GRAPHIC: Discovery of severed head leads to arrest of woman in grisly Wisconsin killing, police say

Taylor Schabusiness.
Taylor Schabusiness.(Brown County Jail)
Published: Mar. 1, 2022 at 3:24 PM EST
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GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY/Gray News) - Officers in Wisconsin said they found a severed head at a home and body parts in other locations, according to a criminal complaint made public.

WARNING: Details in the story and video are disturbing.

Taylor D. Schabusiness, 24, is charged with first-degree intentional homicide, mutilating a corpse and third-degree sexual assault, WBAY reported.

A court commissioner set her bond at $2 million cash at a hearing Tuesday afternoon. Schabusiness seemed calm when she appeared in Brown County court via video conference. She said little, only acknowledging that she has the right to an attorney.

The prosecutor called this “one of the most serious offenses we had in this county in some time.”

Taylor Schabusiness is being held on $2 million cash bond.

The state argued Schabusiness has ties to Texas, raising a concern she’s a flight risk. The prosecution also said Schabusiness was on put on probation seven weeks before the crime and supposed to be on monitoring but apparently wasn’t wearing her monitoring bracelet.

“I think the facts alleged are extremely concerning and disturbing and go to the violent nature and grave nature of the offense,” Assistant District Attorney Caleb Saunders said in court.

Green Bay police said they were called to a home around 3:25 a.m. local time Feb. 23. A person who lived in the home reported finding the severed head in a bucket.

Police located the human head in the basement of the home. A towel had been placed over it, and dried blood was found on a nearby mattress.

Investigators learned Schabusiness may have been the last person seen with the victim. They found her at a home and said she had dried blood on her clothing.

Police searched Schabusiness’ van and found a box with “additional human body parts including legs” on the rear passenger seat, according to the criminal complaint.

Police obtained a search warrant for the home. They found multiple other body parts, body fluids and knives.

Investigators said Schabusiness told them she and the victim had been doing drugs and having sex. She said they had used chains while having sex, and she went “crazy” and started strangling the victim.

A detective said she admitted to hiding the body parts, according to the complaint. She also went into detail about the weapons she used to dismember the body.

“Schabusiness made the comment that at one point, she did get paranoid and lazy and that she thought it was the ‘dope’ that was making her paranoid,” officials said in the complaint.

Investigators said she told them she did not mean to kill the victim, but she enjoyed choking him and continued to do it.

Police met with the victim’s family Tuesday.

Police, forensic teams and the Dane County Medical Examiner’s Office investigated and processed multiple locations associated with the crime.

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