California Mom Who Jumped From Petco Park With Son Searched Online For ‘Easy Suicide’

The partner of a California mother who leapt to her death with her 2-year-old toddler in her arms at a San Diego Padres game last year is speaking out, describing the deaths of his loved ones as “planned” by his girlfriend.

For months, 40-year-old Raquel Wilkins had been drifting “further and further away from reality,” her boyfriend Christopher Browning said, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.

In the months leading up to the California mother’s death, Browning said Wilkins had become increasingly delusional and had recurring thoughts of self-harm. And, on the day of her and her son’s deaths, Wilkins twice spoke to him about what height to jump from in order to successfully kill oneself. In another instance, she asked Browning, “Why don’t you just kill us both?” he said. 

Prior to plunging more than 80 feet to their deaths, Wilkins searched online for “easy suicide” and “means of suicide,” according to an autopsy report obtained by Oxygen.com.

Wilkins bought cotton candy for her 2-year-old son, Denzel Browning-Wilkins, at San Diego’s Petco Park on Sept. 25, 2021. The couple and the boy were observing the “beautiful views” from the stadium’s upper deck when Browning said Wilkins stared deeply at him with an “eerie silence, like in a movie,” he recounted, per the newspaper. “Literally a split-second later,” she dove from the concourse with their son and disappeared from sight, he said.

“Both of them went over,” Browning recalled. “It was very quiet. I was in complete shock.”

Browning has described the incident as “very intentional, very planned.”

“To grieve in a healthy way, you have to honor the truth,” he said. “I’m grateful for the years I had with him and I am sure I will see him again,” he said.

Witnesses at the ballpark, however, appeared split on what happened. One individual told investigators the fall appeared “100 percent intentional,” according to a police report, per the Union-Tribune. 

“Her demeanor walking up was so calm,” the witness said, per a police report. “She didn’t even look down. It looked just like she was trying to hop over a fence.”

A concession worker, however, said the way Wilkins fell over the railing looked “accidental.”

“Her state of mind, when I encountered them, was that she did not want to end her life,” the witness said.

Wilkins' family has disputed the city’s autopsy findings.

“They concluded she did it [intentionally] but there is no evidence she did it,” Wilkins’ family attorney Dan Gilleon told the newspaper.