Staff photos / Ed Runyan
Elijah J. May, 21, left, is seen during his plea hearing Wednesday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. At right is his attorney, Michael Kivlighan, May pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of involuntary manslaughter in the April 11, 2023, killing of Ray’Mon Sims, 22, on Tod Lane on the North Side. May pleaded guilty on his birthday.

YOUNGSTOWN — An assistant Mahoning County prosecutor said Wednesday prosecutors were willing to reduce charges from murder to involuntary manslaughter against Elijah J. May, 21, in the April 11, 2023, killing of Ray’Mon Sims, 22, on Tod Lane on the North Side after reviewing May’s self-defense claim.

Assistant Prosecutor Patrick Fening said that in the process of reviewing the evidence in the case, prosecutors “believed that the defendant was going to be asserting a self-defense claim.”

He added, “In reviewing that claim, as well as the evidence available, the State did believe there was some credence to that claim, which led to this amendment, Your Honor.”

Prosecutors amended May’s charge from murder to involuntary manslaughter with a gun specification, as well as improperly discharging a firearm into or at a habitation with a firearm specification.

May pleaded guilty to the two charges and specifications, and he will be sentenced at 9 a.m. Monday, the same time as the case was scheduled to go to trial before Judge Maureen Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. May pled guilty on his birthday.

Prosecutors and the defense are jointly recommending that May get 6 to 7 1/2 years in prison. The murder charge and gun specification could have carried a life prison sentence with parole eligibility after 18 years if he had been convicted. Fening said the victim’s mother “understood why” prosecutors were willing to reduce the murder charge to involuntary manslaughter.

May is alleged to have fired an AR-15 rifle 18 times outside his home on Tod Lane toward the car in which Sims and another man were traveling after a physical fight among the men.

Multiple neighbors witnessed the fighting and fled as the gunfire erupted, one witness told The Vindicator.

Several homes on the opposite side of Tod Lane from the fight were hit by stray bullets, according to police reports. None of the neighbors were injured. Neighbors said at the time said the neighborhood is generally quiet and not violent.

The city’s North Side pool is at the end of Tod Lane at Belmont Avenue, just a few houses from where the fight and shootings took place.

Shots also were fired at May, but at the time May was indicted, then-Assistant Prosecutor Mike Yacovone told the Vindicator prosecutors did not believe this was a self-defense case.

A Youngstown police report stated that the incident began with 911 calls for a fight with gunfire. It added that “multiple people were fighting, and people were shooting.”

According to a Youngstown police report, a person told Youngstown police the incident was a “gunfight in front of (his or her) residence.”

A neighbor who spoke to the Vindicator said multiple neighbors became aware of a fight among what appeared to be teenagers taking place in the front yard of a home in the 500 block of Tod. Some neighbors got close enough to ask the young men to stop fighting, the resident said.

One “older lady was yelling to get off of” one of the young men, the witness said. When the gunfire began, anyone still in the area fled, the witness said. A home containing several apartments was hit by a shot that traveled through a front window where a child lives, the witness said.

Two other homes were also hit by gunfire, according to Youngstown police reports. They were down several houses from the shooting.

In addition to murder, May was indicted on voluntary manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter in Sims’ death.

Sims, who also had a North Side address, collapsed in the 400 block of Crandall Avenue after being shot in the 4500 block of Tod Lane, police said. Sims and another man were in a car at the time of the gunfire. They drove several blocks away from Tod Lane before their car went through a yard and hit the front porch of a home on Alameda Avenue.

Sims and the other man got out and went to the next street over — Crandall Avenue — on foot, where Sims collapsed. Ambulance workers gave him medical care, but Sims was pronounced dead at nearby St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital.

Sims graduated from Youngstown East High School and attended Youngstown State University, according to his obituary.