A transgender woman admitted to killing her parents in their Utah home because her mother tried to interfere with gender transition surgery, new video shows.
The chilling footage, obtained Wednesday by KUTV in Salt Lake City, shows Mia Bailey, then 28, calmly confessing to fatally shooting her parents, Joseph and Gail Bailey, in June 2024 following years of turmoil.
“I told them I was going to kill myself so many times,” Bailey said in the police interrogation video. “Mental health declining, that’s why I needed that surgery.”
Bailey, who was homeless at the time, said she was $20,000 in debt from hormone replacement therapy and other fees associated with transitioning. She accused her mother of “trying to sabotage” her planned gender affirming surgery.
“She always had boundary issues,” Bailey said. “I had one thing going on, and she took that away from me….She can’t say sorry to save her life, apparently. And I gave her so many chances throughout my life.”
Bailey, now 30, later pleaded guilty in December 2025 to killing her parents and received two prison sentences of 25 years to life, as well as an additional five years for aggravated assault linked to shooting at her brother and his wife as they tried to flee the scene.
Bailey said her mother’s interference with the planned surgery was the breaking point.
“Enough is enough, I’m taking someone with me,” she recalled in the footage. “I went to my parents to do the deed. Kill them…it was spur of the moment. I don’t regret it. I hate them. That was the last straw.”
Bailey stormed into her parents’ home with a gun she purchased from a local pawn shop. She fired about 12 rounds, including one through her brother’s door. She wasn’t concerned if he was wounded, adding, “if it did, then so what?”
Bailey then fled the home and sought a final bullet to kill herself as she ran through yards and hid from police in south St. George.
“I actually was going to plan on standing over the cliff,” she told investigators, adding that she thought the fall would kill her if she wasn’t shot by responding police officers.
Bailey’s confession also contained a plea for more support for the LGBTQ+ community while insisting anyone should be able to transition with less interference. She also said she didn’t consider harming other people as she eluded authorities.
“Enough dead people for the day, or for life, I should say,” Bailey said in the clip.
Washington County Attorney Jerry Jaeger sought consecutive sentences in the case because of the heinous nature of the slayings. Bailey’s attorneys had sought for the sentences to run concurrently, but a judge ultimately agreed with the prosecutor.
“This has been a difficult case for our office, for me personally as the prosecutor, and especially for the Bailey family,” Jaeger said following Bailey’s sentencing in December. “Today wasn’t about Mia. It was about Joseph and Gail, two individuals whose lives were cut tragically short. We are relieved and grateful for the judge’s ruling that Mia serve consecutive prison sentences, one sentence for each victim. We also hope there can be healing for all involved.”
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