The parents of a non-verbal five-year-old girl found dead in a waterway after disappearing from the family’s holiday home have been arrested. John Herb Hayes III, 70, and his wife Geordyn Nichole Hayes, 31, were arrested in Tennessee on Tuesday in connection with the death of their daughter Saylor Hayes.
The pair face charges of unlawfully placing a child at risk/wilfully abandoning a child, according to the Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office. Their arrests came just hours after Geordyn shared an online tribute to her daughter, describing Saylor as “mommy’s little angel”. She posted an undated picture of the five-year-old smiling as she came down a slide, with a halo and angel wings added to the image.
Disappearance and search
Saylor, who was visiting from Virginia with her family, disappeared on Sunday after wandering away from their rental home in Pawleys Island, South Carolina. The youngster was found at around 9.45am the following morning in a nearby waterway after an overnight search involving hundreds of people.
Saylor had a history of wandering and had worn a monitoring device since 2024. Authorities say she was not wearing the Project Lifesaver tracking transmitter she was supposed to have on when she vanished. The documents state the monitor was removed before the family left Virginia, reports the New York Post.
Allegations and investigation
Arrest warrants allege Saylor’s parents placed her “at an unreasonable risk of harm affecting her life and safety” by failing to provide appropriate supervision and safeguards for a “severely nonverbal, autistic five-year-old child with known affinity to water and history of elopement”. It is not known who took the device off or exactly when this happened.
The parents are also accused of complicating the search after Saylor went missing. They said: “[They] encouraged search efforts to be directed toward the use of tracking technology, despite knowing that the child was not wearing the monitoring device. “[They] further directed search efforts away from the nearby body of water.”
Search teams had spent hours trying to pick up a signal using Project Lifesaver equipment on the ground and from a Charleston County Sheriff’s Office helicopter. Investigators later traced the signal to a vehicle and realised Saylor was not wearing the transmitter, according to Washington County, Virginia, Sheriff Blake Andis.
He said: “The transmitter is attached using a specialized band designed for continuous wear. It cannot simply be unclasped or removed by the client; the band must be physically cut in order to remove the transmitter.”
The operation continued through the night, with drones, police dogs and helicopters deployed while nearby docks and the Waccamaw shoreline were also searched.
Official response and next steps
Georgetown County Sheriff Carter Weaver said following the arrests: “Parents and caregivers have a fundamental responsibility to protect children who cannot protect themselves. When the evidence establishes probable cause to believe that a child has been unlawfully placed in circumstances that endanger that child’s safety, law enforcement has a responsibility to act. Saylor was a vulnerable five-year-old child who depended upon the adults responsible for her care and protection. She deserved to be safe. She deserved to be protected.”
The couple are expected to return to Georgetown County once extradition proceedings have been completed. Saylor’s cause of death has not yet been confirmed, with an autopsy due to take place on Friday. Georgetown County Coroner Chase Ridgeway said there were no visible signs of trauma on her body. He added: “The cause and manner of death remain undetermined pending the completion of the autopsy and any necessary additional testing.”
