Before Requesting a 730 Exam: What Counsel Should Document

Stephan M. Carlson, MD, MBA, FAPA · Criminal Competency and Responsibility

Short answer: before requesting a 730 exam, counsel should document the specific communication or reasoning failures that raise a capacity question. A competency evaluation is only as useful as the observations the record gives the examiner. The quality of a CPL 730 evaluation is often set before the examiner is ever appointed. What counsel records in the weeks leading up to the order—the specific things the client did, said, and failed to do—frequently shapes the opinion more than the examination itself. The order is only as good as the doubt behind it A motion under CPL 730.30 follows from the court's reasonable ground to believe a defendant may be an incapacitated person—one who, owing to

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