Judge Jolts Sleepy Juror Awake As 911 Call Exposes Foster Mom's Deadly Admission
A foster mother who admitted to police she suffocated 5-year-old Darnell Taylor and left him in a storm drain stood trial not on whether she did it, but on whether she was legally insane when she did.
Case at a glance
- Pammy Maye — Defendant, foster mother, accused
Next: Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Mark Serrott will sentence Pammy Maye at a later date, which had not been set as of the verdict, according to WOSU Public Media. Maye faces a maximum penalty of life in prison on the aggravated murder count.
A granola bar, a snack, and a killing
Prosecutors say the case turns on something as small as a snack. On February 13, 2024, Assistant Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Kathryn Wolfe told jurors, Pammy Maye was upset with 5-year-old Darnell Taylor for sneaking a granola bar and peanut butter crackers into his bed. 'And that she decided it was at that, at that time, she decided she was going to take his life,' Wolfe said, according to News 5 Cleveland.
Police say Maye suffocated Taylor in his bedroom. She later told investigators, on body-worn camera footage played at trial, that she suffocated him with a plastic bag, then wrapped his body in a sleeping bag. She told police she washed the bed sheets afterward because Taylor had urinated in the bed as he was dying, according to WOSU Public Media.
Just after 3 a.m. on February 14, 2024, Maye's husband, Jabrell Maye, called 911. 'That, that she killed our foster child. She just told me she killed her foster child,' he told dispatchers, according to News 5 Cleveland. That call triggered a Columbus AMBER Alert for the missing boy — even though, unknown to responders at that moment, Taylor was already dead.
The run to Cleveland, the body in the drain
Maye's abandoned Jeep Cherokee was found at Parkview Estates on Memphis Avenue in Brooklyn, Ohio, at 5:50 a.m. on February 14, 2024, according to Cleveland 19 News. She had driven roughly 140 miles northeast from Columbus, leaving her vehicle behind.
Brooklyn police arrested Maye around 9:30 p.m. on February 15, 2024, after a business owner reported a woman walking suspiciously around a building. WSYX reported she was eventually found 'wandering around outside in a nightgown.' During questioning, police said, she told them where to find Taylor's body.
Just after 1 a.m. on February 16, 2024, Columbus officers located the boy in a storm drain, exactly where Maye said he would be. On body camera footage shown at trial, Maye told a Columbus detective, 'Even though I'm feeling bad and my right foot is aching and my back, it don't feel good, but it don't make no difference when my son don't have life,' according to News 5 Cleveland. In the same footage, she said, 'And I know what I was doing. It's not like I'm stupid. Just so that man in evil. Of course I knew that was wrong. And of course I did snap.'
"That, that she killed our foster child. She just told me she killed her foster child," — Jabrell Maye, on the 911 call, per News 5 Cleveland
Who Darnell Taylor was, and how he came to Maye
Taylor's grandparents had been raising him before they told Maye the responsibility had become too much, according to News 5 Cleveland. Maye, a close family friend, took him in and was given legal guardianship of the boy. Taylor's grandmother testified at trial that Maye had been close to the family.
Maye, 51, was his foster mother and legal guardian at the time of his death. Cleveland 19 News reported that Columbus Police Officer David Hughes, who worked the case from the beginning, said after the verdict: 'I had no faith the jury was going to find her guilty. I lost faith in the system because it had failed Darnell so much.' He added, 'Seeing the headstone, and seeing the jury that came back with the right decision, restored my faith in humanity, in the system.'
The charges, the competency fight, and the verdict
Maye faced five counts: aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse (reported by some outlets as gross abuse of a corpse), and three counts of tampering with evidence. Aggravated murder in Ohio is the most serious homicide charge short of a death-penalty count; tampering with evidence covers the sewer disposal and the washed sheets; abuse of a corpse covers how Taylor's body was treated after his death.
Before the case reached trial, a court found Maye incompetent to stand trial and sent her to a psychiatric facility for treatment, according to News 5 Cleveland. The court later ruled she had regained competency and could stand trial.
Jury selection began the week of trial, with opening arguments and witness testimony on one day and closing arguments the next, according to WOSU Public Media. The jury deliberated for just over two hours, starting around 11:30 a.m., before convicting Maye on all five counts: aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse, and three counts of tampering with evidence, per WSYX and Cleveland 19 News.
Maye faces a maximum penalty of life in prison. Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Mark Serrott will sentence her at a later date, which has not yet been set, according to WOSU Public Media.
What each side said after the verdict
The defense didn't dispute what Maye did — only whether she was legally insane when she did it. 'Because we're talking unfortunately about a woman who is deeply and profoundly mentally ill,' defense attorney Sam Shamansky told the court, according to News 5 Cleveland.
After the verdict, Shamansky argued the system itself failed his client. 'If we had a more... a system that understood that middle ground better, this case would have never gone to trial,' he told reporters, according to WOSU Public Media. He continued: 'The problem with the system is that we don't have an intermediate diminished capacity statute that deals with folks that are this ill but not insane. The only question here is where is she going to spend the rest of her life in a psychiatric setting or at Marysville.'
He added that the ruling 'doesn't take away from the very emotional and psychological turmoil that Pammy Maye suffers, every day of her life and will take to her grave regrettably,' according to WSYX.
The Franklin County Prosecutor's Office declined to comment until after Maye is sentenced, WOSU Public Media reported. Maye was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and major depression, but Dr. Daniel Davis, who evaluated her, testified he doubted the illness caused the killing and said Maye may have been overreporting or fabricating symptoms.
What happens next
Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Mark Serrott will sentence Pammy Maye at a later date, which had not been set as of the verdict, according to WOSU Public Media. Maye faces a maximum penalty of life in prison on the aggravated murder count.
How this plays in court
A prosecutor reading this file starts with the confession, because that's the whole ballgame on the question of who did it. Maye told police on body-worn camera that she suffocated Taylor with a plastic bag, wrapped his body in a sleeping bag, drove it to a sewer drain, and even washed the sheets afterward because he had urinated in the bed as he was dying. That's not just an admission — it's a sequence of deliberate, after-the-fact steps, and prosecutors used it to argue Maye knew exactly what she'd done and tried to cover it up.
The defense never contested that sequence. Instead, Sam Shamansky built the entire case around Ohio's insanity defense, telling jurors his client is 'deeply and profoundly mentally ill' — diagnosed with bipolar disorder and major depression. The legal bar for insanity is narrow: a defendant must prove she didn't understand the wrongfulness of her act. That's a much higher wall to climb than simply proving mental illness exists.
That's exactly where the state's expert mattered. Dr. Daniel Davis testified he doubted the illness caused the killing and suggested Maye may have been overreporting or fabricating some symptoms. Combine that with Maye's own words on body camera — 'I know what I was doing... of course I knew that was wrong' — and prosecutors had a defendant essentially testifying against her own insanity claim.
The jury weighed all of it for just over two hours before convicting on every count: aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse, and tampering with evidence. That's a fast deliberation for a case this heavy, which tells you the panel didn't see much daylight between 'mentally ill' and 'legally insane' once they heard Maye's own account of what she did and why.
- WOSU Public Media: Jury finds Columbus woman guilty in 2024 killing of 5-year-old boy
- WSYX: Woman accused of killing 5-year-old boy found guilty on all counts
- Cleveland 19 News: 'Restored my faith in humanity, in the system': Jury finds Columbus woman guilty of killing 5-year-old boy
- News 5 Cleveland WEWS: Trial underway for Ohio woman accused of killing foster son, leaving body in storm drain
- WSYX: Jury to begin deliberations in trial of Columbus woman accused in boy’s death