Police: Killing of man dismembered in Lansing apparently captured on video
LANSING — A man whose body was found in pieces in the basement of a home on West Malcolm X Street Sunday morning had been strangled earlier that day in an apartment on Georgetown Boulevard, according to court documents.
Home surveillance video captured Zaccari Marquise Taylor, 25, being strangled inside the residence, and an exterior camera captured what appeared to be a body wrapped in a bed sheet being carried out by the two people who strangled him, a Lansing police detective testified in a hearing.
One of the suspects told police the body was dismembered in the basement at the West Malcolm X address after he and the other two men charged in the case discussed "whether or not to burn the body," the detective said.
Brothers Marcus Lee Hayes, 35, and Leonard Felton Hayes III, 42, are charged with murder and mutilation of a body in connection with the death. Terrance James Jones, 37, is charged with mutilation of a body and accessory to a felony after the fact.
Jones and Leonard Hayes had recently been paroled, and Marcus Hayes was on probation at the time. All three men are charged as fourth-time habitual offenders.
An attorney for Marcus Hayes did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment. Court records did not list attorneys for Jones and Leonard Hayes.
Police had previously released few details about the killing and investigation, and the court documents give a different timeline than officials have discussed publicly.
The investigation began after Leonard Hayes' girlfriend went to the Lansing police operations center on Wise Road about 7:15 a.m. Sunday to report seeing what appeared to be a man being killed on surveillance video at her apartment in the 2100 block of Georgetown about 4 a.m. that day, while she was at work, police said.
The woman said she spoke with Leonard Hayes, who told her the victim was breathing and had been taken to a hospital, the detective testified. Leonard Hayes then asked her to delete the video, and that's when she went to the police station, records show.
The interior video shows Leonard Hayes fighting with Taylor, and after being struck by Taylor, Hayes "proceeds to then strangle the victim on the floor of the living room while the defendant, Marcus Hayes, watches," a detective told 54A District Judge Kristen Simmons Tuesday.
Taylor, who could be seen in the video struggling and signaling to end the fight, eventually became unresponsive, the detective said. Marcus Hayes later began to strangle him, then dragged him out of the view of the camera, the detective said.
Exterior video shows the Hayes brothers carrying what appeared to be a body wrapped in a bed sheet out of the apartment and toward a parking lot, he said.
Marcus Hayes told police Taylor stopped breathing in the kitchen, and his body was carried to a vehicle and driven to an unspecified location, where Jones got in, the detective testified. The three men discussed "how they would dispose of the victim's body" and brought it to a residence in the 1400 block of West Malcolm X, off Interstate 496 near dowtown Lansing. he said.
The Georgetown address is near Interstate 96 in southwest Lansing.
The three discussed how to dispose of the body, but Leonard Hayes "stated the body would be dismembered, and defendant Marcus Hayes agreed to do so," according to the detective.
Police obtained a search warrant for the Malcolm X address, and Taylor's remains were found in the basement, he said.
Contact Ken Palmer at kpalmer@lsj.com. Follow him on X @KBPalm_lsj.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: Police: Killing of man dismembered in Lansing apparently captured on video
