Taylor Santiago (Missouri Department of Corrections).
A Missouri mom received a second life sentence this week for gunning down one of the fathers of her two children in a multistate shooting spree that left one of the fathers dead and the other hospitalized.
Taylor Santiago, 31, of Aurora, was sentenced in Arkansas on Monday after she pleaded guilty to charges of capital murder and attempted capital murder for the attack on the surviving parent, Nathan Green, and his new girlfriend, Sophia Williams, who was killed when Santiago ambushed them both at their residence in Carroll County.
Court records show that Santiago was sentenced to life without parole plus 40 years in the Arkansas Department of Corrections, with her sentence running consecutively with a life term that she received in Missouri for murdering her ex-husband, Troy Huffman, in Aurora.
The slayings were part of an hours-long January 2025 attack that saw Santiago kill Huffman and then take his Mercedes to Arkansas to shoot Green and Williams in front of their child. Williams died in the attack from a gunshot wound to the head.
Arkansas prosecutors said Santiago "fled from justice" and returned to Missouri, with authorities having to extradite her across state lines to answer for her crimes.
Santiago confessed to shooting Huffman and Green — both fathers of her children — as well as Williams. Cops said she called 911 from the parking lot of the Aurora Police and Fire Facility in Missouri around 2 a.m. to report what she did. Officers immediately took Santiago into custody and responded to her apartment, where they found Huffman dead.
While in custody, Santiago confessed to making the roughly 55-mile journey to Carroll County, Arkansas, in Huffman's Mercedes to shoot Green and Williams at a trailer where they lived, per Kansas City, Missouri, CBS affiliate KCTV. She turned herself in after arriving back in Missouri following the double shooting.
Aurora Police Chief Wes Coatney told Springfield, Missouri, NBC affiliate KYTV that he believed the motive was related to custody issues between Santiago and the two male victims. Coatney said it was unclear why Santiago drove back to Missouri to turn herself in.
"I don't know the answer to that," he told KYTV. "I'm glad she did (turn herself in). I wish she would've come to us before she did all of this so we could've helped her."
Santiago told a detective during her police interview that she invited Huffman over to her apartment to see their son before he was killed. Santiago said that when he arrived, she told the child she was going to "take care of the bad guys" and had the youngster cover their ears. Santiago then pulled out a .38 revolver and hid it behind her back before walking into a room where Huffman was and shooting him, according to the Lawrence County Record.
Santiago reportedly described herself as a "disgusting, evil murderer" while speaking to police in Missouri. She said she believed that "death or jail forever" would be the only appropriate punishments.