In A Child’s Name: Teresa Taylor & Was Former Dentist Kenneth Z. Taylor Released?

In A Child's Name movie and book based on a true story

If you watched television in November 1991, you probably remember the CBS two-part drama In a Child’s Name, starring Valerie Bertinelli and Michael Ontkean. The woman behind the movie was based on the real-life murder of 25-year-old Teresa Benigno Taylor, killed by her husband, Kenneth Z. Taylor, a dentist from New Jersey. They changed a few of the names in the film. Peter Maas’ true crime book inspired it. Some of you are Lifetime movie babies, while some of us old-timers remember when these movies premiered on network television. Back then, those movies were a big deal. In A Child’s Name is the kind of movie you’d remember decades later. I blogged about the story in 2003, back when most general audiences had to buy true crime books to learn the real stories or watch it on the news.

That one gripping scene, what I call the barbell-luminol glow scene, was just horrific. And I think it made every woman shake with fear. That part of the movie stayed with me, and it brought back a very personal memory of an almost fatal barbell experience during my twenties in the mid-1990s. In that clip, Dr. Taylor’s parents arrived while the police were at the house. Puzzled, Dr. Taylor’s mother asked about her son. Investigators explained that they were conducting a luminol test, which shows traces of blood that may be invisible to the eye.

His parents were shocked. I believe it was the first time they really knew that police were considering the possibility that their daughter-in-law was murdered by their son, the seemingly perfect doctor and dentist. According to the court records, in November 1984, Kenneth Taylor took his wife's life with a barbell inside their home. Their infant son, Philip, was only about six months old. What followed was a murder investigation, a criminal trial, and a bitter, multistate custody battle over a little boy who had lost his mother.

Celeste White demanded justice for her sister Teresa Taylor 

Teresa came from an Italian American family. She was a daughter, a sister, and a young mom. At first glance, Ken seemed like a clean-cut guy. He was professional, and he was a dentist, but there were some issues in his personality. He had been married three times. He abused both of his previous wives. He left the first one right after she gave birth to the baby. He tried to smother the second one with chloroform. The third wife was Teresa Taylor. He mistreated her and abused her so badly that she lost teeth. He fixed her teeth, being the skilled dentist that he was. He had a violent temper and seemed deeply troubled. He abused them all. He ultimately killed Teresa—the woman who said she loved him more than life.

The autopsy report showed Ken struck her around seven times. And when you really think about that, the impact of that alone had to be the most terrifying experience ever for a woman. He blamed her a lot for—for things. Mothers are blamed for everything that goes wrong in a family. Ken said so many bad things about his wife. No one really knows what really happened in the house as far as that is concerned. He claimed that she used substances. I don't think the family believed his accusations, and they certainly didn't want that narrative out there in the public. Her sister, Celeste White, fought for her sister’s killer to be brought to justice.

In a Child's Name was based on a book by Peter Maas. Maas researched this case extensively. And when you’re talking about the 1980s and the 1990s, we were the people who read true crime books. And so, Peter Maas's book came out during a time long before ID and TV One and all of these true crime stations.

After Kenneth committed the crime, he hid the body. She went missing. Investigators say Ken put Teresa’s body in the trunk of his car and drove to find a place to dispose of her body. He took baby Philip with him. Ken dumped her body in Pennsylvania at the base of Hawk Mountain—the perfect place—a place she would have liked. That was his reasoning. That was his level of thinking, according to the detectives. Teresa Taylor was discovered on the roadside in a ditch by a man who was walking along the road looking for cans. Teresa’s dad had to identify her.

While his wife was missing, he lied to her family about where she was. After he was arrested, he said that Teresa was high on drugs and attacked him first. Ken Taylor’s parents secretly adopted the boy and brought him to Indiana during a visit in 1986. They did not give him back until the Whites fought for custody in court and finally got the baby back. Teresa's sister, Celeste White, was eventually granted custody of Philip, and Ken's parents were outraged by that agreement. Baby Philip grew up to be a handsome guy. I posted an updated picture of him in the 2000s.

Baby Philip in 2011

Records show Ken Taylor struggled with drug addiction. A woman who is related to him wrote to me years ago and said Ken was nice and friendly. She said he came from a good family, and that she couldn’t believe the monster he became. In the book A Father’s Rage, Ken indicated that he came from a good, wholesome family and that he made the decision to use drugs at 22 while he was in dental school. One of his drugs of choice was marijuana.

According to a chilling jailhouse interview, the bodybuilder denied beating his wife on their honeymoon in Mexico. The segment also revealed that, despite the signs Taylor abused drugs, she still married him and became his third wife. I updated the story around 2012 because we were trying to keep up with word on his parole. The understanding was he had been sentenced and convicted, and he was eligible for parole after 30 years.

Dr. Kenneth Taylor 2012 

Dr. Ken Taylor Released from Prison?

That's the big question that we’ve been asking since 2012. Some have said they saw him in a Virginia prison as late as 2003, but it seems there has been no sighting of him since then, or at least none that has been publicly reported. Most of the cases that I've covered all involve a substance. That seems to be the tipping point. Despite family dysfunction, despite the things that happen in families, it seems it is the drug use that spins the already volatile situation into a tragic, abrupt, or bizarre ending.

While updating the story in 2012, I got the runaround. I called several prisons, including New Jersey and Pennsylvania; he wasn't there. I called the Virginia prison where I heard he had been transferred. I went back and forth with the staff. They accidentally gave me information that was hidden from the correctional facility website, such as his birthdate and his ID number. No one knows why the information was protected. Perhaps it was at the administrative level, or at a federal witness protection level, as some have speculated. Or maybe he was just a flight risk since he had several prison escape attempts, according to a former investigative detective. That dentist was something else!

An ad that was sent to me regarding Ken Taylor's post in 2012.

While incarcerated, Ken wanted to find another girl. A person wrote to me and gave me a copy of the "Write A Prisoner" ad, where he admitted to being a convicted murderer. He sort of brushed it aside…made light of it as if it was nothing. Personally, I believe that he has since been released. We don't know when, but I think he's out. I looked him up, and it seems like there's movement; it’s just a possibility because no one at any of the prisons would confirm it, and he isn’t listed as far as I can tell.

Ken Taylor is around 77 years old in 2026. The movie stayed true to the facts in the case for the most part. They were very careful about that, though a few details were added for dramatization. Women could relate to the story in some way. I think true crime and movies based on true stories appeal to women because we’re always looking for red flags and trying to protect ourselves to avoid falling into the traps love can set.