The man who was sentenced to death for the murders of seven people at fast food restaurants in the 1990s died Friday at a hospital in Nashville.
The New York Daily News reports that 55-year-old death row inmate Paul Dennis Reid passed away Friday evening at Nashville General Hospital, as confirmed by the Tennessee Department of Corrections.
Reid had been at the hospital for two weeks, but the reason for his stay has not been released due to patient privacy laws, according to Reuters. The State Medical Examiner’s office will determine the exact cause of death in an autopsy to be conducted this week.
In 1999, Reid was convicted of murdering seven workers at three different fast food restaurants. The murders took place in 1997 and occurred across Tennessee, from Nashville to Clarksville.
Reid had originally come to Nashville from Texas to pursue a career as a country singer.
The Houston Chronicle reports that the killings began after Reid was fired from his job as a dishwasher at the restaurant Shoney’s in early 1997 after he lost his temper, throwing a dish at another employee.
The day after he was fired, Reid went into a nearby Captain D’s restaurant and killed two young employees. A month later, Reid robbed a McDonalds close to the Captain D’s and shot three others to death.
His last set of killings occurred a month after the McDonald’s shooting, after he kidnapped two Baskin Robbins employees and slit their throats, dumping their bodies at the Dunbar Cave State Natural Area.
Reid was arrested in June of the same year and went on to be convicted of all seven murders. He was sentenced to death in 1999 and was sent to Nashville's Riverbend Maximum Security Institution.