Taylor Parker: Part 1, Fake Pregnancy, Inheritance Lies and a Foetal Abduction Case

[00:00:01] Texas State Trooper Alonzo Chavis pulled a car over onto the shoulder of the road, and as he approached the driver's window, the woman started waving frantically. Something was wrong, very wrong. And the second he reaches the door, he sees it. Sitting in the woman's lap was a newborn baby girl. She's tiny, she's covered in blood, and it was unclear at this moment if the baby was still even alive. Okay, well she's just given birth though, right?

[00:00:27] The baby had a faint heartbeat, but needed an urgent medical attention. But over the next few hours, as medical staff looked over the mother, they would find something deeply disturbing. Today, we're going to be talking about Taylor Parker, and she has a troubled life involving family fortunes, inheritance disputes, medical problems, and a seemingly relentless campaign of sabotage from the people closest to her. Most of all, her mother, Shona.

[00:00:57] Taylor wasn't someone who enjoyed being alone. Friends would later describe a woman who threw herself completely into these relationships, investing everything, almost becoming obsessed. She wasn't just a small-town Texas mother. She was the heir to a fortune. I don't know. It just sounds quite fishy already. This story is so unbelievable that if it wasn't for court records, witness testimonies, and thousands of pages of evidence, you would think that this is made up.

[00:01:57] Welcome to The Compendium, an assembly of fascinating things. A weekly variety podcast that gives you just enough information to stand your ground at any social gathering. We explore strange true stories from the worlds of true crime, dark history, scandals, mysteries, and of course, remarkable people. I'm Adam Cox, your ringmaster for this episode. And I'm Kyle Reesey, your mime liaison associate. Okay, tell me more. Well, basically, I facilitate communication between the mimes and other departments.

[00:02:26] Because the last thing you want is anyone accidentally saying to a mime, use your words. That's like deeply offensive to a mime. Or speak up. Yeah, or speak up. Even worse. But also, I'm just here to bring clarity on certain things, you know? Like, for example, like two hands up, pressed against nothing, usually means like, I'm trapped. But to another mime, it could mean the prince is broken. That's very misleading. Yeah, exactly. So I am there to just facilitate the communication between the mimes.

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[00:04:14] Okay, enough of the housekeeping. Because today, Kyle, on the compendium, we're diving into an assembly of high-risk pregnancies, a multi-million dollar inheritance, and one of the most unusual mother-daughter relationships ever leading to a double murder. Shit. I don't know what to say to that. What? Yes. You make all that up.

[00:04:36] To be honest, this story is so unbelievable that if it wasn't for court records, witness testimonies, and thousands of pages of evidence, you would think that this is made up. Really? God, okay. I'm excited for this, man. Okay, so today we're going to be talking about Taylor Parker. And if you know her already, you know exactly what we're in for. But if you don't, then for now, all you need to know is she has a troubled life involving family fortunes,

[00:05:03] inheritance disputes, medical problems, mysterious threats, and a seemingly relentless campaign of sabotage from the people closest to her, most of all, her mother, Shona. Do you know what? We all know people like this from school, where there's just so much drama going in their lives. Like, you speak to them, there's always something, something going on. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, this is kind of like one of those people. Yeah. It's the kind of people you cut out your life when you reach 30.

[00:05:30] Yeah. Do you know what? I'm too old for this. I've got a sore back. I might not have any kids, but do you know what? I've got other shit I need to be dealing with. Yeah, I cannot deal with you. So her mother, Shona, she would do anything to ruin Taylor's life by harassing her, harassing her partners, involved in organized crime, and even creating bomb scares. Some people believed every word Taylor had to say. Others were not so convinced. But by the time the truth finally starts to emerge, it's already far too late.

[00:06:00] Okay. I'm very intrigued, Adam. Okay. Enough crypticism, if that's even a word. Is that even a word? It's not a word. I don't think so. I'm just going to get into the story because today it starts on October the 9th, 2020. Texas State Trooper Alonzo Chavis was driving along Highway 82 near the city of DeKalb, Texas. It was just a routine patrol for Alonzo, nothing unusual. But then he noticed there's a car coming towards him and something immediately felt wrong.

[00:06:30] The car was moving erratically. It was speeding up and it was drifting. Its hazard lights were flashing as it tore down the highway. At almost the exact same time, a 911 dispatcher named Katie Jimenez received a frantic phone call and the woman on the line was screaming, crying, barely able to get her words out. She said a state trooper was behind her and she needed an ambulance immediately. At first, Katie assumed she was injured. Maybe she'd been involved in a crash. But then the caller explained what was happening.

[00:06:59] And suddenly, nothing about this situation made sense. The woman said she was in labor and was on her way to the hospital. But nature couldn't wait and she was already giving birth behind the wheel of the car. Wow. And so she was driving, was she? Hmm. Okay, crazy. Crazy. Meanwhile, Alonzo Chaffers had already activated his lights and pulled the car over onto the shoulder of the road. And as he approached the driver's window, the woman started waving frantically, motioning for him to come closer, faster.

[00:07:28] Something was wrong, very wrong. And the second he reaches the door, he sees it. Sitting in the woman's lap was a newborn baby girl. She's tiny, she's covered in blood. And it was unclear at this moment if the baby was still even alive. Okay, well, she's just given birth though, right? Yeah. The umbilical cord was trailing from the infant's stomach and disappearing beneath the woman's clothing. And for a moment, the trufer could hardly process what he was seeing. This woman was hysterical. She told him she'd just given birth whilst driving.

[00:07:56] And now her baby wasn't breathing. She begged him to help, begged him to get them to a hospital. But there was one condition. She refused to go to the nearest emergency room. She wanted to go to Edibel, Oklahoma, a hospital which was 40 minutes away. And Alonzo's like, well, there's much closer hospitals. Surely you'd want to go there. Yeah. Why did she want to go to that hospital? Well, she insisted that her doctor was at this specific hospital and she just wanted to get to her doctor. Sure.

[00:08:23] So it's like, it's a, I don't know how it works in America, but like you have to go to this particular hospital. Otherwise it's not covered. And then you're like stuck with like a 50 gram bill or something. Yeah. So Alonzo, he can see that she's in distress. And I was like, let me just call you an ambulance. Let's get you to hospital. Heartbeat, but needed an urgent medical attention. And Taylor is covered in blood. And the nurses and doctors, when she arrives at the hospital are concerned for her health,

[00:08:51] given that this looked like a traumatic roadside birth. But over the next few hours, as medical staff looked over Taylor, they would find something incredibly alarming. Nothing about this incident that they were dealing with made sense. In fact, what they uncovered was something deeply disturbing, one that would shock America and that many people did not see coming. What was it? Well, I'm going to leave you on that slight cliffhanger. Oh, you're going to do a classic Adam Cox switcheroo. We're going to now go back. Yeah. To the very beginning.

[00:09:21] So this was the end. We need to find out about Taylor. So Taylor Renee Parker liked to present herself a certain way. On Facebook, the 27 year old described herself as a wildflower. She was wild, free and wicked with a glow that was never meant to be tame. Oh God, I hate her already. Her profile painted a picture of a woman with endless interests. She listed herself as an amateur photographer, office administrator, a medical assistant. Basically, she tried her hand at a lot of different things. Pretty much. Yeah.

[00:09:51] But more than anything else, Taylor wanted people to see her as a mother. Her social media was filled with photographs of her children. What seemed to be missing, however, was the one thing that Taylor appeared to want the most, a lasting relationship. Okay. How many kids has she got at this moment? She's got two kids at this moment. She just wants a little daddy for both Timmy and Michelle. And so by her late 20s, Taylor had already lived through a series of intense romances, two marriages, in fact, and painful breakups.

[00:10:18] She became a mother at just 17 years old after falling pregnant with her daughter, and Merson. And the relationship with her daughter's father eventually collapsed, leaving Taylor to raise her largely on her own. And then a few years later, she marries a guy called Tommy, who steps into the fatherly role. And later, they have a son together called Trey. For a while, it seemed like she'd found a stable family life that she was after. Okay. So at this point now, there's still two kids. But the marriage doesn't survive.

[00:10:46] After years together, Tommy files for divorce in 2017, and their separation was pretty bitter, and there was a custody battle over Trey initially. For many people, that might have been enough of a reason to slow down, but not for Taylor. She moves on real quick. Within months, she remarries, beginning a whirlwind relationship with a man called Hunter Parker. The marriage lasts less than a year before ending in another divorce. So by now, there's a bit of a pattern emerging. Taylor wasn't someone who enjoyed being alone.

[00:11:16] Friends would later describe a woman who threw herself completely into these relationships, investing everything, almost becoming obsessed. We've seen those types of people before, right? Was it Sherry Pippini? She was quite obsessive about her partner as well, willing to go to extreme lengths just to keep them interested, keep them involved. Yeah, exactly. And just weeks after her second divorce with Hunter, she then meets someone new. Oh, wow. And his name is Wade Griffin. And unlike the men who came before him,

[00:11:44] Wade seemed like exactly the kind of person that Taylor wanted to settle down with. And not long after meeting him, she tells him some life-changing news that she is pregnant, not with one baby, but with twins. Oh, okay. Now for the 27-year-old mother of two, it felt like the beginning of an entirely new chapter. She and Wade had fallen for each other real quick, and now they're planning their future together. But according to Taylor, that future was ripped away almost suddenly as it appeared, because a few weeks into the pregnancy,

[00:12:13] she joins her father, Mark, and a family friend whilst they worked on a farm. And then during some like machinery or whatever, this cable snaps and it strikes Taylor in her abdomen. Oh, shit. Making her miscarry. And so it's her father that calls up Wade, and he has to break the news to him, essentially. Are we buying this, by the way? Because if her father has to break the news, I don't know, there just seems to be something quite suspicious about the father breaking the news. Do you know what I mean? Okay. We'll put a pin in that. We'll put a pin in that. Okay.

[00:12:43] The loss devastates her though, and as she leans on Wade for support, the relationship deepened. And for the first time, Taylor begins sharing details about her family and her past. And according to Taylor, there was something Wade didn't know about her. She wasn't just a small town Texas mother. She was the heir to a fortune. And is this a lie as well? I don't know. Like, do you know what I mean? It just sounds quite fishy.

[00:13:13] Okay. Okay. And like, you already kind of gave me a bit of a preview of what type of person she is. Everything we hate in human beings. Do you know what I mean? We all know those types of people. So it just seems like this is someone who's like very used to potentially lying a lot, exaggerating. Someone who would like you to tell them a story and they would have done the same thing, but even better. Do you know what I mean? Let's reserve judgment for now. We listen and we never judge. What was that from?

[00:13:42] That's from Gypsy Rose. From her Instagram account. Oh yeah, that's right. Oh God. Well, we're just scratching the surface. Oh, yeah. So Taylor tells Wade that she comes from old money. She claimed her family was connected to the Blackburn Syrup Empire, a well-known Texas company that had generated wealth for, well, generations. Making black syrup? Well, it's Blackburn Syrup. I don't know if it's black syrup. I mean, they're from Texas.

[00:14:11] So is it oil by any chance? There is oil connected to this. In fact, her family owned, I think, land-rich oil and gas production, producing royalty payments worth millions of dollars. So this guy that she's involved with, he must be thinking, damn. Yeah, exactly. All being well, one day, much of that money would belong to her. But there was just one problem. Oh no. According to Taylor, she couldn't access any of it because the person controlling the family's finances

[00:14:39] was her mother, Shona Pryor. And what they needed him to do was to accept an email from a Nigerian prince and then send over $20,000 to unlock the deeds to the business. I don't think that happened, but I'm surprised it didn't happen, the story to be honest. Really? Yeah. So the mother, she is controlling the finances and Taylor paints her as, well, it's a real bleak picture, their relationship. I think she says that her mother has never wanted her,

[00:15:09] that she'd been mistreated throughout her childhood. And that even as an adult, her mother continued trying to control every aspect of her life. Wade had no reason to doubt her. He naturally felt sorry for her. And to him, Taylor seemed like a woman trapped between these two worlds, someone who appeared wealthy on paper, but emotionally, she was quite isolated in reality, I guess. She felt alone. And before long, she would ask Wade for a favor that would pull him directly into her family's affairs. Not long after telling Wade

[00:15:38] about her family's wealth, Taylor comes to him with an opportunity property. Her grandparents owned land in Byron Mill, Texas, property that had slowly fallen into disrepair after her grandfather became too ill to manage it himself. Taylor said that she wanted to restore it and bring it back to life. And according to Taylor, they agreed to support the project using money generated from the family's oil and gas royalties. Okay. So Wade, does he know that this is all happening? Or is this what she's telling him has happened? Like she's gone to her grandparents and they think

[00:16:07] this is a great opportunity? I think she's pitched it to Wade and she's saying like, listen, my grandparents are on board. If we do this up, they're going to help fund this essentially. no, full support and whatnot. Yeah, but there needs to be a little bit of investment from them early on because currently, Taylor doesn't have access to her fortune. Of course, yes. So the land, it needs fencing, bush needs clearing, everything, they need to hire some people, they need to get equipment. And essentially, they estimate it's going to cost

[00:16:37] around $50,000. Oh, that's not much. Not much, but it's not money that they have easily. Well, they can't access it at the moment. I mean, if you've got old money and you can't access $50,000, you ain't got no money. Do you know what I mean? Well, she has the money, just her mother is keeping it from her. All of it though, oh, she's got old money money? Bitch, come on. Come on. If you're shocked at that. Oh God. Anyway,

[00:17:06] she manages to convince Wade, you take out this loan, this investment, I'll, you know, put it in your name, but I will give you the money back when I get access to my old money. Yeah, exactly. So work begins, contractors were hired and equipment rolls in and for a brief moment, it looks like the project's finally underway, but then everything falls apart because Taylor calls Wade in tears. According to her, her mother Shona had discovered what they were doing and intervened. The funding had vanished, the account was empty and the money that they had promised

[00:17:36] was gone essentially and the timing couldn't have been worse because bills were coming out, obviously Wade's put this investment in and now he's out of pocket because he's not going to be able to pay this back. Yeah, he's going to have to stop paying the loan back. But why does her mother have access to her own bank account? Well, she is well connected is all I'm going to say. Okay, it's old money. And so, Wade is covering the costs out of his own pocket. He trusts Taylor because she's showing him messages, emails, documents that appear

[00:18:05] to support everything that she had told him about her inheritance. As far as Wade was concerned, the problem wasn't Taylor, the problem was her mother because this wasn't the last time Taylor promised that money was on its way. Over the following months, the same pattern repeated itself and believing that relief was just around the corner, Wade continued investing in their future. Further vehicles, farm equipment, livestock, loans, debt that he would never have taken upon himself if it wasn't for this promise that this inheritance was coming. Sure, yeah,

[00:18:35] no, I get it. And the thing is, when this wire transfer is about to be approved and like only, you know, days away, something would happen involving Taylor's mother, Shona, the transfer would fail, the account would be frozen, another legal issue would appear and Wade would be left carrying the burden. And so by late 2019, Wade felt like he was fighting a war against someone he'd never even met. And according to Taylor, Shona wasn't just controlling the inheritance anymore, she was actually trying to destroy her life.

[00:19:05] The messages, they never seemed to stop, these emails, these texts, this online harassment, sometimes they came directly from Shona herself and other times they appeared under a strange alias. Oh. Often using names like Mandy Boyd and all this stuff and so to Wade it seemed really bizarre but Taylor always had an explanation. Yeah, what was her explanation for it being a different name? Or she would say actually it's just my mum trying to hide someone else because they're getting all these abuse threats and stuff like that. She would always say it's my mum,

[00:19:35] she's controlling this or whatever. Sure, okay. Then one day, Taylor told Wade she had been visited by a law enforcement officer. The man introduced himself as Agent Coburn and according to Taylor, he hadn't come with good news. He claimed that her life was in danger. Taylor said Coburn told her that the dispute over the family fortune had escalated far beyond courtrooms and bank accounts. In fact, her mother was connected to organised crime and had hired people to kill Taylor. What?

[00:20:04] Kill Taylor? This has escalated far too much. All over this Blackburn syrup or whatever. Exactly, $50,000. That's what this is all over. And it's not even her money. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, and no one's paid anything yet. No. It's only money that she's gotten from a loan from the bank that she's eventually going to use to pay like the old money to pay back her boyfriend. So like, this is all just really silly. Yeah, and you know, getting death threats, this feels like

[00:20:34] it's escalated very quickly. Wade and Taylor have only been dating I think less than a year at this point. Wow, really? And a lot has happened. Yes. And if that wasn't frightening enough, Taylor said that the threat extended to her daughter. So her mother was after her own grandchild. This is stupid. So it wasn't just a family dispute, it was a matter of survival. So Wade says, come live with me, I'll protect you, all this sort of stuff. But according to Taylor, that safety wouldn't last because she was convinced that her mother knew everything that they were doing,

[00:21:03] whether her phone was tapped, they knew where they went, who they spoke to, even private conversations seemed to find their way back to her mother. And so I think they end up buying like burner phones at some point because they're a bit concerned about even speaking to each other. This is so stupid. Clearly, this is just rubbish. Taylor believed their phones had been compromised, that someone was monitoring them, watching them, listening. Whether any of that was actually happening didn't matter to Wade. What mattered to him was that Taylor seemed genuinely terrified.

[00:21:33] And as her fear grew, all he wanted to do was just protect her. Yeah, of course. And according to Taylor, they weren't alone. She claimed that there were undercover officers that were monitoring the property around the clock. Well, for her protection. Yeah, watching from a distance and she would say to Wade, oh, don't speak to them because you'll blow their cover. But she would see these police officers around, right? Yeah, this 50-year-old man pushing a wheelbarrow. He's undercover. Oh, that little kid over there who's fishing in the ravine is undercover. He's actually

[00:22:02] a 60-year-old cop. Yeah, I mean, obviously, I think she was saying that they're adults, but we're making joke of it, but she would say that there were people out there in the public that were undercover. I mean, is Wade okay? Is Wade all there? Have you seen pictures of Wade? I've seen pictures of Wade. And what does Wade look like? Does he look like someone who would easily fall for a scam? Um, I mean, I don't know how to say this politely. Hold, hold the phone. Let me Google this guy. Okay, so Wade Griffin. I mean, there's no excuse here.

[00:22:32] Like, he does not look like someone that would fall for a scam. No. Do you know what I mean? He's not what I pictured. She, however, does look like a Jezebel. Doesn't she? She's got this, like, blonde, dark, bleached, flowing hair. She's got eyes like a cat. Pregnancy photos. Yeah, that happens a bit later. Interesting. Oh no, there's another picture of Wade. Yeah, he looks like someone who'd fall for a scam. He's got a chin strap beard

[00:23:01] and he's got a little cowboy hat. Yeah, he does look like someone who'd fall for a scam. The thing is, there's a lot of people, I'm not saying this is a scam at this point, there's a lot of people that believe Taylor. So it's not just Wade that she manages this to convince us. So she's good, basically. She's a good manipulator. She, a lot of people, yeah, don't have reason to doubt her. And even when they do, there's always an explanation. Yeah, there is, there's always an explanation with these people, you know, always. Yeah, and the thing is, Taylor always insists,

[00:23:30] it's all real. Then just before Christmas, she receives what she described as the final update. The investigation with her mother was over. There were people responsible had been caught and there had allegedly been arrests after a shootout with the FBI. Oh God, out of interest, has Wade ever met Taylor's mother? No, not. But then the most shocking development of them all, so Agent Coburn is the one that reveals all this information. Can we just call him what it is? What?

[00:24:00] It's Cockburn. Definitely Coburn. What? There's no CK in there? I don't think so. But it's spelled Cockburn. I know what you mean, yeah. Okay. I just don't know if that's how his name, I don't think it is. We'll come on to it, you'll understand. So Agent Coburn, he reveals the most shocking development of all. Shona, she had taken her own life whilst in custody. And so just like that, the woman that Taylor blamed for years for this chaos and financial hardship was gone. And she was, I don't know,

[00:24:30] maybe there was like a tinge of sadness, but for her, I feel like it was relief because now it felt like things could change. There weren't going to be any of these disputes, people hiding money. She can now start to have the future that she'd always wanted. that's right. Does she get her $50,000 back then, her mother had taken from her account? Well, I think there's some legal things that have to happen first, but essentially that money should be on its way any minute now. So that's what she's telling Wade. Okay. Poor Wade.

[00:25:00] And it's around this time that Taylor suggests something bigger, like a new project for them. And it's buying a ranch called Pecan Point. And not long after Christmas, she contacts this real estate agent named Rusty Lowe about the property in southern eastern Oklahoma. And for Wade, it was almost impossible not to fall in love with it. It's nearly 2,000 acres of rolling farmland stretched along the Red River. There were cattle pastures, pecan groves, hunting rights, reservoirs,

[00:25:30] and enough opportunity to build something and support the family for generations. Yeah, have a pecan pie like farm. I imagine it's like the Dutton Ranch a little bit like... But in Texas. Yeah. Yeah. So Taylor and Wade, they drive out to see it together. They fall in love with it. And the asking price is pretty steep. It's around $4.7 million, which is not a problem now that Taylor's going to get this money, right? Taylor wastes no time. She makes an offer. She tells Rusty she is an heir to the Blackburn syrup fortune.

[00:25:59] And she basically signs the paperwork without hesitation. And so to the people around her, she certainly looked like someone who had the money because she was so confident. She was like so reassuring. Yeah, yeah. But does she not have to put down a deposit or like show evidence that she had the money? She just had to sling a name that she was part of the Black Syrup Syrup Company. I don't know. What even is it? Yeah. I don't think she's given them any money yet, but she's starting the process essentially. Maybe she's put down a bit of money. This is going to take a little while to clear.

[00:26:30] Sure. But not everyone in Wade's family was convinced by Taylor's stories. In fact, Wade's mother, Connie Griffin, had been sceptical from the beginning, much like yourself, Kyle. I think with good reason. There were just a lot of small things that didn't quite add up, let alone the whole FBI shootout. One of them was Taylor's custody situation. Now, despite being a devoted mother to Merson, she didn't have custody of her younger son, Trey, which Connie was like, that seems quite odd. But Taylor had an explanation.

[00:26:59] She said that she had been recovering from a serious medical emergency when a judge pressured her into signing away her parental rights. And Connie, I guess she accepted it, but I don't think she ever fully believed that. And it wasn't the only thing. There always seemed to be another crisis, another legal dispute, another family emergency, and another reason why the millions of dollars Taylor talked about never quite arrived. Still, as unusual as the story sounded, there appeared to be evidence supporting them. She would show

[00:27:29] documents and emails, conversations with lawyers and banks, and royalty payments in remarkable detail. So whilst it seemed sceptical, or not real... Yeah, she was showing the receipts, basically. Exactly. And it's kind of like, okay, there's enough evidence to suggest you have some money. Yeah, but she's clearly forging these receipts. Yeah. But it seemed to settle things at least until the next drama happened. Okay, she's fighting fires, this one. Cue the next drama. It's just days

[00:27:58] before Christmas and Taylor receives an unexpected message from Agent Coburn. He's back on the scene. Oh, Cockburn's back. And according to Taylor, he had something unbelievable to confess. He'd lied. Shona wasn't dead. She had never been... Why would he lie? Well, the entire story had supposedly been fabricated to protect Taylor from further stress whilst the investigation was still ongoing. Okay, so question, just one quick question. Your mother has died and you hate her.

[00:28:27] You chose not to go to her funeral? What about the extended family? They were then asking where she was? Was she even buried? Like, how much time had gone by? Why was Shona not buried and why did Taylor not go to her funeral? Those are questions I don't know the answer to. Well, I do. I'd be like, honey, are you okay? I'm so sad to hear about your mum. Are you going to go to the funeral? You're not? No? It doesn't sound like any of those conversations have even happened. Well, it probably did, but I reckon Taylor's, I hate my mother, I'm not going, whatever.

[00:28:57] And Wade's only kind of hearing Taylor's version of events, right? Oh, like Taylor Swift's version. I mean, no, but yes. Anyway, Taylor was furious that she had been lied to, that actually her mother was still alive and that she was potentially still in danger, that the inheritance, the money, the pecan point purchase, all of that now lies on the fact that her mother's back. Is any of this, is she now going to get her money essentially? Taylor reportedly cut ties with Coburn immediately,

[00:29:27] telling never to contact her again. But by this point, the damage is done because only days later, she comes face to face with the woman she believed had been tormenting her for years at a family Christmas gathering. And Wade goes with her. So the moment Taylor and Wade walk through the door, the atmosphere feels different. Conversations stop, people glancing at one another and sitting there among the family members was Shona Pryor very much alive. And? For Wade, it was the first time meeting the woman

[00:29:56] he'd heard so much about. There was no warm introduction, no attempt to smooth things over, just tension that filled the room. So you're the bitch that you've been tormenting my wife. Yeah. But that didn't actually happen because Taylor basically whisks Wade off into another room to wrap presents because it's Christmas. Just escapes talking to her mother. But that doesn't sit well with Shona. She barges in and basically comes in and says, stop hiding. Why don't you join everyone? And there was this kind of argument and tension. It was awkward, it was uncomfortable

[00:30:26] and before long, Taylor and Wade, they just hand their gifts out and they leave and they didn't really say much. And for Wade, he sees all this and actually to him, this convinces him that yeah, Shona is a piece of work. Yeah. Like whether or not maybe all the information that he's been told is true. But he doesn't know why there seems to be that friction. She's saying it's because of obviously everything that's happened. My mum literally trying to kill me. But actually, the tension is actually because probably Shona knows that she's been lying.

[00:30:55] She can't put off introducing Wade to her family any longer. And so she's gone in there trying to protect him and keep him away from the family so he doesn't ask any questions which will just create even more of a mess for Taylor. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. And then what's happened is Shona's noticed and go, why don't you come in and join us? I sit down, have Christmas and she's just freaked out and so they've just left early. Yeah. That could be what's happened but to Wade he's like, yeah, she's clearly the piece of work you've always said she is

[00:31:25] and I understand why you've got a bad relationship and he buys everything that Taylor's ever told him. Wow. Okay. Meanwhile, the whole Pecan Point deal is still trying to go through. There's back and forth with contracts but then there's delays with paperwork and at first Rusty Lowe tries to be patient. He's the one that's trying to sell the ranch to Taylor and Wade because these transactions can be complicated. Family trusts can be pretty messy and it's hard to get that money essentially

[00:31:54] but to reassure him Taylor arranged what she claimed would be a $7 million wire transfer from her inheritance but it never appears. And then she pivots to another explanation. The funds, she say, would come from royalties generated by her family's oil and gas interests and she produces these documents off her contact details and even connected Rusty with representatives she claimed could verify everything. He speaks to them and it does give him enough reassurance but he's getting pissed off that it's taking this long. but also what's crazy

[00:32:24] is I know she's obviously faking a lot of these documents, right? I wouldn't even know where to begin to start faking these documents. It's not just documents though, there are conversations with people. Yeah, so she's obviously faking online conversations and emails and messages. I think there's telephone calls as well. How is she doing this then? Is it fake or is it real? Oh, don't do this now. Anyway, Taylor's like, she's convinced it's Shona that's blocking access to her money and deliberately

[00:32:53] sabotaging the purchase. So desperate for a solution, Taylor turns to her uncle Butch. According to her, Butch was wealthy enough to solve the entire problem himself. She tells Wade that her uncle had agreed to provide the $20 million needed for the purchase but even if that was true, moving that kind of money doesn't happen overnight. So once again, Rusty is asked to wait and once again, he finds himself trying to verify where the money was actually coming from. When he attempts to contact Butch directly, Taylor is furious because now she's

[00:33:22] increasingly frustrated with people questioning her finances. She basically is like, that's enough. I've got the money. You'll get it when you'll get it. Basically, she's pissed off with people like questioning her. Yeah, checking up on that. But the deal never comes to fruition and that's partly because of what happens next because by the beginning of 2020, Wade Griffin had reached his limit. Months of promises had led nowhere. The money never appeared and his debts are just increasing. For the first time since they met,

[00:33:52] Wade was seriously considering walking away. Taylor, however, wasn't ready to give up. Whatever anyone else thought of her, one thing seemed undeniable. She loved Wade and she talked about marrying him. Then just a few weeks later, Taylor discovers she is pregnant again. All right. After everything they'd been through, she saw it as a sign, a fresh start. Maybe even the thing that would finally bring them back together. Immediately, she starts telling friends. One of the first people

[00:34:21] she contacts is her friend Angela Pate or Pat. Taylor couldn't contain her excitement. She talked about the baby and the future, everything like that. But Angela is surprised by this news. Not because Taylor didn't want another child, but because of what Taylor herself had told her a while back. Which was? According to Angela, Taylor had previously claimed she'd undergone a partial hysterectomy several years before. Now, whether there had been a misunderstanding or whether Angela perhaps remembered it

[00:34:51] incorrectly. Or uteruses grow back. Or that. It was enough to make her think, that doesn't sound right to me, but I'm no doctor. Yeah. Yeah. Honey, are you sure about that? There's a little bit of gas in there. I think she was trying to be a good friend. Maybe just take a few pregnancy tests just to make sure. And Taylor agreed. And before long, Wade had received the news he was going to be a father. It wasn't necessarily what he was looking for. After all, his finances weren't in a good place. He was under a lot of strain. A baby was just going to probably make matters worse.

[00:35:21] But gradually, Wade began to warm to the idea, partly because he thought things could get better and partly because actually he was excited to be a father. And on March the 14th, 2020, just days after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, Taylor shares the news publicly that she is expecting a baby girl with Wade. And Wade picks out a name, Clancy Gale, and their friends and family, they come over to celebrate. They have a gender reveal. All really nice.

[00:35:51] Unfortunately, not everyone shares their excitement because before long, rumours start circulating around town. Some people are questioning whether Taylor was really pregnant at all, partly because she wasn't showing very much and partly because by this point, there were already people that just didn't trust her. Most brush off those rumours. After all, every pregnancy is different, so some women don't show early. Yeah, exactly. So, hang on. The fact that we know that this is a bit of a con, like she's gone as far as faking a pregnancy potentially.

[00:36:21] So, when I look to that picture of Wade and Taylor posing for, what, their gender reveal or whatever, is she not pregnant? She is pregnant in that photo, yeah. Okay. I don't know what's happening. So, she is pregnant. Well, people are doubting her, but as we're going to come on to, she's got plenty of evidence to suggest that she is pregnant. So, even though Wade believes her and a lot of her friends believe her, that didn't really stop the whispers and particularly around Wade's family, they remain very

[00:36:51] skeptical about almost everything. The women in our family, when they fall pregnant, they really show, where's your baby bump? You got no baby bump. Well, the thing is, I think Wade's family were just concerned that she was using this as a way to entrap him. And so, they just weren't ready to accept this just yet. But, to Wade, like, it seemed like Taylor was pregnant. She appeared pregnant. She battled morning sickness.

[00:37:20] She spent hours vomiting. She had all these appointments that she would go to. And she constantly talked about the baby. But during the height of the COVID pandemic, Wade often couldn't accompany her beyond the waiting room. Of course! So, she was going to these hospital checkups on her own. Yeah, but she would show him the ultrasound images, details from the appointments, the conversations, the recommendations. So, Wade bought it, essentially. Taylor would tell him the baby was moving and that...

[00:37:49] God! Quick, come feel! Oh, yeah, nah. She got tired. Well, this is the thing. He would feel her stomach and be like, oh, so it's like psychological. Yeah, I think I can feel it. And I think he starts to feel bad for himself as like, well, is she pregnant or can I not just feel it? I'm like, what's going on? Then he hears shared friends say, oh, no, we felt the baby kick. And so, he's like, oh, well, if you felt it, then, yeah, why am I even questioning this? And he's also touching her belly. So, you know when you are not touching

[00:38:19] someone's pregnant belly, right? Yeah, you know what's real and what's not. I'm so confused. Well, as spring turns into summer, the rumors begin to die down because Taylor does start to show. Okay. And for a while, it seemed like actually that just, that shut up everyone. But then other problems appear. In early April, Taylor emails her friend, Angela again, a pregnancy verification letter and asked if she just could print it out for her. It seemed like a simple favor. She'll do it. She prints it out. She just takes a quick look at it. Yeah. And at first,

[00:38:49] it seemed normal, but then she notices, oh God, well, the due date's correct, but the name of the patient, this is someone else. This isn't Taylor. It's not. So, it wasn't hers. No, so she contacts Taylor and goes like, oh, there's something wrong here. And Taylor's like, well, it catches her off guard and she breaks into tears and she says, this is my mother Shona again. And Angela's like, what? She said like her mother has somehow got connections in the hospital or whatever and she's interfering with the paperwork to make it look like

[00:39:19] that she's faking her pregnancy to make people hate her, all this sort of stuff. Yeah. Okay. Yes. And so, Angela is like, okay, but I do need some proof that you are pregnant. I mean, yes. Yeah. So, she approaches that conversation gently with Taylor and so, she takes Taylor to Walgreens and buys several over-the-counter pregnancy tests and they all come back negative or inconclusive. But she's showing though at this point. Yeah. And so,

[00:39:48] instead of easing Angela's concerns, it just makes her even more confused. Yeah. And so, they keep going and are determined to get a definitive answer. Angela drives Taylor to a nearby medical clinic in Mount Pleasant and because of COVID restrictions, she has to wait outside in the car. But when Taylor comes back, there is a printed page with her name and everything and it verifies that Taylor is pregnant. I mean, listen here, right? If you've got Angela who's driven you to somewhere in Mount Pleasant

[00:40:17] and told to stay in the car, Taylor's got out of that car and she has managed to blag whoever is behind that counter to give her a printed out document confirming that she is pregnant. And it has the due date and everything. That is one clever motherfucking hustler. Do you know what I mean? To come back out in that time and not be prepared or anything. Yeah. She's good. And so for Angela, she's like, okay, but she's not going to doubt that. She's not just thought that she's gone behind someone's desk or whatever. And what is the likelihood

[00:40:47] of you walking into a random pharmacy and getting that letter? And so for her, that settles it. Taylor is, in fact, pregnant. Yeah. And so Taylor, she continues to document her pregnancy online with ultrasound photos, updates for medical appointments, pictures of her growing her baby bump. And imagine all the little captions like, oh, this is the happiest I've ever been. Just like, so too bad for those people who doubted me, Angela. Really passive aggressive with it. And whilst Wade

[00:41:16] is genuinely excited about becoming a father, excitement doesn't pay the bills and the collapse of the peak and point deal had him with all these debts that he was struggling to pay off. He had the pressure of, you know, looking after a family and Taylor didn't make things easier. She wanted reassurance, affection. And whilst Wade cared about her, he struggled to match the intensity of her expectations. Oh, really? And increasingly, that started to, I don't know, form a bit of distance between them.

[00:41:45] And she saw it as rejection, but I guess he found it just incredibly stressful. Yeah, sure. He's just stressed out, man. So in July, Taylor announces that doctors were monitoring concerns with her pregnancy. She posts an ultrasound online and said that Clancy's heartbeat had become irregular. And they think it's Shona. Well, no. It's Shona's fault. For one time, it's not, but it's the stress of everything that's happening and basically alludes that the way that Wade was treating her was affecting the birth of her and her baby. Oh, she's so manipulative,

[00:42:15] isn't she? Eventually, Angela speaks to Wade directly and says, look, you're going to have to put that to one side. You need to be there for your girlfriend. And he takes that feedback on board. And basically, it becomes happy again. And that's when they have that photo that you looked at where he's nursing her baby bump. Sure, it's like a maternity photo shoot. Oh, okay. Do you remember we saw one of those when we were in Australia? We did that very early morning walk from Bondi Beach all the way up to, I think, Poogee Bay. And as we were walking,

[00:42:45] we saw this woman in this flowing kind of like bikini thing. And she was doing a photo shoot on the beach. Do you remember that vaguely? Vaguely. Yeah. Why do people do that? I don't know. I think that's the only time you can have a photo with a person growing inside you. You can have a photo with a person inside you whenever you want. God's sake. But yes, okay. So that was from that photo shoot there. So that's when they're at their happiest, right?

[00:43:15] So they have this photo shoot. Okay. So yeah, when's this baby coming? I want to know. Well, that's the thing as it gets closer to the due date, people that are very skeptical are like, she's going to plan a miscarriage or something, right? How is she going to get out of this? Yeah. But also they are seeing the baby bump. So how can she not be pregnant? And then people have felt the baby kicking and then she's got all this evidence whether she's lying or not. I mean, I can understand how feeling the baby bump could be psychological. So I get that,

[00:43:44] but that is cruel. If she pretends to have a miscarriage, that is awful. But also the size of her belly faking that. Is she just like eating too many Jaffa cakes? I don't understand. Well, there's still enough evidence that suggests she is pregnant and there's a lot of evidence that makes people question whether she is or not. Yeah, because you definitely know if someone is a bit chubby or if they're pregnant, right? Like, they get to a point where those two things are very clearly discernible. Yeah, and this is only

[00:44:14] a couple of months away from actually her due date. So she's going to be quite big. Then on September the 16th, just six days before the baby was due, Wade receives an anonymous text message. The sender insisted Taylor couldn't possibly be pregnant. They claim she'd previously undergone a partial hysterectomy, backing up what Angela had thought. So was this text message from Angela, do you think? No, it was, well, we don't know that. It was just a mystery person. They also claimed that the ultrasound images were old

[00:44:43] and they claimed that the entire pregnancy was a lie. But Wade dismissed it immediately. There'd been enough rumours and stuff like that so he just brushed it off. He's getting angry about it as well. But they did blame this harassment on Shona once again. Okay, of course they did. What he didn't realise was that the truth was far more disturbing than he could have imagined because while Taylor and Wade were counting down the final days until Clancy Gale's arrival, another woman was preparing for the birth of a baby girl as well. Her name was

[00:45:13] Reagan Hancock Simmons. Now, Reagan knew Taylor as well. Now, I can't be sure exactly. I think Taylor may have done some wedding photography for Reagan. Either way, they had connected and bonded over their pregnancy because in fact, they were pretty much due to give birth around a similar time. Interesting. Now, Reagan is just 21 years old. She's married to her husband, Homer, and already raising a young daughter from a previous relationship. Reagan was preparing to welcome another baby girl

[00:45:43] into the world. She documented her pregnancy online. And like Taylor, she spent much of her time thinking about the little girl she couldn't wait to meet. And that baby already had a name, Braxlin Sage. And as Taylor's due date approached, the two women spoke a lot. They exchanged messages about pregnancy symptoms, nursery preparations, fears about becoming mothers, and they would, you know, meet up together. Reagan worried that her daughter might arrive early and Taylor worried about the opposite. Her due date

[00:46:12] had come and gone, so she didn't give birth on the 22nd of September. According to Taylor, doctors weren't concerned. Recent scans showed everything was progressing normally and she assured Wade there was nothing to worry about. Then came good news. Her doctor had finally scheduled an induction at the Titus Regional Medical Center in Mount Pleasant. That was going to be on October the 5th. And that's normal, I'm assuming. Yeah, I think it is normal. Sure. One or two weeks, right? Yeah, okay. So she's a couple weeks late. She's due to be induced

[00:46:41] on the 5th of October. Yeah. A few days before her scheduled induction, another message arrives from Mandy Boyd. Now, this is one of the aliases from Shona. The same account had been harassing Taylor for several months. He claimed that on the day Taylor was due to give birth, a bomb threat would be called into the hospital. And when it happened, Mandy wrote, Taylor would somehow be blamed. It sounded ridiculous like so many of the messages before it, but to Taylor, it frightened her and they couldn't ignore it because of everything that's happened before. But why would you

[00:47:10] tell the person that you were going to pin a bomb alert onto, like a bomb scare onto? You wouldn't text that person to say, oh, by the way, the day you go in for your induction, it's going to be a bomb scare. And I'm going to tell everyone it's you. Yeah. Make it look like it's you. That's fine because I've got this text message from you saying, so if the police come to me and say, oh yeah, you're the one responsible for the bomb scouts, show them the text message with your number on it, bitch. So, all they could do was wait until October the 5th

[00:47:40] and when it arrived, instead of meeting their daughter, the day begins with chaos. In fact, a fire breaks out beneath Wade's cabin. Okay. Thankfully, no one is injured and firefighters manage to contain the blaze before it spreads. But it's pretty significant the cabin's left without electricity or running water, so they can't stay there. They have to then move in with Wade's parents, I believe. Later that morning, Taylor receives a call from the medical center to say that her induction has been cancelled.

[00:48:09] Just hours earlier at five o'clock in the morning, someone had phoned in with a bomb threat to the hospital. Hundreds of patients and staff had to been evacuated. Shh. Okay. Absolutely busy day. So news footage even showed people moving to temporary shelters and things like that. So it's kind of chaos, but again, they're like, that bloody Shona. Yeah. She's done it again. And the thing is, though, she's putting other people at risk. What if there's a high-risk pregnancy there or like premature babies

[00:48:39] or anything? Yeah. And this is the whole hospital. It's not just the maternity ward. Exactly. Other procedures could have been going on, some life-threatening stuff that day. Yeah. So bad. Fortunately, the hospital was quick to reschedule Taylor's appointment. It's now going to be October the 9th. So just a few days later. Sure. Okay. What's she going to come up with on the 9th of October? Jesus. She's got a few days to think about it. Yeah. So they're now at Wade's and Connie, Wade's mum, she wasn't necessarily relieved to see them. No.

[00:49:09] She looks concerned because when Taylor disappears for a while, Connie confronts her son and says, I seriously question if there's going to be a baby at this point. I also want to know where Taylor has disappeared to. She is in her ninth month. She's heavily pregnant. Women like that don't just disappear quickly. I'm just nipping out. It's like, I'm sweating. I'm fed up. I just want this baby out of me. You're not going anywhere.

[00:49:38] You are lumping on the couch and just waiting it out. Do you know what I mean? So she's nipped off somewhere and that's given Wade's mum an opportunity for her to confront him. Yeah. I mean, I don't think this is the first conversation but she's, I don't think there's a baby. I think the bomb threat was probably Taylor. Yes. She sees everything for what it is and Wade's like, this is exactly what Shona would say would happen that everyone's going to think it's Taylor. So for Wade, he obviously, he gets angry, he gets upset with his mother

[00:50:08] and he does confront Taylor about it saying like, you know, I'm really concerned people could still keep saying this. Obviously, Taylor is hurt by what Wade has said and she's, do you know what? In a couple of days, everyone is going to see the truth. No one's going to doubt us again. Exactly. Everyone's going to see. I'll show you all. Yeah. And that manages to calm Wade down. On October the 8th, the atmosphere inside where Wade and Taylor were living was tense. The previous few months had been exhausting and after the fire on the 5th,

[00:50:37] a forensic investigator was asked to determine what caused the blaze and initially they thought maybe it's an electrical fault. On closer examination, they said it had been started deliberately. Oh really? How? They said it was arson and so first thing that Taylor and Wade think of, of course, is... Shona? Yep. They just need to get her in custody again. She might kill herself again. So again, they're obviously concerned that Shona's watching their every move. So to create a little distance,

[00:51:06] they decide they need a backup hospital somewhere outside of Texas, somewhere beyond Shona's reach. Taylor spends a few hours making calls and most hospitals turn her away but they managed to find a hospital in Oklahoma that says, actually, yep, we've got space, you can come here, no questions asked. So for the first time in a few days, the couple felt a sense of relief, they had a plan, things were back in motion but there was just one problem and that was money. They were already under enormous financial pressure and the expense

[00:51:35] of a pregnancy, well, that's obviously something that's expensive, you have to pay for that. But fortunately, Taylor believed she had a solution several weeks earlier she had arranged a deal with a ranch owner in Oklahoma named Scott Robinson. Scott was hosting hunting groups on his property and needed wild hogs for the weekend. The agreement with him would bring in more than $6,000 which would cover the costs of the pregnancy and kind of, you know, the immediate finance issues that they had. Well, $6,000 is a lot lower than I thought

[00:52:04] it would normally cost. Yeah, maybe it's just what they need to tie things over to be fair. Now, the timing of this deal wasn't ideal because it was around the time that Taylor's induction was going to happen but they felt that they didn't have much choice. They had to go forward with it. They were going to leave before sunrise, drive the hogs to Oklahoma, complete the sale and then go to the hospital to have the induction. It's such a busy day. It's a busy day, right? So, Wade is preparing the truck for the following morning and that evening

[00:52:34] Taylor goes to visit her friend, Reagan and they just have like a catch up and then the morning arrives and before sunrise Taylor says to Wade she'd spent the night suffering severe cramps and couldn't face the four hour drive to Oklahoma. Instead, she planned to just head to the hospital straight away essentially. She didn't want to do the detour. Fine, and so Wade is going to go and sort out the hogs on his own. So basically, he is not going to be there at the pregnancy. Convenient. She's going to fucking steal a baby. Wade hated the idea. No,

[00:53:03] he wants to introduce his new baby girl. Yeah, but he realized that the hog delivery couldn't wait and so he agrees. He leaves around 4 a.m. planning to meet Taylor over at the hospital. Almost immediately, things start going wrong. When Wade arrived at the ranch in Oklahoma, nobody seemed to know who he was or why he was even there. I've got some hugs to sell. He waits for ages wanting to talk to the owner, Scott Robinson and Scott comes out, he's confused and he says, look,

[00:53:33] I've got your 150 hogs. And Scott's like, I never ordered them. He said, but wait, there's this whole conversation. He kind of shares in this chain of messages and stuff like that and he's like, oh, hang on a minute, Griffin, that rings a bell. Yeah, I was speaking to a Taylor Griffin a couple of weeks back but I felt like she was messing me around and I never agreed to any deal whatsoever. And Wade's like, I really need this money. I've got 150 hogs. I need to get rid of them. He needs to leave ASAP essentially. He manages to convince

[00:54:03] Scott to still accept them but he only gets two and a half thousand for them because apparently getting rid of animals across state lines without permission or something, like that's a criminal offense essentially. They haven't gone about this the right way. Sure. And so he was like, so you break the law, son, but I'll take these hogs off your hands. For a steal. Yeah. But for Wade, he's like, that bloody Shona again. She's sabotaging our lives. Anyway, he does the deal and he arrives at the hospital and he hurries inside.

[00:54:33] He walks straight to the reception and asks for Taylor's room number and then points him down the hallway. Three police officers were already approaching and before Wade could even ask what's happening, they order him to turn around and place his hands against the wall. His heart drops and for a moment he thought the ranch deal had caught up with him, that somehow the hogs had landed him in some kind of legal trouble. But that wasn't the issue because hours earlier at around 10 a.m. the ambulance had arrived at the very same hospital carrying a woman named Taylor Parker and of course

[00:55:02] she had a baby with her. Now according to Taylor, she had given birth whilst driving on the highway. The new baby girl she held in her arms wasn't breathing. Medical staff rushed the infant into emergency care and Taylor told nurses the baby's name and everything like that. When staff asked her due date, Taylor gave an answer that immediately confused them because she said I was September the 22nd. The baby she claimed was already overdue but the child in front of them was tiny. She looked like... Like she was premature.

[00:55:32] Yeah. Well, possibly has someone got the dates wrong? Either way, the nurses, they see this infant in trouble and they don't dwell on the kind of the timelines. They just make sure that they focus on getting the, you know, looking after the baby. Sure, yes. Doctors worked desperately to save her. CPR, incubation, every intervention available but nothing worked. A few hours later after arriving at the hospital, baby Clancy Gale was pronounced dead. Oh no. The atmosphere

[00:56:02] in the emergency department was somber and newborn had died but that wasn't what had staff whispering amongst themselves. Yeah, why are they arresting Wade? Because while doctors were fighting to save the infant, they made a discovery that made no sense. A doctor is captured on camera saying it surely doesn't look like a baby came out of there. What? The hospital examinations indicated she hadn't been pregnant at all. The baby she brought to the hospital

[00:56:30] wasn't hers and suddenly a horrifying question emerged. If Taylor wasn't the mother, where was the real one? She has cut this baby out of another person basically is what you're saying. It didn't take long for people to find out the answer. Within the hour, reports come through from New Boston, Texas. A young woman had been found murdered inside her home. Her name was Reagan Simmons Hancock. The same Reagan that Taylor had visited the night before. The same Reagan who had been

[00:57:00] seven months pregnant and the same Reagan who had been helping Taylor prepare for motherhood. When officers arrived at the house, they discovered a scene so violent that even experienced investigators struggled to process it. Blood covered the room, furniture, walls, flooring, everywhere. This wasn't an accident. It wasn't a robbery gone wrong. As officers began examining the scene, another terrifying detail emerged. Reagan's three-year-old daughter Kinley was still inside the house, alive, confused, asking where her mother was.

[00:57:30] And when investigators turned their attention back to Reagan's body, they finally understood what happened. Because Reagan hadn't simply been murdered, the C-section-like wound proved her unborn baby had been taken from her. And for the first time, the investigators began to suspect that the woman calling herself the mother of Clancy Gale wasn't a victim at all. She was their prime, suspect. I'm so shocked. Who would ever do something like that? That's what happens when you get yourself

[00:57:58] into such an absolute pickle that the only way out is to resort to doing something like this and she's done it. Yeah. It's the most horrific thing. Yeah. Not only that, she's killed a mother to a small toddler as well. And that's the end of part one. In part two, we'll uncover more of Taylor's lies going back years. How Taylor spent months convincing friends, family, doctors, and even her own boyfriend that she was pregnant.

[00:58:28] The lies she told, the identities she created, and why she did this in the first place. And the disturbing obsession that prosecutors would later argue had been building long before Reagan Hancock even met Taylor. Because the question wasn't just what happened on October the 9th, 2020. It was how far Taylor Parker had been willing to go to make everyone believe her fantasy was real. Yeah. And that is the story, Adam. That is the story. That's half the story. I tried to do this in one episode

[00:58:57] and as you can see, there were so many twists and turns and lies I could not cover it in one episode. I can't believe how many lies she's told. But also then, how so many people have just fallen for them. That's wild. So yeah, there's been so many lies and quite early on you were very sceptical of these lies because they seemed so outlandish. And also because, Adam, we're doing a podcast episode about it. There's got to be some kind of twist there, right? It was never going to be straightforward. But it seems incredible the amount of stuff

[00:59:27] that she managed to get away with or convince people. Yeah, and I'm kind of disappointed in myself for not seeing where this was going because the lies continued on up until literally the day she was due to give birth on the 22nd of September. And you think to yourself, how is she going to get around that, right? Spit a lie on this one, yeah. Exactly. And you did say about the bomb threat, but at the end of the day, the bomb threat, that doesn't end the fact that she's pregnant. It probably just bought her more time, didn't it?

[00:59:57] And I guess she was waiting as much as she could for this woman to come as close to term as possible to give that baby that she was planning on stealing the best chance. That's probably what that was, right? Yeah, I mean, I don't know if this was always her intention. I think there's evidence to suggest that she had tried, we'll cover in part two, she tried to get babies in the past in other ways. Really? But I don't think people were suspicious of her pregnancy. I don't think anyone

[01:00:26] thought this was how it was going to end. No, who would ever, ever think that? In fact, I thought this was such a rare thing, but in fact, there is like over 30 attempted or actual fetal abductions in the last, I don't know, 10, 15 years. The fact that it has the name fetal abductions is horrifying. Yeah. And they all tend to have this similar pattern of these women who are in these relationships, want to do anything they can to hold

[01:00:55] on to them. And this is some of the lengths that they go to. Well, I'm looking forward to listening to part two, and I think so are a lot of our listeners. Shall we run the outro? I think so. Let's run the outro for this week. And that brings us to the end of another fascinating foray into the compendium, an assembly of fascinating things. If today's episode has sparked your curiosity, then please do us a favour and follow us on your favourite podcasting app. It really makes a world of difference and helps other people like you find the show. And for our

[01:01:25] dedicated freaks out there, don't forget, next week's episode is already waiting for you on our Patreon, and it's completely free to access. And if you want even more, then join our certified freaks tier to unlock our entire archive, delve into exclusive content, and get a sneak peek of what's coming next. We'd love you guys to be part of our growing community. We drop new episodes every Tuesday, so until then, never underestimate how far someone might go to keep their story alive. See you next time. See ya.