This notice of appeal comes nine months after a Wisconsin jury declared Taylor Schabusiness guilty of first-degree intentional homicide, third-degree sexual abuse and mutilating a corpse in the February 2022 killing of 24-year-old Shad Thyrion.
The Wisconsin woman serving a life sentence for the meth-fueled murder, beheading and post-mortem sexual assault of her sometimes lover is appealing her conviction.
A lawyer for Taylor Schabusiness, 26, has informed the Wisconsin Court of Appeals that he plans to submit a formal appeal so that his client's case can be heard in front of the three-judge panel for the state's third district.
Records show that Schabusiness and her lawyer, Greg Petot, have also started to request transcripts from her pre-trial hearings and her initial appearance in Brown County Court.
Schabusiness has not yet filed her formal appeal, which is expected to be submitted in the next few months.
This notice of the appeal comes nine months after a Wisconsin jury declared Schabusiness guilty of first-degree intentional homicide, third-degree sexual abuse and mutilating a corpse in the February 2022 killing of 24-year-old Shad Thyrion. The jury deliberated for less than an hour before returning with their verdict, and spent the same amount of time deliberating the following day before they declared that Schabusiness was of sound mind when she murdered Thyrion.
Judge Thomas Walsh sentenced Schabusiness to life in prison for the murder. Schabusiness never denied killing Thyrion, and entered a plea of not guilty by mental disease or defect to the charges.
Schabusiness also received consecutive sentences of 90 months for mutilation of a corpse and three years for third-degree sexual assault.
In handing down his sentence, Judge Walsh did not mince his words, telling Schabusiness: "The offense in this case can't be overstated. In this case, you seem to run out of superlatives in describing what happened."
He went on to say: "This crime offends human decency, it offends human dignity, it offends the human community. It really does."
When asked if she had anything to say at her sentencing hearing, Schabusiness told the judge: "There isn't."
Those remarks marked the end of an unpredictable trial, during which Schabusiness was ordered to wear a spit hood covering her face out of fear she might spit or bite a member of the court. During one pre-trial hearing, Schabusiness also punched and attacked her former defense attorney.
According to the criminal complaint filed in Brown County Circuit Court, Schabusiness allegedly admitted to killing Shad Thyrion during an interrogation. She also allegedly told detectives that she sexually abused his corpse before dismembering his body with a bread knife.
“Schabusiness responded that the police were going to have fun trying to find all of the organs,” wrote Caleb Saunders, assistant district attorney for Brown County, in the complaint.
“Schabusiness stated all of the body parts should be in the basement. Schabusiness stated there should be a foot or a leg in the minivan. Detective Graf asked Schabusiness what she did with the head, and Schabusiness stated she had put the Victim’s head in a black bucket and put a blanket over it,” the complaint reads. "Schabusiness stated the plan was for her to bring all of the body parts with her but she got lazy and only ended up putting the leg/foot in the van and she forgot the head."
Schabusiness is now incarcerated at the Taycheedah Correctional Institution.
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