalez and another worker as they took garbage to the trash bin. He ordered them back into the building, robbed the restaurant, which was just a few miles from the Captain D's, and ordered them and two other employees into a storeroom. Then he shot all but Gonzalez execution-style in the head as they lay face down. Apparently running out of bullets, Reid stabbed Gonzalez 17 times before leaving him for dead. Gonzalez survived and identified Reid as the killer. Reid received three death sentences for the murders on May 27, 2000.

A month later, Angela Holmes, 21, and Michelle Mace, 16, were kidnapped in a robbery at a Baskin-Robbins ice cream store in Clarksville, about 50 miles northwest of Nashville. Reid waited until closing time, about 10 p.m., and convinced the two young women to open the door. He then drove them to nearby Dunbar Cave State Natural Area where he slashed their throats. Reid was arrested in June 1997 and linked to the murders after attempting to kidnap and kill the Shoney's manager who fired him. He was convicted and condemned in three separate trials - one for each set of murders. Reid received two death sentences for the Baskin-Robbins murders on Sept. 22, 1999.

Hours from a scheduled execution date in April 2003, Reid resumed his appeals after receiving 'sign from God'. Seventeen immediate family members of Reid's victims had planned to witness the execution and were gathered at an undisclosed location awaiting a bus ride to the prison when the execution was called off. Jerry Jackson, father of Sarah Jackson, 16, one of Reid's first victims, declined to comment when contacted at home after the stay was issued.

UPDATE: The Tennessee Supreme Court granted a stay of execution for Paul Dennis Reid Junior, convicted in the 1997 slayings of seven people in Nashville and Clarksville. Reid was to have been put to death by lethal injection on October 5th, but the court granted his request for a stay and reset the execution for next June 28th. Reid has been convicted of three incidents of multiple murder during a three-month period in 1997. He received seven death sentences for the string of murders at fast-food restaurants in Nashville and Clarksville. Reid was a Texas drifter who moved to Nashville to attempt a career in country music. The October 5th execution date was for two of the murders. Both the Supreme Court and the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals have upheld Reid's convictions this year after he filed appeals.

Paul Dennis Reid

On September 22, 1999, a jury in Clarksville, Tennessee, sentenced Reid to death for the murder of the two ice cream shop employees. Reid, 41, who is already facing execution for killing two fast-food workers in Nashville, showed no emotion when the decision was read. He now faces a third trial in November on charges he killed three workers at a Nashville McDonald's in March 1997. Reid's attorneys, claiming his client suffered brain damage as a child, argued he should be spared execution because of his "broken brain." Prosecutors said he should die because of the cruelty of the murders and his past crimes.

'Broken brain' defense used

He was convicted Saturday of premeditated murder, felony murder, especially aggravated kidnapping and especially aggravated robbery in the deaths of Michelle Mace, 16, and Angela Holmes, 21.

The two were kidnapped the night of April 23, 1997, after a robbery at a Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop in Clarksville, about 60 miles northwest of Nashville. Their bodies, with throats slashed, were found the next day at a state park a few miles away.

Reid's attorneys, who claimed he suffered brain damage as a child, argued he should be spared execution because of his "broken brain." Prosecutors said he should die because of the cruelty of the murders and his past crimes.

Reid was convicted in April and sentenced to death for murdering two Captain D's workers during a robbery in Nashville in February 1997. He faces a third trial in November on charges he killed three workers at a Nashville McDonald's in March 1997.

Paul Reid

On Sunday morning, February 16, 1997, sixteen-year-old Sarah Jackson and twenty-five-year-old Steve Hampton were shot and killed as they prepared to open the Captain D’s restaurant on Lebanon Road in Donelson, Tennessee.

Steve was the manager of the restaurant; Sarah was a high school student working part-time at the restaurant. An area director for Captain D’s spoke with Steve on the telephone around 8:15 to 8:30 a.m. that morning.

Over an hour later, around 9:45 to 10 a.m., an employee arrived for work but was unable to enter the restaurant because the doors were locked. He telephoned the Captain D’s from a neighboring restaurant and got a busy signal. When he called a second time a few minutes later, no one answered. Believing something was wrong, he contacted another Captain D’s employee whose father was a Metro police officer.

The employee’s father arrived at the scene and, after the assistant manager of Captain D’s unlocked the door, entered the restaurant between 11 a.m. and noon to find Steve Hampton and Sarah Jackson dead, lying face down on the floor inside the restaurant’s walk-in cooler.

The victims had been shot execution-style while lying on the floor. Steve had been shot twice in the back of the head and once in the back. Sarah had been shot four times in the head and once in the back.

According to the medical examiner, two of Sarah’s head wounds were fatal, but the two other head wounds were superficial, and the shot to her back was not immediately incapacitating. If these less serious wounds were inflicted first, the medical examiner testified Sarah may have been able to move; and, in fact, a blood pattern of Sarah’s gloved hand on shelving near, but above, her body indicated that Sarah had attempted to pull herself up from the floor after she was shot.

The victims were shot with a .32 caliber weapon, probably a revolver. $7140, including $250 in coins, was taken in the robbery. Steve’s wallet, which contained $600 that he intended to use to pay rent, also was missing.

The police first considered Paul Reid a suspect in this crime on June 12, 1997, after his arrest in Cheatham County for allegedly attempting to kidnap the manager of a Shoney’s restaurant. From this arrest, the police obtained Reid’s fingerprints and photograph.

Although none of Reid’s fingerprints were found at Captain D’s, several items belonging to Steven Hampton were discovered one day after the murders lying alongside Ellington Parkway, a four-lane highway in East Nashville.

Among the items found was a movie rental card belonging to Steve. Reid’s right thumbprint was found on this card. The area where Steve’s belongings were found was 11.5 miles from the crime scene and 1.2 miles from Reid’s home.

Police also found several shoe prints inside Captain D’s near the safe. Although the tread design of these shoe prints did not match, the length of these shoe prints was consistent with shoes seized from Reid’s residence.

In addition, the State introduced into evidence a photograph, dated July 16, 1996, which showed Reid wearing a pair of dingy white tennis shoes that police had not found in his residence. Two witnesses identified Reid as the man who came by Captain D’s the night before the murders inquiring about a job.

They testified that a man came into the restaurant through the exit door around 10 p.m., shortly before closing the night before the murders. This man said he was interested in applying for a part-time job and that he worked at Shoney’s just down the road. The proof showed Reid worked as a cook at a Shoney’s 2.1 miles from these murders.

The employees gave the man an employment application and told him that the manager, Steve Hampton, would be working the next day. When the man asked if anyone would be at the restaurant on Sunday morning, Carter told him that Steve would be there but would be busy and unable to talk until approximately 2:45 p.m., after the Sunday lunch rush.

The man left in a dark-colored car. About a week after the murders, employees helped police prepare a composite sketch of the man they had seen.

In June of 1997 the police showed them a photographic lineup of six individuals, including Reid. One of the employees positively identified Reid as the man who had inquired about a job the night before the murders.

A short time later, the other employee saw Reid during a television news report about his arrest. He immediately called the police and informed them that Reid was the man who came into Captain D’s the night before the murders.

At trial, he explained that he was sure of this identification because the news report, as opposed to the photographic lineup, enabled him to hear Reid’s voice, see the way his lips moved when he talked, and see the way he walked.

Three other people who had been driving by the Captain D’s restaurant on the morning of the murders testified, linking Reid to the murders. A man who was passing by the restaurant at approximately 8:45 a.m., saw a blue Ford station wagon with damage to the left front, and possibly to the left rear, “parked at a funny angle toward the rear of the building.”

The proof showed that prior to these murders, Reid drove a light blue 1988 Ford Escort station wagon which had been involved in an auto accident in January of 1997.

As a result, the car was appraised by an insurance company on February 3, 1997, and was found to have damage to the left front end. The man testified that Reid’s car in the insurance company’s photographs was similar to the car he observed in the Captain D’s parking lot the morning of the murders.

Around 8:50 a.m., a woman was driving by Captain D’s on her way to church when she saw a man, whom she later identified as Steve Hampton, standing inside the doorway of the restaurant talking to a man outside who was holding white paper in his hand. She described the unidentified man as dark-haired and approximately five inches taller than Steve. This description was consistent with Reid who was dark-haired and approximately six feet, three inches tall, as compared to Steve whose height was five feet, eight inches.

Around 9:30 a.m., another passerby noticed “a car that sort of looked out of place.” According to him, the small to medium-sized car was parked about a car-length away from the front of the building headed in the opposite direction of the drive-thru arrows painted on the lot. He also noticed a man walking hurriedly away from the restaurant toward the car.

When the man stopped at the passenger side of the car and looked up, the man “elevated his face and . . . it seemed like our eyes sort of caught one another, and when he saw that I was watching him, he dropped his head, just completely down in a suspicious way.”

The man entered the passenger side of the car. The witness described the man as tall, with a muscular build and large neck, dark eyebrows and dark eyes, a full head of hair which was slicked back. The man was wearing a white shirt, dark pants, and white, “not new,” tennis shoes.

He heard about the murders the next day and called the police twice to report what he had seen, but no one contacted him. When he saw Reid on television after his arrest in June of 1997, the witness again called the police and identified Reid as the man he had seen near the Captain D’s on the morning of the murder.

On the night of April 23, 1997, Angela Holmes, age twenty-one, and Michelle Mace, age sixteen, were working at a Baskin-Robbins store on Wilma Rudolph Boulevard in Clarksville, Tennessee. The store regularly closed at 10:00 p.m. At around 10:10 p.m., Michelle's brother arrived at the store to pick up his sister.

He noticed that Angela Holmes’ car was in the parking lot and that the lights inside the store were on. He entered the store through an unlocked door and found no one inside. He called 911. Officers were dispatched to the scene and searched the store.

They found the cash register drawer empty, except for some coins, and a safe in an office with the top removed. The victims’ purses were found at the store; no money had been taken from the purses. A mop and bucket were found in the customer area, and the freezer was left open.

On the morning of April 24, 1997, the bodies of Angela Holmes and Michelle Mace were found at the Dunbar Cave State Natural Area in Montgomery County, Tennessee, which was between 2.1 and 3.6 miles from the Baskin-Robbins store.

Both victims had suffered deep stab wounds to their necks, as well as stab wounds, cuts, and abrasions to other parts of their bodies. Both had bled to death. A witness testified that she had visited with the victims at the Baskin-Robbins store from 9:20 p.m. until 10:00 p.m. on April 23, 1997.

At one point, a man in his late twenties or early thirties entered the store and became “obnoxious” and “very loud” about the prices before leaving. As she left the store at 10:00 p.m., the witness saw a “shiny red” car enter the parking lot. Two other witnesses testified about seeing the same car at or near the store.

Others testified to seeing a red car near Dunbar Cave around 10:30 p.m. on the night of April 23, 1997. They said they thought it was “odd” because the car was not in a parking space.

A serologist and DNA specialist with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation testified that a DNA sample taken from blood found on Reid’s left tennis shoe was consistent with the DNA profile of Angela Holmes.

In addition, a DNA sample taken from small blood stains found on the right tennis shoe was consistent with a mixture of two or more donors from which neither Angela Holmes nor Michelle Mace could be excluded. A fiber comparison specialist with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation testified that fibers found on both victims’ clothing were compared to fibers in Reid’s car.

The medical examiner testified that Angela died as a result of a stab wound to her neck that went “all the way to her backbone.” The wound, which was consistent with a knife blade of eight or nine inches, transected the carotid artery and jugular vein. He testified that Michelle had suffered fourteen stab wounds, including a fatal stab wound in her neck.

He said that a compound incision penetrated Michelle’s backbone, consisted of three changes in direction, and was consistent with a sawing motion. Both victims would have taken five to fifteen minutes to bleed to death and would have been conscious eighty percent of that time.

After the latest delay for Reid granted in June of 2006, the victims' families were frustrated but not surprised. "With all of the appeals he keeps going through and all of the drama he keeps starting, we're just trying to stay positive for each other," said Brenda Sewell, whose brother, Robert Sewell, 23, was shot to death by Reid in a robbery at the Hermitage McDonald's. "We've just got to do what it takes to get by," she said.