Expert witness: Taylor Parker is not mentally ill

NEW BOSTON, Texas (KTAL/KMSS) – An expert witness says Taylor Parker was not suffering from any mental illness when she brutally beat and murdered Reagan Hancock and cut her unborn baby from her womb.  

“The crime scene was horrendous,” said forensic psychologist Dr. Michael Arambula, who did not interview Parker personally but conducted an extensive review of all the evidence and records related to the case. “I was looking for some kind of mental deterioration that would account for that, but instead I saw that she stuck to her plan and (there was) no remorse afterwards.” 

The testimony came on the second day of the penalty phase of Parker’s capital murder and kidnapping trial in Bowie County. The jury convicted Parker last week on the charges and now must determine whether she should get the death penalty or life in prison.  

On the stand Thursday, Arambula said he has seen patterns in women who kill others, such as their partners or their children. In those cases, there are usually clear indications of significant mental illness.  

“In this case, there is nothing regarding any mental illness and nothing regarding intoxication and Ms. Parker falls in the category of fetal abductors, which are rare but fall into a class of women who don’t have a mental illness. The murders are planned. They’re premeditated. They have plans for after.”  

He called the amount of scheming it took to pull off the lies as long as she did vast, extraordinary, and impressive.  

Dr. Arambula said Taylor Parker’s actions leading up to, during, and after the crime indicate she has a borderline personality, fitting the definition for what are known as “Cluster B” personality disorders in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM-5. The manual is the standard reference used by clinicians and researchers to define and classify mental disorders.

“Cluster B” personality disorders are a collection of personality disorders that affect how people behave, typically characterized by a higher likelihood to behave dramatically and erratically. That includes narcissism and antisocial personality disorder, and people who are known as sociopaths, which is defined by a disregard for others and failure to demonstrate guilt or remorse. 

“It’s important to remember that people typically have empathy for other individuals and it’s also important to remember that crimes occur in the heat of the moment,” Dr. Arambula said. “Things happen when people make bad decisions, and it really does adversely affect them. They try to escape, but there’s a humanity that remains within them that knows the severity of taking a life. That’s different than somebody that takes a life, and it doesn’t bother them. That’s a lack of empathy or remorse…there’s a cold callousness.” 

And that’s what Arambula said he sees in this case.  

“Despite all the blood and knife wounds and blunt force injuries…It was evident to me that Taylor Parker kept her plans to take that baby even though there was a child in the house.”  

Jurors also heard Thursday from Parker’s jailhouse therapist, who testified that Parker was typically polite but “a bit guarded” during their sessions until a disturbing incident in which Parker got angry about having to remain handcuffed with her hands behind her back during therapy sessions. 

Parrish said Parker “went completely dark, her eyes went completely dark and her face distorted. And then she sat down, and she was not happy. We didn’t meet for very long that day. ”  

“It disturbed you?” Crisp asked Parrish on the stand. “Yes, ma’am absolutely. And going forward, I knew I had to be careful.”  

Parrish also testified that Parker quickly earned a reputation as being a “top dog” in the jail because of her ability to get what she wanted and managed to manipulate just about everyone, including the correctional officers.  

Parrish said that is an “ongoing situation and it is frustrating to watch.” 

“In my opinion, she’s not a typical inmate,” Parrish said. Where there are typically more drug addicts or inmates with impaired mental functioning, Parrish said Parker is smart and “almost appears to thrive while being incarcerated.”  

Parrish said Parker has never said much to her about the murder or discussed anything “in depth,” trailing off whenever Parrish has tried to probe. But if they were talking about something superficial, she says she would get a very detailed response.  

Parker did express anger about being in jail and about loneliness. She wanted male companionship and complained about being surrounded by women, saying there was “too much estrogen.”  

One thing Parrish said Parker never expressed was remorse for the crime.  

The day before the first anniversary of Reagan’s murder, Parrish said Parker appeared upset. Parrish said she thought they might be getting somewhere and pressed Parker about it. She was not expecting Parker’s response, which was concern that people would be talking bad about her on Facebook and online.  

In fact, Parrish testified, Parker said things that suggested someone else was responsible for Reagan’s murder.  

Parrish noted from an August 2021 session with Parker that “her prayer is that the family knows who she is and that she would not do something like this. She says she hates the people who were involved in this and she doesn’t want her children to see her in jail.”  

Parrish said Parker even told her that she loved Reagan, although she never said her name.  

“They were friends, to the best of my knowledge.”  

Parker also spoke as though she was very close with Reagan’s family, claiming they really knew her and knew she was not even capable of doing this.  

“I lost someone, too,” Parrish says Parker told her.  

During the jury selection process this summer, Parrish says Parker expressed concern that there was not going to be anyone that hadn’t heard about what she had been accused of. She also wanted religious people on the jury, “who knew about mercy and forgiveness,” but also people who are a little more “carefree, alternative,” who would not care what the prosecution would say about her.  

But most of all, Parrish said, Parker did not want any women on the jury. Especially mothers.   

In other testimony earlier in the day, the jurors learned Parker gave up custody of her son in her divorce from her first husband, Tommy Wacasey, and never paid a dime in child support.   

According to documents shown in court, Parker owed $8469.08 in back child support and penalties as of January 2021. Requirements to pay child support are suspended when the person ordered to pay is incarcerated, but they still owe unpaid child support and any penalties that accrue for nonpayment. 

On the stand, Wacasey’s divorce attorney Eric Marks testified that Parker, then still going by Taylor Wacasey, came to the divorce hearing without an attorney and confirmed on the record that she had no objections to Tommy Wacasey taking full custody of their four-year-old son.  

Marks says he found that odd, and so did the judge. He says he also knew the judge would not be inclined to grant sole custody to one party unless there was good reason to do so. But Marks testified that Wacasey did not want to go negative on Taylor in court, and he followed his client’s wishes.  

As a result, the judge ordered joint custody with Wacasey as the primary parent and also ordered Parker to pay $225 per month in child support even though Wacasey had not asked for it. That amount was based on minimum wage, in what Marks described as something of an “olive branch” for Parker because he could have based it on her income.

Marks also testified that Parker was in a hurry to get the divorce finalized in March 2018 because she was planning to marry Hunter Parker by the end of that month. Taylor and Tommy had been separated since the previous July. Taylor went on to marry Hunter Parker less than three weeks later.