How woman who faked a pregnancy and killed for a baby hid the truth from her partner
Warning: This article contains discussion of themes which some readers may find distressing.
A new documentary is revisiting the heinous crime committed by a Texas woman who faked her pregnancy and murdered her pregnant friend.
The new Netflix true crime documentary, Maternal Instinct, revisits the shocking story of Taylor Parker and the devastating crime she carried out.
After getting divorced twice, she met hog trapper Wade Griffin - but the relationship started off on lies - and long carried on.
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Taylor told Wade she was the heir to a $6 million estate - and in January 2020, she told him she was pregnant and due in September. However, what he doesn’t know is that Taylor, who is believed to have two children from previous relationships, had her tubes tied years prior, after suffering pre-eclampsia during her first pregnancy.
Meanwhile, Reagan Simmons-Hancock, 21, actually was pregnant.
Taylor met Reagan after being hired to photograph her wedding, and when Reagan became pregnant with her second child, Taylor started making more contact with her and progressing their 'friendship'.
Keeping up the huge lie over the months of her so-called pregnancy, Taylor wore a fake silicone pregnancy bump to avoid suspicion - even from her partner.
Speaking for the first time since her crime, former partner Wade has opened up about how she managed to carry on the lie.
He told Netflix: “She would go to a doctors appointment, but I couldn’t ever go in with her because it was COVID at the time.
“When I did try to go, she said the doctor had an emergency, or he couldn’t meet us, and we had to reschedule.”
Taylor also posted a number of pictures wearing the fake bump on her social media, even pretending it was ‘kicking’ in Snapchat videos.
Of course, people had their suspicions, with Wade's friend Stephanie Ott even making calls to labs and clinics to try to get confirmation of the pregnancy. However, they were bound by health privacy laws.
Then came the ‘due date’.
In October 2020, just after her ‘fake due date’, Taylor was pulled over by police for driving erratically - in which they found her carrying a dead newborn baby, who had an umbilical cord still attached.
She pretended it was hers and that she had naturally given birth, but things just didn’t add up.
In a devastating turn of events, Taylor later admitted during questioning that she had been involved in a 'physical altercation' with Reagan, and had brutally cut out her unborn baby, resulting in her death.
An investigation revealed Taylor had stabbed Reagan more than 100 times.
She was convicted of capital murder and given the death penalty, making her the youngest woman on death row in Texas.
During the documentary, Griffin said: "It was unimaginable what she did, I don't even know how to explain it.”
Maternal Instinct can be watched on Netflix now.
A timeline of Taylor Parker’s crime
2014
Mother-of-two and wedding photographer Taylor Parker decides to get her tubes tied after suffering pre-eclampsia, a dangerous condition which raises blood pressure, during her last pregnancy.
2015
Parker goes to her doctor with bleeding, who concludes she has had an ectopic pregnancy. She undergoes a hysterectomy, permanently removing her ability to have children.
July 2019
Parker, who is now twice divorced, meets hog trapper Wade Griffin at a local rodeo and they start a relationship. She lies to him that she is the heir to a $6 million estate.
September 2019
Jessica Brookes hires Parker as the photographer at her daughter Reagan Hancock’s wedding to longtime boyfriend Homer Hancock. Parker also previously took their engagement photos.
January 2020
Parker tells Griffin she’s pregnant. He doesn’t know about the hysterectomy. To maintain the ruse, Parker wears a fake pregnancy bump, takes maternity photos and throws a gender reveal party. She claims her due date is September.
Staffers at the hospital where Parker had her hysterectomy are ‘very confused’ about her social media updates, but are bound by privacy laws.
May 2020
Hancock tells her mum Jessica that she’s pregnant with her second child. Jessica later says that after Parker finds out Hancock is pregnant and expecting a girl, she starts to have more contact with her.
September 2020
After her ‘due date’ passes, Parker tells Griffin she will need to be induced or have a c-section.
October 9 2020
Parker watches a video on how to deliver a baby pre-term at 35 weeks, the length of Hancock’s pregnancy. She tells Griffin she is travelling to Idabel, Oklahoma to be induced. Instead, she travels to Hancock’s home, killing her and cutting her unborn child, Braxlynn Sage, from her womb. Hancock’s three-year-old daughter is later found in the house unharmed.
Parker is later pulled over by a Texas State Trooper for erratic driving. As the trooper is approaching her car, she calls 911 and asks for an ambulance, saying: “I’m starting to have my baby.”
The trooper finds Taylor covered in dried blood and holding Hancock’s dead baby, with the umbilical cord still attached.
She is taken to hospital, where it is soon determined she has not given birth. She is arrested the same day.
December 2020
Taylor is indicted by a grand jury on charges of capital murder and kidnapping.
October 2022
Parker is convicted of capital murder.
November 2022
Parker is sentenced to death. Jessica says a ‘heavy burden has been lifted’.
May 2026
The Supreme Court says it will not review Parker’s case. She remains on death row. A date of execution has not been set.
June 12 2026
Netflix documentary Maternal Instinct is released.
Topics: True crime, Netflix, Texas
Kiesha Dosanjh