Texas Woman Arrested After Allegedly Trying to Buy Woman’s Child for $500,000 in Walmart

Rebecca Lanette Taylor in a police photo. Crockett Police Department

A Texas woman was arrested after she allegedly tried to buy another woman’s child for $500,000 as they shopped at a Walmart, police said.

Rebecca Lanette Taylor, 49, was charged with the sale and purchase of a child, according to police records obtained by local media outlets. An affidavit said that a “white woman with blonde hair approached” a mother and child in the self-checkout line at a Crockett, Texas, Walmart.

According to police records, Taylor “began commenting on her son’s blonde hair and blue eyes. She asked how much she could purchase him for.”

The mother, who was not named, “tried to laugh this comment off, thinking Taylor was joking. Taylor told her that she had $250,000 in the car and she would pay that much for him. [The mother] told her no amount of money would do,” KETK-TV reported.

The mother also told police that Taylor was accompanied by another woman, who asked for the name of the child. Taylor told the woman that she wanted to buy the child for some time and allegedly knew the child’s name despite the mother not having told them.

“Taylor began screaming at (the mom), saying if she wouldn’t take $250,000 for him, then she would give her $500,000 because she wanted him and she was going to take him” while they were in the parking lot, according to the affidavit, which was filed by Lt. Ahleea Price with the Crockett Police Department, according to The Messenger newspaper.

The records also said the mother locked her children in the vehicle. Taylor kept saying that she wanted the child and would pay the mother $500,000.

Price wrote that officials went to Taylor’s residence to ask about the situation. In the affidavit, officials said that they watched surveillance video and it appeared to match with the mother’s claim.

“She told me that she doesn’t like thieves, then she stated I could speak with her attorney and to get off her ‘precipice.’ She slammed the door shut,” Price said in the affidavit.

Taylor was taken into custody on Jan. 18 and was charged with the sale or purchase of a child, which is a third-degree felony under Texas state law.

She was released from jail on Jan. 20 from the Houston County Sheriff’s Office on a $50,000 bond, reported Click2Houton.

It’s not clear if Taylor has an attorney.