Bodycam footage has been shown to a Wisconsin jury showing the horrifying moment police put a man’s severed head in a bucket.
Taylor Shabizness, 25, is on trial for the murder and dismemberment of her 25-year-old boyfriend Shad Thirion, who was killed and dismembered in his mother’s basement in February 2022.
Authorities say he strangled Thyrion to death in the Green Bay home he shared with his mother, sexually assaulted her and dismembered her body, leaving it throughout the house and in a car. His head and penis were found in a bucket.
Photos of the grisly crime scene and blood-soaked bags and a bloody mattress were also shown in court on Monday, the first day of Scabbizness’s trial.
Scabbiness was charged with first-degree murder, mutilation of a corpse and third-degree sexual assault after the victim’s own mother discovered her son’s severed head in a bucket, covered with a towel, at her home.
Taylor Shabizness, 25, is on trial in Wisconsin for the murder and dismemberment of 25-year-old Shad Thirion, who was killed and dismembered in his mother’s basement in February 2022.
Authorities say he strangled Thyrion to death in the Green Bay home he shared with his mother, sexually assaulted her and left parts of her body throughout the house.
In body camera footage shown in court Monday, police were shown in the basement where they made the gruesome discovery in the bucket
Chabizness is accused of taking advantage of Tyrion during rough sex and strangling him to death with chains. He then allegedly dismembered her and dumped her body parts in various places before having sex with her corpse.
His head and what police described as ‘male organs’ were left for his mother Tara Pakanich and her boyfriend Steve Hendricks to find.
Hendricks called 911 that night, telling dispatchers that his girlfriend ‘swears she found her son’s severed head in the basement.’
Body cam footage shown in court Monday shows Pakanich telling police something about a ‘severed head’ and pointing to the basement of their home.
‘I opened the towel,’ Hendricks is heard telling police. ‘I threw up the towel because I don’t know what it is, man. I have a bad attitude and he’s like: ‘What do I think?’ I don’t know.’
Tyrion’s penis was found in the same bucket as his head, and other body parts were found in various bags in the basement, including plastic shopping bags.
Taylor Shabizness, pictured in a mugshot last year, is accused of beheading her boyfriend after he choked her during drug-fueled sex.
One of the responding Green Bay officers took the stand Monday and described what happened after they arrived on the scene.
‘I went down. At the bottom of the stairs, on the right, was a green bucket with a shower towel on it,’ Officer Alex Vanish testified. ‘Just to verify that there was a real head in the bucket, I took off the towel and there was indeed a severed human head in the bucket.’
Police found Tyrion’s penis in the bucket along with his head.
In the video played in court, the officer wearing a body camera said, ‘If we can get more units soon, that would be appreciated.’ ‘We’ve got quite a bit of blood here.’
Other body parts were found in various bags in the basement, including a plastic shopping bag. His upper torso was found in a storage tote along with a carving knife and several internal organs.
Other body parts were found in bags in the basement, along with plastic shopping bags
His upper torso was found in a storage tote along with a carving knife and several internal organs
Police records show that Pakinich called authorities to her home in Green Bay after 3 a.m. and revealed that she had woken up to the sound of a storm door and the sound of a car driving by.
A blood-stained mattress was part of the crime scene
Shabizness told detectives that he planned to take all the body parts with him when he left in his minivan, but that he got ‘lazy’ and was unprepared because the killing was random and not planned.
Police records show Pakinich called authorities to her home in Green Bay shortly after 3 a.m. and revealed that she was awakened by the sound of a storm door and the sound of a car driving by.
He then noticed that the basement light was on and went to see if his son was there, assuming it was Shabizness – with whom Tyrion had spent the day – that he had heard leave.
The criminal complaint states that after the victim’s mother did not see anyone in the basement, she found a bucket under the stairs after she left.
After removing a blanket covering the top of the bucket, he ‘discovered the victim’s head’, according to complaint documents obtained by DailyMail.com.
Upon arriving at the scene, Green Bay Police Officer Alex Wanish reported how he observed the plastic bucket on the floor…[with] A shower/beach towel over the bucket.’ The officer ‘raised the towel and saw a human head inside the bucket.’
He also noted ‘there was dried blood on a mattress next door.’
Law enforcement quickly arrived at Scabbusiness after the find, and found blood on his sweatshirt and pants, scratches on his arm, as well as a cut on his left thumb and what appeared to be blood on his hand.
When questioned about the incident, Scabbizness, who has a husband and recently became the mother of a son, admitted that she and Tyrion had been high on drugs — including smoking — methamphetamine earlier in the day.
He said he shot himself and Tyrion with trazadone, a powerful sedative. Police recovered drug paraphernalia including a glass pipe and bag containing light colored powder from the spot.
Chabizness initially claimed to have blacked out during the attack, and when asked why the head was in a bucket, replied ‘it’s pretty good’.
He told police that he and Tyrion were going to have sex, and that he made two metal chains, one for her and one for her.
She said she put his chain around her own neck because they had previously strangled her during intercourse.
Scabbusiness said he put his chain around her own neck because they had choked during intercourse before.
But then he shocked investigators with his next comment, as he ‘cursed the head. I can’t believe I left the head though.’
According to the complaint filing, he then told the officers they were going to ‘have fun trying to find all the organs because he dismembered the body.’
While sober, Shabizness reportedly told detectives that after Tyrion put a chain around her neck – which she compared to a dog’s choke collar – he choked her and went ‘crazy’.
He said he could feel her heart beating, ‘so he kept pulling her harder and choking her,’ claiming she wouldn’t die because she was just ‘rebuilding muscles’.
Scabbiness was charged with first-degree intentional homicide, mutilation of a corpse and third-degree sexual assault.
Since his arrest, Schabubiness has pleaded not guilty in court and had a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity entered by his former attorney.
Brown County Circuit Court Judge Thomas Walsh ruled in March that Shabizness was fit to stand trial.
In February, Scabbizness attacked his previous attorney during a court hearing before a deputy wrestled him to the courtroom floor.
Taylor Shabizness, 25, was seen assaulting her attorney Quinn Jolly in court on February 14.
Scabbiness was pictured returning to a Brown County courtroom earlier this month, where he violently attacked his own defense attorney.
Before his trial began, Shabizness entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity entered by his former attorney – who was eventually allowed to drop the case after an infamous courtroom attack on him was caught on camera.
In a defense motion, Schabusiness’ attorneys argued that the sexual assault charges should be dismissed because such a crime was factually and legally impossible because Thirion was already dead.
‘The defense strongly asserts and argues that it is impossible and almost impossible for law enforcement to have committed sexual assault with the dismemberment found in the manner in which the body was found’.
‘The appendage (penis) was not attached to the body when it was found and the appendix was unable to function due to its condition.’