01/12/2026
A Miami man who threw a 5-year-old girl into the Everglades and left her to be eaten by alligators could again be condemned to die almost three decades after the girl's death.
76-year old Harrel Braddy kidnapped 5-year old Quatisha Maycock and her mother, Shandelle Maycock -- an acquaintance Braddy met in a church group -- on the night of Nov. 7, 1998. Braddy beat Shandelle Maycock, choked her until she was unconscious, put her in the trunk of his car and later left her in a deserted stretch of U.S. 27 near the Broward-Palm Beach county line, according to prosecutors. She survived.
Now, a new jury will hear details of the brutal crime as Braddy again faces ex*****on due to changes in Florida's death penalty law. Braddy's resentencing started Jan. 5 in Miami-Dade Circuit Court with jury selection.
Braddy's motive, investigators say, was that he was spurned by Shandelle Maycock, who had repeatedly rejected his advances. Fearing the daughter could identify him, Braddy dumped the child alive on the side of Alligator Alley, prosecutors say. Quatisha Maycock's body was found in a canal days later by fishermen.
The girl had bite marks from alligators on her head and stomach, according to the Miami Herald's archives. Her left arm was severed and her skull crushed, prosecutors said.
During Braddy's trial in 2007, a medical expert testified that the girl was still alive when alligators bit her. Braddy was convicted and sentenced to death at his trial nine years after the grisly crime.
"The defendant ... caused this 5-year-old to die, alone in the wilderness, and to be mutilated by monsters of the swamp," former Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Leonard E. Glick said in his sentencing order. "Adults are supposed to protect children from monsters; they are not supposed to be the monsters themselves."
Shandelle testified that she initially saw Braddy as “nice” and occasionally asked him for favors, the court documents state. He once made a sexual advance, but after she threatened him with a knife, he left and later apologized. She said he never made another advance before that fateful day.
Braddy could be spared from ex*****on due to changes in Florida's death penalty law.
In 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court found Florida's death penalty sentencing system unconstitutional, as it called for a judge to determine whether a death penalty should be imposed, which violated the Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury.
Florida lawmakers, with support of then-Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, rewrote the state law to allow only 10 of 12 jurors to recommend a death penalty. But the Florida Supreme Court in 2017 ruled the new law was unconstitutional, saying jury verdicts needed to be unanimous.
That was the catalyst that granted about 100 Florida death row inmates, including Braddy, the opportunity for a new sentencing. Braddy had been sentenced to death in 2007.
Braddy, however, may again be resentenced to death with a nonunanimous jury vote. In 2023, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a new law that allows juries to recommend a death sentence with an 8-4 vote instead of unanimously. The Supreme Court has yet to take up a constitutional challenge to the new nonunanimous verdict law.
DeSantis pushed for the change after the Parkland school shooter, who killed 17 students and faculty in a shooting spree at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High on Feb. 14, 2018, was spared from the death penalty in 2022.
Braddy's case is the third death resentencing in Miami-Dade in recent months. In November, a jury spared the life of Labrant Dennis, who was convicted of bludgeoning to death his ex and the football player she was seeing in 1996. Later that month, another jury said Rafael Andres should be sent back to Florida's death dow for beating, stabbing and strangling a waitress with a rice-cooker cord in 2005.
Braddy was well-known to law enforcement before Maycock's murder. His criminal history included convictions for robbery, kidnapping and attempting to kill a corrections officer by strangling him.
Braddy was sentenced to 30 years behind bars but was released from prison in 1997, a year before Maycock's killing, after serving only 13 years.
"He's an extremely dangerous guy," former Miami-Dade Police spokesman Ed Munn told the Herald at the time of Braddy's arrest.
While jailed, Braddy also became known for delaying his first trial by going through 10 lawyers and, at one point, representing himself.
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2026/jan/08/convicted-man-to-face-potential-death-row-return/
https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/man-convicted-of-leaving-girl-to-be-eaten-by-gators-may-again-face-death-sentence/3745453/
https://people.com/woman-kidnapped-girl-eaten-alive-alligators-possible-death-penalty-11881590
A Florida man convicted in a decades-old case in which a 5-year-old girl was left to be eaten alive by alligators is again facing a possible death sentence.
