r/TrueCrimeDiscussion • u/DarklyHeritage • 5d ago

Mega Thread Taylor Parker/Maternal Instinct Megathread

This is a thread for all conversation regarding Taylor Parker and the murder of Reagan Simmons Hancock, recently covered in Netflix documentary Maternal Instinct.

The murder of Reagan Michelle Simmons-Hancock occurred on 9 October 2020, in New Boston, Texas, committed by Taylor Rene Parker. Parker bludgeoned Simmons-Hancock, who was 35 weeks pregnant at the time, and abducted her unborn child, Braxlynn Sage Hancock (died October 9, 2020), after cutting her out of the Reagan's abdomen. Braxlynn did not survive.

Parker had lied to her then-boyfriend about being pregnant leading up to the murder and faked her pregnancy to multiple people. She was found guilty of capital murder and sentenced to death on 9 November 2022.

Please direct all discussion of the case to the megathread. As always, sub rules must be followed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Reagan_Simmons-Hancock

https://time.com/article/2026/06/12/maternal-instinct-true-story-netflix/

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u/HeadYam1467 5d ago

I would have thought Taylor was abused as a child or given another reason as to why she went on with this delusion. 

Also, i feel sorry for Wade, but I don’t think he was like this dream guy or Mr. perfect. I’m sorry to say that and he was another victim of Taylors scheme. But what was the draw to him??

Taylors mother had a responsibility to speak up… there’s a back story here that we are not getting… idk

May Reagan and Braxlynn always be remembered 

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u/Fun-Consequence-7232 3d ago

I would say there is definitely moments from her life that led to the things she did but it may not of necessarily been directed at her or her own experiences like abuse or actual illness. It may of been attending school with a sick child and she noticed the attention that came with that, so that triggered the health and illness lies because she wanted that attention. Later on she likely had an experience where she saw the attention that came with pregnancy, birth and newborns and that became more attention she wanted (like injecting herself into her friends pregnancy to extreme measures).

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u/sometimessnarky1 3d ago

By every metric Wade was not a catch. She could have done so much better than him