Kriti Mehrotra
A sense of terror befell the entire community of Avoca, Wisconsin, when Susan Diane Pickett and her beloved pit bull Chico were found dead inside their trailer home in May 2021. The 54-year-old was a proud member of society and doing her best to provide for herself as well as her family, so the fact that she was heinously murdered shattered all those who knew her. Thankfully, though, as explored in Investigation Discovery’s ‘Signs Of A Psychopath: Evilness Inside My Head,’ officials were able to identify and arrest her perpetrator within days.
Susan Pickett and Her Dog Were Beaten Before Being Stabbed
Although born on November 26, 1966, in Chicago, Illinois, to Virginia Lucas and Richard Vaverek, Susan Diane Pickett had reportedly long called Mineral Point, Wisconsin, home. She had relocated alongside her parents when she was a young girl, only to then build her own independent life there – she fell in love, got married, and welcomed two sons into their world. It was around 1998 that she tied the knot with a man named Troy Pickett, with whom she shared Taylor Pickett and Sean Pickett despite their interpersonal struggles over the years.
According to records, the Picketts were far from a unit by the mid-2010s since Susan and Troy had separated for good, and then they sadly lost Taylor at age 18 on March 1, 2015. The matriarch eventually moved to a trailer home in Avoca alongside her younger son Sean and their pit bull Chico, where they reportedly led a rather impoverished, troubled life. She did her best to provide by serving as a waitress at multiple restaurants in the Dodgeville and Mineral Point area, but it wasn’t comfortable or stable in any way, shape, or form. Susan was thus excited to relocate all the way to Iowa by the time the spring of 2021 rolled around – her new boyfriend, Ernest “Ernie” Wheeler, had asked her to move with him.
However, everything changed on May 10 as 21-year-old Sean contacted emergency services to report he had just found his mother and their dog dead in a bedroom of their trailer. Authorities immediately rushed over, locating the young man outside with dried blood on his pants, shoes, and the front of his shirt while the victims were in the spot he’d specified. Susan and Chico lay in a pool of their blood with a lot of splatter all around, following which the machete as well as the metal bar near them were identified as the murder weapons. An autopsy confirmed the 54-year-old suffered a fatal skull fracture and brain bruising from blunt force trauma before she was stabbed multiple times in her back, liver, and throat.
Susan Pickett’s Assailant Was Apprehended Within 48 Hours
When officers arrived at the crime scene and saw Sean covered in blood, they not only took him into protective custody but also called the Iowa County Sheriff’s Department for help. It was with their aide that the area was secured, neighbors were questioned, Susan and Chico’s remains were recovered, and the matter was quickly classified as a brutal homicide. Since the 21-year-old had already pointed fingers in the direction of his mother’s boyfriend in the 911 call, claiming he knew Ernie killed them, that’s where investigators first looked. Yet, it quickly came to light that he wasn’t even in town on the fateful day and had last seen his girlfriend weeks prior when he dropped her off so she could pack for the Iowa move.
Detectives didn’t waste any time in confronting Sean with these facts, especially since they’d noted how his clothes were the ones covered in dried blood, driving him to come clean. He reportedly alleged he was “possessed” by the evil voices inside his head, who made him believe he was dead and had to kill both Susan as well as Chico “in order to go to peace.” According to police records, he added that he told the voices he wasn’t going to harm anyone, but he blacked out as soon as he stepped into the trailer.
He subsequently confessed that he beat his mother with a metal bar before stabbing her and the dog until they were dead while still in a blacked-out state. Therefore, on May 12, Sean was formally arrested, charged with one count each of intentional murder and mistreatment of an animal causing death, and held on a $100,000 bond. He was booked into Iowa County Jail, where he remained after initially pleading not guilty and then changing it to not guilty by reason of insanity, alleging mental health issues.
Sean Pickett is Currently Incarcerated in a Wisconsin Prison
Sean stood trial for the 2 counts against him in July 2022 – after being deemed competent – where one of Susan’s friends testified the mother-son duo had a long, tumultuous history. She alleged the young man often threatened to kill his mother when she refused to do things for him or didn’t do them up to his standard, leading to several arguments between them. The prosecutors added he was upset about her plans to relocate with Ernie and her decision to sell their trailer home, which could have sparked a fit of rage.
On the other hand, the defense alleged Sean acted in self-defense after finding his mother stabbing their dog. They argued that while he wasn’t happy with Susan’s choice to move to Iowa, it was owing to her choice of partner because Ernie was a convicted sex offender. They claimed the three of them even fought about it, and she allegedly turned to substance abuse after Ernie got tired and left them alone so she could pack up. They further contended that her alleged use of substances made her aggressive, resulting in her turning on her son after he tried to stop her from harming Chico. Sean testified to the same before revealing instances of when he reportedly ran away from home to get away from his mother, her aggression, and her behavior, which have always remained unsubstantiated.
When Ernie took the stand, he testified that Susan knew about his conviction and had still agreed to move to Iowa with him, so there was nothing hidden between them. He also added he believes a major reason she was excited about the relocation was to get away from Sean, since things between them had been tense for a while. He even alleged the young man had been abusing his mother in ways that were taxing for her both emotionally and physically, a claim her other loved ones seemed to back. Hence, after just an hour and 46 minutes of deliberations on July 7, 2022, the jury found Sean guilty as charged – one count each of intentional murder and mistreatment of an animal causing death. It was around 2 months later that he was sentenced to a life term without the possibility of parole for 40 years. So, today, at age 27, Sean is serving his time in a facility within the Wisconsin Department of Corrections.
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