A mother’s 911 call plunged Green Bay into a nightmare. “My son’s head is in a bucket,” Tara Patek screamed. Inside her basement, police found the severed head of Shad Thyrion, 24. The rest of his body was missing. Hours later, officers arrested Taylor Schabusiness, 23, who calmly confessed to strangling, sexually assaulting, and dismembering her friend.
The interrogation video is chilling. “I forgot the head. I wanted the head,” Taylor told detectives. She described putting a metal chain around Shad’s neck during 𝒔𝒆𝒙, tightening it even as his face turned purple. “I just didn’t stop,” she said. After he died, she continued abusing the body, then cut it apart with kitchen knives—all while high on methamphetamine.
Taylor’s obsession with serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer emerged immediately. Investigators found 24 searches for Dahmer on her phone, including a selfie of Taylor smiling next to Dahmer’s picture. She took that photo just days before the murder. Prosecutors would later argue her fascination went beyond morbid curiosity; it mirrored the brutality of her own crime.
Born Taylor Coronado in 1997, she married Warren Shabusiness in 2020 and later changed their last name—an idea born from 𝒹𝓇𝓊𝑔 use. Her father testified she suffered from bipolar disorder and PTSD after her mother’s death. But the defense’s insanity plea failed. A jury convicted her of first-degree intentional homicide, mutilating a corpse, and third-degree sexual assault after less than an hour of deliberation.
During the second phase of trial, psychologists painted a portrait of a woman in psychosis. One expert said Taylor threw a plastic chair at her, then sat calmly with no emotional response. Yet the jury rejected the insanity defense, finding her actions were volitional—not the result of a mental disease or defect. The verdict was unanimous.
Shad’s family delivered heartbreaking victim impact statements. His uncle Kelly wished Taylor would “meet the same fate as your idealistic Jeffrey Dahmer.” But his father Michael shocked the courtroom by saying, “I forgive you.” He added, “I know you got a heart. I know you got a brain.” Taylor showed no visible reaction.
Judge Thomas Walsh imposed a life sentence without the possibility of extended supervision. He called the crime “offensive to human decency” and said the public needed protection from such unpredictable violence. Taylor was also sentenced to an additional 7.5 years for mutilation and 3 years for sexual assault, all consecutive.
Even behind bars, Taylor could not stop her violent outbursts. In 2024, she was charged with attacking prison staff. In April 2025, she assaulted her own attorney in court, screaming “Bastard man!” before being subdued. A judge later sentenced her to 90 more days in jail for disorderly conduct, consecutive to her life term.
Taylor Schabusiness now resides at Taycheedah Correctional Institution. The case remains one of Wisconsin’s most horrific murders—a stark reminder of how drugs, mental illness, and a dark fixation can converge into unspeakable tragedy. The state has seen nothing like it, and the scars left on Shad’s family, the community, and the justice system will not soon heal.
