"The Fast Food Killer"

Paul Dennis Reid went on a murderous rampage after being fired from a job as a dish washer.  Not much of an excuse is it?  But then again, since when do people need an excuse to go out and end other people`s lives?  By this time, Reid already had a violent criminal history.  He had served just 7 years for a nasty armed robbery in Houston, Texas, his home state, in 1983.  He moved onto Nashville, Tennessee, in a hope to make it as a country & western singer.  Instead, he found himself working at Shoney`s Restaurant in the town of Donelson.  He was fired, so he went into a Captain D`s restaurant on the pretext of seeking employment.  He timed it perfectly as it was not quite ready to open.  He robbed it but that was not enough.  At gunpoint, he forced Steve Hampson, 25 & Sarah Jackson, 16, into a walk-in refrigerator, made them lie face down on the floor, then cold bloodedly shot them both in the back of the head.  It was February 16th 1997.

    The following month, March, he struck again.  This time at McDonalds, where he forced four employees into a back room, again, ordering them to lie face down.  He shot three of them in the back of the head, but lack of ammunition meant he had to improvise on the last victim.  He used a knife on him, but despite 17 wounds, the man survived.  He was later able to recognise Reid. ( makes you think of the Zodiac who stabbed the couple by the lake multiple times.  The girl died but miraculously the man survived)  Then in April, Reid claimed his next two victims.  Angela Holmes, 21 & Michelle Mace,16, were abducted and murdered by Reid after he robbed the ice-cream parlour they worked at, in Clarksville.  Then in June, he tried to abduct and murder the manager who fired him, but was apprehended.  Police quickly linked him to the string of murders, with the survivor at McDonalds, positively identifying him.  He was convicted and sentenced to death.  He avoided execution in 2003 but died in Nashville General Hospital in November 2013 of natural causes.  No doubt some moron somewhere shed tears for him.