A jury trial is now set for Pammy Maye, the Columbus woman charged in the death of 5-year-old Darnell Taylor.
Maye appeared before a Franklin County judge on Friday, July 31, 2026, and formally rejected a plea agreement that prosecutors had put on the table, leading to the trial.
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| Darnell Taylor |
The case traces back to the night of February 13, 2024, around 11 p.m. precisely, when Maye suffocated Taylor, a child who was in her custody.
Hours later, in the early morning of February 14, Maye woke her husband up and informed him of what she did so he immediately dialed 911 to report that Taylor was no longer alive.
Court records show that during that call, Maye placed her hand over her husband's mouth and tried to stop him, while she told him she "had a plan."
She then left the home in a 2015 Jeep Cherokee, and an Amber Alert was issued, as per online reports.
Police found the Jeep a few hours later in Brooklyn, Ohio, while Maye was located on the evening of February 15, wandering outside a business on Tiedeman Road, wearing only a nightgown.
Officers immediately took her into custody, and roughly three hours after that arrest, investigators discovered Darnell Taylor's body inside a sewage drain in the 1000 block of Marsdale Avenue in Columbus.
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| Pammy Maye at her hearing in 2026 |
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| Pammy Maye after her 2024 arrest |
A grand jury later indicted Maye on one count of aggravated murder, three counts of tampering with evidence, and one count of abuse of a corpse.
She was initially held in the Cuyahoga County Jail before being extradited back to Columbus, where a judge set bond at $4 million.
At her first arraignment, Maye entered a not guilty plea through her attorney, Samuel Shamansky, and during that hearing, Shamansky asked the court to consider moving Maye from the county jail to a secure psychiatric facility.
"This is going to be a mental health case through and through," he reportedly told the Judge.
In April 2026, Maye was found competent to stand trial, so on July 31, 2026, she was back in court to consider a plea agreement offered by the prosecution.
The deal would have required Maye to plead guilty to aggravated murder and abuse of a corpse, with three counts of tampering with evidence dismissed. It carried a sentence of 20 years to life in prison, as per WKYC News.
However, Shamansky told Judge Mark Serrot that Maye wanted a jury to decide the case instead. "I've explained the possibilities, the ups, the downs, everything that could happen, couldn't happen, and her desire, your honor, is to try this case to a jury in November," he said.
Judge Serrot observed that the proposed sentence was essentially the same range a conviction at trial would bring, noting that there was no significant difference.
"The offer that was made would be pretty much what she would be convicted of at trial," the judge said. "So, she would be pleading to something that would still allow a maximum sentence, but I would decide the sentence, and that would be up to me. So, it's not like the prosecutor is giving something away in this case."
Maye appeared for the hearing but she lasted roughly 20 seconds in the court room as deputies escorted out, because she kept shouting, "God is dead." Her trial is now scheduled to begin November 9, 2026.
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