PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Andrew D. Reisner AU - Jennifer L. Piel TI - Mental Condition Requirement in Competency to Stand Trial Assessments DP - 2018 Mar 01 TA - Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online PG - 86--92 VI - 46 IP - 1 4099 - http://jaapl.org/content/46/1/86.short 4100 - http://jaapl.org/content/46/1/86.full SO - J Am Acad Psychiatry Law2018 Mar 01; 46 AB - In Ohio, a criminal defendant is incompetent to stand trial only if “a present mental condition” renders him unable to understand the nature and objectives of the proceedings against him or to assist in his defense. Some forensic mental health evaluators have treated the mental-condition requirement as synonymous with, or similar to, the psychiatric condition required in the state's insanity criteria, which requires a “severe mental disease or defect.” Yet the term mental condition does not appear in other areas of the state's criminal code or in the state's definition of a mental illness for purposes of civil commitment. Moreover, Ohio's adjudicative competency statute does not explain what conditions or symptoms constitute a mental condition sufficient to render a defendant incompetent. This article is a review of the mental condition requirement in competence to stand trial laws, using Ohio as an example, and how this term has been interpreted (or misinterpreted) by mental health evaluators and the legal system. Suggestions for practicing forensic evaluators are offered.