Social worker confesses to sexual abuse of a boy – now faces prison

A 24-year-old Ohio mental health counselor who was arrested on her birthday last October, just four months after receiving her license as a social worker, pleaded guilty Tuesday to sexually abusing a 13-year-old boy she was supposed to be helping.

Payton Harleigh Shires of Mount Sterling appeared in a Franklin County courtroom with her defense attorney and admitted to four counts of sexual abuse of a minor and scaremongering by showing up at the victim’s home with a gun while he was out on bail. She claimed the boy’s mother “ruined her life” by calling police.

According to documents seen by Law&Crime, the defendant also pleaded guilty to witness and victim intimidation. In total, this means that Shires will face a prison sentence of up to 28.5 years when she is sentenced on June 27, according to the agreement.

Shires, who received her social worker license in Ohio on June 12, 2023, subsequently worked for the National Youth Advocate Program. The defendant was reported to Columbus police in late September for allegedly admitting to the abuse during a phone call with the boy’s mother while police were listening in. The mother had said she had seen messages from Shires to her son asking if the woman had “seen the videos or messages” or if those videos had been deleted.

As Columbus Police noted, these texts and videos were not deleted.

Payton Shires (left) outside Franklin County Court on May 28, 2024, where she pleaded guilty (WBNS/Screenshot), (right) in a Columbus Police Department mug shot

After being arrested on her birthday, Shires was released from jail on bail. As a condition of her release, she was prohibited from having contact with the victim or any other unsupervised contact with minors.

However, her bail was revoked when police said she had threatened suicide after showing up at the victim’s home with a gun.

Authorities said she called the boy’s mother, threatened to kill her and said the father had “ruined her life.” The mother said she saw Shires on camera sitting on the porch with the gun.

Following her re-arrest, a civil lawsuit was filed against Shires and the National Youth Advocate Program. The lawsuit alleged that the organization that hired her as a social worker was negligent in its hiring and supervision of Shires.

The lawsuit alleges that while employed by the organization, Shires had “an inappropriate sexual relationship” with John Doe “at various locations in Franklin County, Ohio, as well as other counties in Ohio.”

The boy’s mother, Jane Doe, reported the “inappropriate conduct” to a director of the National Youth Advocate Program on Sept. 22 and requested that Shires be “removed from the custody of plaintiff John Doe.” However, the organization did not immediately remove her and the “inappropriate sexual relationship continued,” court documents say.

The group had previously stated in a statement to Law&Crime that it was “sad about the situation involving one of our former employees and a young person under the care of our organization.”

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