Taylor Parker Murdered a Pregnant Woman and Stole Her Baby And the Netflix Documentary Left Out the Full Picture of What That Meant

On October 9, 2020, Reagan Simmons-Hancock was 35 weeks pregnant with her daughter. She was 21 years old. Taylor Parker, her wedding photographer who had become her friend, murdered her and kidnapped her unborn baby.

The baby later died.

Parker was convicted of capital murder in November 2022 and sentenced to death.

Netflix's documentary "Maternal Instinct," released June 12, 2026, tells the story. But there's more to what happened than what made it into the film.

The Pattern Before The Murder

Parker had been married twice before she met Wade Griffin, the man she was with when she killed Simmons-Hancock. She had two children from those marriages: a daughter born when Parker was 17, and a son born when she was 21. She didn't have custody of either child.

With her second husband, Hunter Parker, she discovered she couldn't get pregnant because of a hysterectomy. Hunter testified that she only told him about the hysterectomy after they were married. Parker asked two of her former friends to be surrogates for her, offering both of them six figures if they would say yes.

Hunter also testified that Parker told him she suffered from several medical ailments and pretended to be sick to encourage him to stay married to her. She used aliases to convince him she was receiving a large inheritance.

Parker and Hunter divorced in the summer of 2019. By August, she was with Wade Griffin. When Hunter learned via social media that Parker was claiming to be pregnant, he reached out to Griffin's brother to tell him Parker had had a hysterectomy. He never spoke to Griffin directly.

The Hysterectomy Question

Parker's lawyers argued in court documents that she didn't give consent for the hysterectomy. They claimed that doctors asked her ex-husband, Wacasey, for approval while Parker was under anesthesia. When she woke up, she "flew off the handle and asked why [Wacasey] didn't wake her up so she could make that decision."

The doctor who performed the procedure testified that Parker had gone through the required wait period for the initial tubal ligation and was adamant about her decision. But the consent question for the hysterectomy, whether it was truly hers to give, remained contested in court documents.

Searching For Pregnant Women

As her fake September 2020 due date approached, Parker became desperate. According to testimony, starting September 14, 2020, she began researching online where she could find pregnant women. She searched maternity consignment shops and pregnancy clinics in the area. She searched license plate numbers, one of which belonged to a pregnant woman.

After her due date passed, Parker attended a teen pregnancy support group. Investigators testified that she could have been telling the pregnant girls she met that she was a midwife to get closer to them.

That's what the documentary didn't fully capture: the premeditation, the targeting, the deliberate search for vulnerable pregnant women.

What Experts Said About Her Mental State

Multiple psychiatrists and psychologists testified during Parker's trial and sentencing about her mental state. What they said was consistent and stark.

Forensic psychologist Dr. Michael Arambula testified that Parker was mentally fit when she committed the crime. "I was looking for some kind of mental deterioration that would account for that, but instead I saw that she stuck to her plan and (there was) no remorse afterwards," he said.

He continued: "In this case, there is nothing regarding any mental illness and nothing regarding intoxication, and Ms. Parker falls in the category of fetal abductors, which are rare but fall into a class of women who don't have a mental illness. The murders are planned. They're premeditated. They have plans for after."

Arambula theorized Parker might fit "Cluster B" personality disorders, which involve impulsive and dramatic behavior, and people who "often don't realize their thoughts and behaviors are problematic."

Parker's psychiatrist, Dr. Edward Gripon, said she didn't have a mental illness beyond displaying some qualities of mixed personality disorders. When asked if she could be diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder, histrionic personality disorder, or borderline personality disorder, he said she didn't fit all the criteria. But he said she could have a "mental condition" that affected her quality of life and ability to maintain relationships.

Psychologist Dr. Timothy Proctor conducted standardized tests and found no evidence of a mental disorder. But he concluded that Parker "presents with psychopathic traits" including "pathological lying and manipulativeness."

Parker's licensed counselor in jail described her as polite but "a bit guarded." In one incident, when Parker remained handcuffed, she "went completely dark, her eyes went completely dark, and her face distorted." The counselor said Parker was a "top dog" in jail and "almost appears to thrive while being incarcerated." That's not typical inmate behavior.

What The Murder Actually Cost

Simmons-Hancock's husband, Homer, didn't appear in the documentary. About a week after Parker was convicted, Homer filed a civil negligence and wrongful death lawsuit against Parker and Griffin.

In the lawsuit, he documented what happened: Parker killed his wife due to reckless driving. She took his baby, whom the jury determined was still alive when she fled the scene in Griffin's vehicle toward Oklahoma. Parker was stopped for speeding and driving erratically by a Texas State Trooper who observed the baby on Parker's lap. The baby was later pronounced dead.

As of June 2026, that case appears to be ongoing.

What This Actually Means

Taylor Parker did not kill Simmons-Hancock in a moment of mental illness. She did not act impulsively or without understanding what she was doing. Experts testified she was mentally fit. She was sane.

What she did was plan. Search for vulnerable pregnant women. Attend pregnancy support groups to get close to them. Stick to her plan. Show no remorse.

She faked a pregnancy for 10 months. She prepared a nursery. She bought fake pregnancy results and a silicone belly. She was nearly two weeks past her supposed due date when she murdered a 21-year-old woman and stole her unborn baby.

The baby died.

That's what happened. Not mental illness. Not a breakdown. Deliberate, premeditated planning by someone who experts agreed was mentally fit and sane, but displayed psychopathic traits, pathological lying, and manipulativeness.

Reagan Simmons-Hancock was 21 years old and 35 weeks pregnant. She was murdered by someone she thought was her friend. Her unborn baby was kidnapped and died.

Taylor Parker was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death. The mental health experts who evaluated her agreed on one thing: she wasn't mentally ill. She was just capable of planning and executing the deliberate murder of a pregnant woman to cover up a 10-month lie.

That's what the Netflix documentary covered. That's also what it left out — the full scope of the premeditation, the targeting, the expert testimony that no mental illness could explain what happened.

Because sometimes the most disturbing part of a crime isn't what's broken in someone's mind. It's what's present in their calculation.