Netflix’s new true crime documentary Maternal Instinct — streaming now — revisits one of the most disturbing criminal cases in recent Texas history: the 2020 fetal abduction murder committed by Taylor Parker, a woman who faked a pregnancy for ten months, killed a 21-year-old expectant mother, and attempted to pass the victim’s newborn as her own.
The case centers on the murder of Reagan Simmons-Hancock in New Boston, Texas. Parker attacked the young mother inside her home, killed her, and performed a crude C-section to steal her unborn baby, Braxlynn Sage. Parker had sustained the deception using a silicone belly, forged ultrasounds, and staged gender reveal parties in an effort to keep her boyfriend, local hog trapper Wade Griffin, from learning the truth.
A Texas state trooper pulled her over shortly after, driving erratically with a newborn in the car. Parker told the trooper she had just given birth on the side of the road, but her body showed no signs of pregnancy or delivery. The baby died. Parker was arrested and, in October 2022, convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.
In November 2025, an appeal of her kidnapping conviction was denied, and in May 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear her case regarding the death sentence. Parker, now 33, remains on death row awaiting an execution date.
Directed by Jessica Dimmock, whose credits include Captive Audience and The Texas Killing Fields, the 94-minute film is produced by Story Syndicate, the company behind Harry & Meghan and Depp v. Heard. Dimmock chose not to interview Parker, telling USA Today her intent was to center “the perspectives of the people that it affected the most.”
Parker’s inner world is reconstructed indirectly — through internet searches, social media activity, and the accounts of those who trusted her. Dimmock described the film’s deliberately paced structure as “in some ways the closest thing that mirrors what happened to the victim and the victim’s family.”
The decision has drawn critical praise. Reviewers have credited Dimmock with resisting the genre’s pull toward perpetrator fixation, keeping the camera trained on grief rather than spectacle. One critic wrote that Dimmock “by doling out Parker’s pathological lies and absurd deceptions in modest doses, accomplishes two strategic things — momentum and controlled toxicity.”
