Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of murder and abuse. Reader discretion is advised.
On March 29, 2023, ABC 20/20 aired an episode titled “Hell in Heels” that showed an interview with Haylei Jordan. More than 20 years ago, Haylei’s mother, Laren Sims, murdered her stepfather, Larry McNabney, by injecting him with horse tranquilizer.
As per ABC News, Haylei Jordan’s mother, Laren, met Larry McNabney in 1995, and the two eventually tied the knot. Laren was reportedly Larry’s fifth wife, and he believed that the woman he married was named Elisa. Moreover, he was unaware of his wife’s troubled past.
Laren Sims was a con woman who went by several aliases. After her marriage with Larry, she befriended his 21-year-old secretary, Sarah Dutra, and the duo reportedly plotted Larry’s murder. On September 12, 2001, Laren and Sarah killed Larry at a Southern California horse show by injecting him with a lethal dose of horse tranquilizer. Laren then liquidated the couple’s assets and skipped town with Haylei. Police later discovered Larry’s body buried in a vineyard.
In March 2002, authorities managed to arrest the con woman in Destin, Florida. Per abc10, Laren wrote a three-page confession letter where she mentioned how Sarah Dutra was also involved in Larry’s murder. While waiting for her trial, Laren took her own life on March 31, 2002. In her suicide note, she revealed that her late husband physically abused her.
Meanwhile, Cristin Olson, one of Larry’s daughters from a previous marriage, stated that her father was not physically abusive. However, according to Haylei Jordan, she witnessed her stepfather hurting her mother.
Haylei Jordan revealed that her mother, Laren Sims, once even separated from Larry McNabney
According to ABC News, Haylei Jordan stated that Larry McNabney was addicted to alcohol and drugs, and she didn’t feel safe around him. He allegedly abused Laren, which once made her separate from her husband. However, she changed her mind after Larry gave her death threats.
Haylei Jordan stated, “She did try to leave a couple of times actually. He tracked us down and said if she didn’t agree to come home with him he would kill both of us and then kill himself.” Haylei further explained how her stepfather was losing control of himself. She said, “[McNabney] was going off the rails. He was losing control of himself. I knew it got really bad when my mom looked at me and said, ‘Oh, I got you a job training horses in Maine,’. And I packed up and left.”
ABC News reported that after her mother’s death, Haylei went to live with her family in Brooksville, Florida. She revealed that she hadn’t seen them in almost a decade, saying, “I came home to the town that I was born and raised in, but I hadn’t seen my family in almost a decade. I didn’t know what to do, because the only thing I had ever done was make sure that my mom was okay.”
According to abc10, Laren Sims’s accomplice, Sarah Dutra, was sentenced to 11 years in prison for voluntary manslaughter in 2003. However, in 2011, she was released from jail on a three-year parole in 2011.
