A Texas woman was just convicted of an absolutely heinous and disturbing crime.
Taylor Rene Parker, 29, was found guilty of murdering 21-year-old Reagan Michelle Simmons-Hancock, a pregnant woman, in a plot to steal her baby. Beating the expectant mother over the head, Parker gruesomely cut the baby out of Simmons-Hancock's body with a scalpel. Then she finished the mother off by stabbing her to death.
The baby later died. When authorities found Parker on the side of the road, she told them she had just given birth to the baby and it wasn't breathing.
The crime took place in October 2020, but this week a Texas court found Parker guilty of murdering Simmons-Hancock and stealing the baby.
Parker's plot was nothing short of evil. Before murdering Simmons-Hancock by bashing her in the skull with a hammer, she faked her own pregnancy. She went to extreme lengths to convince everyone who knew her that she was expecting a baby. She dressed to make herself appear pregnant, even wearing a fake baby bump. She also faked sonogram images and posted dozens of updates about her pregnancy on social media. She also went so far as to have a gender reveal party for her fake baby.
Her plot all came to a tragic end when she killed Simmons-Hancock by beating her and stabbing her over 100 times. Then she removed the baby from her body, something she had been meticulously preparing to do by watching YouTube videos.
The convicted murderer could not conceive, given she'd had a hysterectomy. Prosecutors alleged that Parker faked the pregnancy and committed the gruesome murder so that her boyfriend wouldn't leave her.
Apparently, he also believed her elaborate lies and was, somehow, not aware that she wasn't truly pregnant. Prosecutors said she even told him that she was being induced on the day of the murder.
“In the past two weeks, the evidence has never been more clear,” Assistant District Attorney Lauren Richards told the jury. “She’s a liar, a manipulator, and now she’s gonna be held accountable for it.” Richards also spoke to the unimaginable pain that the pregnant mother must've gone through in her final moments, calling that pain "indescribable."
“When Taylor had the baby and Reagan was still alive, that’s when Taylor started slashing and cutting," she said. "She can’t leave her alive. It was no quick death. She just kept cutting her. I guess Reagan would not die fast enough for Taylor to get out of there and get on with her plans.”
Prosecutors are asking for the death penalty, but it will be up to jurors to decide whether Parker deserves to die or spend the rest of her life in prison. Parker's sentencing trial will take place on October 12.
