Where Taylor Parker is now after admitting to cutting baby out of friend's womb and attempting to steal child
Warning: This article contains graphic content and descriptions of crime that some readers may find distressing.
A new Netflix documentary called Maternal Instinct follows the story of Taylor Parker, a Texas woman who pretended to be pregnant for months and lied to her husband about it.
She bought a fake silicone belly to pretend to be pregnant, and also claimed she had a multi-million dollar inheritance.
Maternal Instinct takes a gruesome turn when it reveals Parker also murdered pregnant woman Reagan Simmons-Hancock in an attempt to steal the baby growing in her womb.
Parker was found by police after they pulled her over for driving erratically with the foetus in her lap, she was taken to hospital where they found no signs that she'd given birth, and the body of Reagan Simmons-Hancock was discovered by her mother Jessica Brooks.
Reagan's family said they'd become worried when she hadn't dropped her daughter off at daycare, and when her mum went to her house she found the disturbing murder scene.
The woman had been stabbed over 100 times and suffered 35 blunt force trauma injuries, and Jessica had to call 911 to tell them her daughter was dead.
Jessica also begged Reagan's step-father Marcus Brooks not to go inside the house and look.
Their friend Chris Hughes went inside to look for Reagan's three-year-old daughter, saying it was the 'worst thing you can imagine, the worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life', and he had to step over the woman's body as he searched for her child.
The young girl was found upstairs hiding under the covers and jumped into Chris' arms when she recognised him as a friend of her grandparents.
At the hospital Taylor Parker had tried to claim the baby in her lap had been hers, but her story fell apart quickly under investigation and she was arrested.
Where is Taylor Parker now?
Indicted by a grand jury on charges of capital murder and kidnapping, Taylor Parker pleaded not guilty but in 2022 she was convicted and sentenced to death.
She tried to argue against the kidnapping charge on the grounds that the baby she stole, later named Braxlynn, was dead but a doctor for the prosecution testified that the infant still had a heartbeat upon arrival at the hospital.
Parker is now on death row at the Patrick L. O'Daniel Unit, Gatesville, Texas.
In 2025 she appealed against her kidnapping conviction, but KTAL reports this failed, they also reported that earlier this year she attempted to appeal before the US Supreme Court, but they denied her petition.
She is still awaiting an execution date.
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 conceive 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, who 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.
9 October 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’.
November 2025
Parker's first appeal against the kidnapping charge fails, a judge decides 'a rational juror would find beyond a reasonable doubt that Braxlynn was 'born alive' at the time that Parker kidnapped or attempted to kidnap her'.
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.
12 June 2026
Netflix documentary Maternal Instinct is released.
Maternal Instinct is available to stream on Netflix.
Joe Harker