Overview
- Prosecutors opened the Miami-Dade penalty retrial by showing graphic evidence and describing alligator bite marks, including teeth impressions to the child’s skull, according to State Attorney Abbe Rifkin.
- Shandelle Maycock recounted being beaten, choked, and left for dead in 1998, while prosecutors said Harrel Braddy left her 5-year-old daughter in the Everglades because he feared she could identify him.
- Braddy, now 76, attended court as his defense team delayed its opening statement until presenting evidence later in the proceeding.
- The proceeding is a penalty-phase resentencing only; Braddy’s 2007 death sentence was vacated after a 2017 ruling that upended Florida’s prior capital-sentencing scheme.
- Records show Braddy had multiple prior violent convictions and had been released from prison about a year before the abduction and killing.