Bahsid McLean stabbed his mother, Tanya Byrd, to death in her Morrisania apartment on February 26, 2013 after she told him he was not a good father.
A Bronx man was convicted in the death of his mother, who authorities said he fatally stabbed before dismembering her body and taking selfies with the woman’s severed head.
After a nearly month-long trial, a jury found Bahsid McLean, 26, guilty of second-degree murder and unlawful dissection of a human being, a violation of public health law, in the 2013 killing of his 45-year-old mother, prosecutors said Monday.
“The defendant fatally stabbed his mother and then chillingly took photos with her mutilated corpse,” Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark said in a statement.
McLean stabbed his mother, Tanya Byrd, to death in her Morrisania apartment on February 26, 2013 after she told him he was not a good father, officials said.
He then went to a hardware store to buy a two-foot power saw, which he used to chop up his mother’s body, according to authorities.
When he was done dismembering the corpse, McLean took photos with his mother’s severed head before putting the remains in garbage bags inside suitcases that he dumped throughout his neighborhood after telling a friend that he wanted to take the trash out, prosecutors said.
“If you kill somebody, you should be able to cut them up too,” McLean told authorities after his arrest, according to video played in court, the New York Daily News reported. “If you can’t do that, if you don’t have the stomach to cut them up, then you’re a coward.”
Read: Man Strangled Roommate Before Stuffing His Body in Suitcase and Hosting a Party: Cops
McLean’s attorney, Lynn Calvacca, reportedly argued that her client was mentally ill.
“Does this look like someone who knows what he is doing is wrong?” Calvacca asked the court as she held up a photo of a smiling McLean posing with his mother’s severed head.
But prosecutors argued that the murder was cold-blooded and that McLean knew what he was doing.
“A jury has found him guilty of these horrific acts and now he faces many years in prison,” Clark said.
McLean will be sentenced on December 5. He currently faces 25 years to life in prison.
Watch: Suspected Serial Killer Spoke to Mom Before Admitting to Quadruple Murder
