What Happened at Taylor Parker’s Murder Trial?
Parker admitted to having a bloody fight with Reagan and cutting her baby from her womb, but pleaded not guilty to charges of capital murder and kidnapping.
More than 140 witnesses testified over 26 days of testimony during a nearly two-month trial that began in September 2022. Parker’s attorney Jeff Harrelson did not call any witnesses until the penalty phase.
Rather, he urged the jury during closing arguments Oct. 3 to find Parker guilty of murder—rather than capital murder—based on the letter of the law, “even if you don’t like it.”
As for the other charge, Harrelson advised, “It’s our position that you can’t kidnap someone unless you’ve been born and alive.”
First Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Kelley Crisp countered in her rebuttal, “The child was born when Taylor Parker cut her out. That’s when she was born. So what Taylor Parker decided wasn’t her decision to make, but she did. She decided when she was born, and she also decided when Reagan was gonna die.”
The jury deliberated for less than an hour before finding Parker guilty of capital murder. She was sentenced to death on Nov. 9.
Judge John Tidwell offered no additional comment during sentencing, instructing deputies, “You can remove her and take her to death row.”
Texas Department of Criminal JusticeWhere is Taylor Parker Now?
Parker, now 33, became the seventh woman on death row in Texas, located in the maximum-security Patrick L. O’Daniel Unit at the Gatesville correctional complex.
None of the women have received an execution date.
In 2025, an appeals court denied Parker’s petition to have her conviction for kidnapping overturned, and the U.S. Supreme Court denied a plea to review her death penalty conviction in May.
NetflixWhere Is Wade Griffin Now After Taylor Parker’s Murder Conviction?
Griffin returned to hog trapping and tending to his farm.
“The whole point behind it all,” he said in the doc, “I really don’t know. I guess she was hoping one day I’d finally tell her I loved her, but I never did.”
Connie said some people in town “turn and walk the other way” when they see her son, but, as seen in the doc, he did reconnect with friends he’d become estranged with when they confronted him with their suspicions about Parker.
