Pod Insights Criminology Sam Haskell About this episode In 2023, authorities received a call about possible human body parts in plastic bags outside of a home in Tarzana, California. When officers arrived at the scene, there were no bags in front of the house and no body parts to be found. The next morning, a man found a torso in the dumpster, which ignited an exhaustive investigation. Join Mike and Morf as they discuss Sam Haskell. The son of a Hollywood mogul, Sam was 35 years old and married with children in 2023. As the investigation unfolded, the authorities released that Sam's wife, Mei Li, and his in-laws, Yanxiang Wang and Gaoshen Li, were missing. It would be up to the detectives to try to unravel the mystery around what happened to them. You can help support the show through Patreon. We'd love to connect with listeners on social media. We are available on the following platforms: Facebook - Facebook Discussion group - Instagram - Threads - X Formerly Twitter - Blue Sky - Twitch - Tik Tok Criminology is an Emash Digital production hosted by Mike Ferguson and Mike Morford.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised.
0:37 Speaker 01 Hello everyone and welcome to episode 370 of the Criminology Podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson.
0:43 Speaker 00 And this is Mike Morford.
0:45 Speaker 01 Mr. Morford, how you doing, buddy? Just get back from vacation.
0:48 Speaker 00 Yeah, I'm getting back in the saddle and you know, it's always hard when you come back vacation, getting back to work and you know, taking it on, but I'm diving in and here we are recording this new episode. How you been?
1:00 Speaker 01 I've been doing good. You know, I had a little vacation last week as well, and it is hard. You know, when you have a week where you don't really have the same responsibilities and you're kind of just lounging, you might be having a few cold ones or whatever it is, and then you come back and it's like, boom, you are right back in the, in the swing, swing of things. It can be a little jarring right at first.
1:29 Speaker 00 Yeah, you just get it plug away and get back to work.
1:33 Speaker 01 Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shout outs. We had Cinda Sharp, Christina Frisch, and Abigail Gutierrez. So a lot of new support. We really appreciate that.
1:43 Speaker 00 That's really awesome. Thank you so much for that support and for anyone else that would like to help, head over to patreon.com/criminology to get signed up.
1:51 Speaker 01 So we're just about a month away from Crime Con and we've been giving people our promo code CRIMINOLOGY to use to save 10% on their standard badges at checkout at crimecon.com. But now we have some info about our joint Criminology TCAT meetup there.
2:07 Speaker 00 Crime Con's happening September 5th through the 7th at the Gaylord Rockies Resort Convention Center. That's in Aurora, Colorado. We'll be on Podcast Row and of course, we'll be hanging out with listeners of Criminology and TCAT on Saturday night, September 6th at 9:00 PM. That's going to happen at the Mountain Pass Sports Bar. That's right on the premises, so you don't need to leave the facility. We really hope to see everyone there. It's always a lot of fun.
2:32 Speaker 01 That is for sure. You know, every year that we go to Crime Con, you know, that's one of the things that I look forward to the most is the meetup. Get to really kind of hang out with people. So Morf, now that we have all that out of the way, let's dive into this week's case. We're talking about the 2023 crimes of a man named Sam Haskell in California. And what he did was so heinous and shocking, it made headlines early on, and it suddenly began to dominate the headlines again, just recently, when the case came to a very abrupt end. At the time of this recording, the situation is still unfolding, and there are some questions still unanswered.
3:17 Speaker 00 On the evening of Tuesday, November 7th, 2023, authorities received a call about possible human body parts in plastic bags outside of a home at 4115 Coldstream Terrace in Tarzana, California. When officers arrived at the scene, there were no bags in front of the home and no body parts to be found. Because they found no bags full of human body parts or no other evidence of a crime, there wasn't really anything authorities could do at the time. After all, it could have just been trash, and police perhaps thought that some overzealous true crime fan may have overreacted calling in this tip. In a lot of cases, when a body is found, the person who first discovered it describes initially
3:58 Speaker 00 thinking that they were looking at a mannequin, but it ended up being a murder victim. Is it possible that what they thought initially were body parts was simply trash? That maybe resembled the shape of a body?
4:09 Speaker 01 It wasn't until around six o'clock the next morning that there was movement on the case. Authorities were called to a dumpster behind a shopping center on Ventura Boulevard and Rubio Avenue and Encino. A man had been looking through the dumpster, hoping to find some cans or bottles he could recycle for money, but instead, he found what he was pretty sure was the headless torso of a woman. The remains were in a black plastic trash bag, which had been placed into a duffel bag and then thrown away. Obviously, whoever had left the torso in the dumpster had never meant for it to be found. It was discovered simply by chance.
4:50 Speaker 01 There are many dumpsters in the area, but the man looking for recyclables just happened to choose that one.
4:57 Speaker 00 Police combed carefully through the dumpster, but no other body parts were found in or around it. The location was only about five miles from the home that had been the subject of a report about possible human remains the night before. The timing was of interest, and police had to think it might be more than coincidence. Investigators worked to link the locations together. Using surveillance footage from multiple places around the city, they were able to work backwards from the dumpster all the way to the home at 4115 Coldstream Terrace in Tarzana, five miles away. The house belonged to 35-year-old Samuel Haskell IV. Although his name is widely reported in news articles as Samuel Haskell Jr., he's actually Samuel Haskell IV.
5:41 Speaker 01 It was at that point that the case took on a bit of celebrity to it. Samuel Haskell IV's father, Samuel Haskell III, was once an executive vice president and worldwide head of television for the William Morris Agency, a talent agency in Hollywood. Sam Haskell III had represented huge names in the 90s like George Clooney, Dolly Parton, Ray Romano, and Whoopi Goldberg. He retired in 2005, nearly two decades before these murders happened, but he was still listed as head of Magnolia Hill Productions, a film and TV company that he founded in 2013.
6:22 Speaker 01 Along with all of that, he was head of the Miss America Organization until 2017.
6:29 Speaker 01 Haskell III's wife, Mary Donnelly Haskell, was an actress and a beauty queen who had once been crowned Miss Mississippi. The two were high school sweethearts. So it was clear that in that area, the Haskell name was well-known. And more, if you know, we often talk about, why do some cases gain traction with people, or, you know, pique people's interests a little more than others? Well, here's a one reason. You know, anytime you have some celebrity connections to a case, you know, that is going to draw people in. I mean, you're talking about names like George Clooney, Dolly Parton, Ray Romano.
7:12 Speaker 01 I mean, these are, these are huge entertainment stars. So anyone linked to them is only going to fuel the interest in whatever is, is going on in, in the crime.
7:26 Speaker 00 Yeah, there's such an interest in Hollywood stars, celebrities, anytime that gets combined with something salacious, you know, deaths, murders, mystery, I think it just fascinates people that much more. So they, they want to tune in and see what's going on. And, you know, I think the story really takes on a life of its own that way. Police looked at 35-year-old Samuel Haskell IV to see if he had a criminal record. And it looks like the last time he ran into any trouble with the law before the murders was in 2008, when he was charged with two counts of assault with a deadly weapon. He received three years of probation after pleading no contest to battery. So this was clearly a red flag for investigators. They went back to his home on Coldstream Terrace, took a
8:11 Speaker 00 closer look. And what they found was disturbing. There were pieces of plywood that were covered in blood. Police would later find out that Haskell had purchased this plywood just days before it was found.
8:23 Speaker 01 What police didn't find were Haskell's missing wife, 37-year-old Mei Li Haskell and her mother, 64-year-old Ya Sheng Wang and stepfather, 71-year-old Gao Shen Li. Mei's parents were living with the couple so that they could be involved with their three grandsons. They had moved away from their own home in China about five years earlier, when the Haskell's youngest son was about one-year-old. According to the Daily Mail, they didn't have a good relationship with their son-in-law. Jenny, one of Mei's friends, recalled that Haskell was rude to them and ignored them,
9:07 Speaker 01 and explained that they made him angry. They couldn't speak English, but he made no effort to interact with them. Mei was happy to have them there, and the language barrier didn't matter to everyone. Mei's friend Jenny said they were very helpful with the kids. Mei's mother suffered a stroke that left her partially disabled, but she still cooked, cleaned, and watched the children. So she was a big help. Although DNA would need to verify, police believed that the remains in the dumpster belonged to Mei Li. Investigators arrested Sam Haskell IV at a mall in Canoga Park. At the time of his arrest, he had a pocket knife and a receipt from Home Depot with him.
9:52 Speaker 01 He had purchased coveralls, a moisture barrier, diamond saw blades, and plywood just days before. This all painted a very dark picture for police and would prove that what Haskell had done was premeditated. And there was more. Inside his rental car, investigators found a bloody military-style knife, a loaded .357 revolver, and 32 rounds of ammunition for it, a one-way ticket to Japan, and passports for each member of his family. Blood later matched to both Mei and her father was found on the .357 revolver.
10:32 Speaker 01 And I'll tell you what, it seems like almost every case we do, someone
10:40 Speaker 01 Is either tripped up or incriminated by purchases made at Lowe's, Home Depot, Walmart, you name it, right? You know, it, a crime is committed and then that crime has to be covered up. Well, you gotta go somewhere, I guess, and, and buy the supplies to do that. But it seems so very often that police are able to, you know, figure out where the purchases were made, you know, uh, get a receipt, even get surveillance footage. Just see that in so many cases.
11:18 Speaker 00 So you get picked up for this kind of crime and you have a receipt showing that you've purchased this kind of stuff. The police are probably salivating, trying to figure out how they can link this stuff to the murder and, and tie it back to him. And I think having this stuff just made it easier for them to do their work.
11:38 Speaker 01 Well, and that's on top of the bloody knife, the 357 revolver. It seems like a lot in a pretty short amount of time, leading to this guy having done something really, really bad.
11:55 Speaker 00 As news broke about the gruesome fines and Haskell's arrest, neighbors were shocked. It was well known among those in Haskell's circle that he was very interested in weapons like firearms and swords. Because there were unsecured guns in the Haskell's home, at least one neighbor kept her children from playing inside the house. Their next door neighbor, L. Benamy, told the Daily Mail, "The kids could play at my house or usually in the front lawn. I was okay with the kids playing in their front lawn." Benamy also had nothing but great things to say about May, saying, "You couldn't ask for a better neighbor. May was an amazing mom, an amazing person, and an amazing daughter to her parents."
12:34 Speaker 01 It appeared clear to police that Haskell was planning to flee the country before his arrest. They found out that he had invited his mistress on a vacation to Japan. In addition to the one-way ticket he had on him, he had purchased a round-trip ticket for her. Haskell apparently had no plans to return to the US to face any kind of consequences. He certainly had the means to flee, and he may have had enough money to live in another country for quite some time. $67,000 in cash was found during a search of Haskell's office.
13:12 Speaker 00 Police had to figure out how things unfolded, and they still didn't know where May's parents were, but they feared the worst. May's parents were last seen on November 6, 2023. LAPD Detective Efren Gutierrez, during his first press briefing on the case, said they would normally be home in these hours, and attempts have been made to contact them by phone, by cellphone, and no answer. And the same with May. She's unaccounted for. May was last heard from on November 5. By that evening, she stopped answering phone calls or responding to any texts. This immediately worried her friends, like Jenny, who told the Daily Mail, "I knew something was wrong, because she always responds right away."
13:54 Speaker 01 May's friends knew something had to be wrong on the morning of November 8. No body parts had been found yet, and May wasn't known to be missing. But that morning, when Haskell took his sons to school, it stood out because it was always May who did the drop-offs and pickups. One friend, whose name hasn't been released, told the Daily Mail, "It was odd to see him," and this person noted how normal he acted. Saying he even confirmed a playdate for our kids for this past Sunday. According to their neighbor, Benamy, May's whole life revolved around the boys and she would never leave without the kids.
14:37 Speaker 01 Benamy also said that on the evening of November 7th, her husband smelled what he described as rotting flesh, but assumed an animal had died nearby. And this is one of the things that always jumps out at me in a case where someone is missing and you know, friends, family, you know, people in their life are saying, well, they would never have done this, or this happened and it was so out of the ordinary. You also have a mother who people are saying, you know, lived for her kids, right? Her kids were her whole life. She would just never up and leave them.
15:22 Speaker 01 And I think that is true in many, many cases. It's why I don't often go straight to the theory of, well, someone left voluntarily, especially in a situation like this. I think May's friends knew that she would never just leave her kids. And I think that goes for a lot of parents.
15:47 Speaker 00 Yeah, I think these friends and neighbors did a good job helping police by painting a picture of who May was and what her routines were. And I think they really helped establish a timeline too of things, you know, helping them to, to figure out when May was actually missing and when something may have happened to her.
16:08 Speaker 01 Well, and the other thing you'd have to say is with what police have discovered about May and especially about, you know, her husband, Sam, things are not looking good for him.
16:22 Speaker 00 Yeah, we've mentioned already this laundry list of things that he's been connected to all these almost things that you might find in a murder kit. The receipt from Home Depot, the gun, and then you've got blood evidence in the home. It's just overall, it looks like he's the prime suspect for sure. Around 9:00 PM on November 7th, a child living next door to the Haskell home may have heard Sam Haskell fleeing the home with his sons. According to People Magazine, she heard what she believed was a child call out hello and help shortly before hearing the slam of a car door and the sound of it accelerating at a high speed. No remains belonging to either of May's parents have been found as of this recording, but investigators
17:07 Speaker 00 believe they met the same fate as their daughter. The knife found in Sam's rental car tested positive for blood and investigators found the DNA of May, Yao Shang, and Gao Shin Lee on the blade.
17:19 Speaker 01 And again, going back to things that don't make Sam Haskell look good, you know, you've got to focus in on this knife. Finding the DNA of May and her parents, all three of them, on the blade of this knife, that's a real bad sign and most likely why the police believed that even though they hadn't found the bodies of the parents, they were most likely deceased.
17:51 Speaker 00 Yeah, that's some strong physical evidence. And then you have the blood that was on the gun as well. Just, you know, stuff seems to be piling up for police making a case against this guy.
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18:48 Speaker 01 along with access to 24/7 messaging with your care team. So support is always in reach. Ready to reach your goals? Visit forhers.com/criminology to access personalized affordable care for weight loss, hair, menopause, and more. Individual results may vary and stopping treatment may result in weight regain. Weight loss by HERS is not available in all 50 states. Wegovy is the registered trademark of Novo Nordisk AS. To get started and learn more, including important safety information, Wegovy clinical study information and restrictions, visit forhers.com. Due to the fact that only her torso was recovered, May's cause of death remains unknown.
19:31 Speaker 01 According to the LA Times, it was listed by the medical examiner only as homicidal violence. The medical examiner is not even sure whether or not May was already dead before her husband started dismembering her body. The autopsy report reads in part, "The possibility that the head and neck removal was initiated prior to death cannot be entirely excluded." According to the autopsy report, "The smoothness of the wound where May's legs were detached suggests a sharp power tool was likely used to perform these amputations." The machine saw that authorities found in the Haskell home would create those kinds of cuts.
20:17 Speaker 01 And more, if we talk about a lot of gruesome things on this podcast, we're talking about murders and, and things like that. But one of the things that, you know, always kind of leaps into my mind is, you know, first off, how do you kill someone? You know, that, that's the first question. And especially, how do you kill someone you love? But then how do you dismember and cut up their body? I mean, you want to think about gruesome, that's gruesome stuff. And then on top of all of that, the medical examiner saying that the dismemberment
21:00 Speaker 01 could potentially have been done prior to death. That ups the gruesome factor even more.
21:08 Speaker 00 Yeah, that's hard to even think about. That's the stuff out of nightmares for something like that to happen. And you know that that he may have done this to someone he loved is just really hard to fathom, you know, that he would do it to anyone, let alone someone that he loves. And did it according to police, based on what they believe, did it three times because they believe the same thing happened to May's parents. So to to be able to do that to three different people, just I just boggles my mind. I don't know how someone can can do that. As we've seen recently with our episode about the murder of Lauren Giddings, it's not out of the question for someone who dismembers a body to use more than one dumpster to get rid of the
21:53 Speaker 00 evidence. In Lauren's case, just like in this case, only Lauren's torso was found. The rest of her body, which had been placed in a different dumpster across the street, has never been found. And that seems obviously what happened in this case, too, at least to this point. It seems like Sam Haskell must have distributed the trash bags that contained the rest of the body parts in multiple places. The other dumpsters he used must have been picked up without incident. When it comes to trying to figure out which dumpsters he chose to use, it proved somewhat impossible. Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman told the LA Times, he had several days and drove through Los Angeles County.
22:32 Speaker 01 Sam Haskell, the fourth, was charged with three counts of murder with the special circumstance of committing multiple murders at one time. He was initially held without bail, but it was later set at $2 million. A high dollar amount was probably a good idea since he was obviously not planning to stick around before his arrest and had that large chunk of cash in his office. Haskell never posted any bail. When investigators searched his home on Thursday morning, two days after the call about possible body parts at the home, they found large amounts of blood and evidence. That someone had tried to clean up after themselves. The scene suggested that the dismemberment had taken place there.
23:17 Speaker 01 Eight bags full of bloody evidence like towels and bedding were recovered from the backyard and the garage, but there were no body parts found at the scene. Investigators also found a machete and a machine saw. Canes belonging to May's parents were mixed in with the bloody trash. There was also bloody plywood that we mentioned earlier, which appeared to have been underneath the bodies when they were dismembered. So earlier, you know, I talked about the thought of dismembering a person or persons after committing murder. But now I want to talk about, you know, how do you think that you're going to get away with that?
24:02 Speaker 01 You know, as gruesome as it is to talk about dismembering bodies is a very bloody proposition. So doing that inside your home, virtually impossible not to leave evidence behind. And maybe it's more of that he thought, well, by the time they find it, I'll be in Japan. So it doesn't matter.
24:27 Speaker 00 Yeah, it certainly seems like he didn't take the time to clean up or to hide this evidence. You know, it's clearly premeditated because he has these tickets. You know, he bought the tools he would need to do all this, but it seems like there was no follow through on, on what would happen after he cut their bodies up. I have a hard time getting into some of these people's heads that do this because it seems like on one hand, they planned a lot, but then when you look back at it, it's they didn't plan much at all. So it's, it's very strange when we talk about these kinds of cases.
25:04 Speaker 01 Well, and I think one of the things that goes along with that is you think about. Getting rid of the body parts, right? Driving around, finding all these different dumpsters to dispose of the bags, but then leaving eight bags full of the most incriminating evidence ever in the backyard in the garage. Why would you not get rid of that as well? So I'm with you. I mean, I think there was some things that were thought out, but there was a lot that wasn't.
25:39 Speaker 00 This was clearly a gruesome and horrific triple murder, but it didn't matter to authorities that May's parents' bodies hadn't been found. They were confident that they still could prove their case. Deputy DA Silverman told NBC News, "I don't need a body to charge a murder. With their canes inside Haskell's home, part of their daughter in a dumpster, and their blood on a knife, there's seemingly very strong evidence. Authorities believe the children may have been inside the home when the murders were committed, but luckily, they were physically unharmed."
26:11 Speaker 01 And that's a scary thought in of itself. I mean, it's great that they, the kids were unharmed. But if they were really inside the home, what did they see? What did they hear?
26:22 Speaker 00 Yeah, you would hope that they didn't have to see what was happening in that home because that could do irreparable damage long-term for them. And hopefully, they get counseling if they needed. It's almost like the scene out of the TV show Dexter. When he was, you know, a child, he witnessed his mother's murder and it was very gruesome. So not to compare, you know, a fake TV show. I'm not trying to do that. This is reality. But, you know, we know that when children see this kind of stuff, it can do some damage. So I really hope that they, they get help if they need it.
27:01 Speaker 01 A surveillance camera at a business in the shopping center where May's torso was recovered, recorded Haskell around 4:45 PM. He was getting a black trash bag out of the trunk of his Tesla and then putting it into the dumpster. It obviously had something heavy in it, based on how he struggled to lift it up. The shopping center wasn't far from Haskell's office. He was also recorded moving trash bags into an SUV that he rented. May's car was found near the Airbnb Haskell was staying at after the murders. The inside of the car tested positive for blood. It belonged to May's stepfather. In December, about a month after her body was found in the dumpster,
27:46 Speaker 01 investigators finally confirmed that it had been the torso of May Haskell recovered from that dumpster.
27:54 Speaker 00 It seems like a good time to pause here and look back to see what led up to this terrible triple murder. May and Sam Haskell IV met at Cal State Northridge sometime in the mid 2000s when they were both studying there. May's education was a group effort. Her parents sold their home in China to be able to pay for tuition at the college, and her uncle got a job at a restaurant so that he could also pitch in. May was taking accounting courses, and it's unclear what Sam was pursuing. That seems like a continuing trend in the relationship. One of May's uncles mentioned that she was the one with a job, several jobs actually, and her husband just bounced around aimlessly.
28:32 Speaker 01 The Haskell's mortgage was $7,000 a month. Aside from just being located in Southern California, an area with pricey real estate, the home is pretty sizable. A Zillow listing both six bedrooms and six bathrooms, and there's a pool in the backyard. It's a gorgeous home. Despite her husband being described in the press as a Hollywood heir, May still had to work multiple jobs to be able to keep a roof or that specific roof over their heads. There's little doubt that May was working hard with the help of her parents to raise her kids there and have a wonderful life. But her husband took all that away.
29:17 Speaker 01 And California real estate is very expensive, everybody knows that. $7,000 a month, Morph, can you imagine having that as your mortgage payment?
29:28 Speaker 00 Now, that's, that's pretty hefty.
29:31 Speaker 01 I mean, most people don't even make $7,000 a month. But this notion that, you know, May is working multiple jobs and that Sam is kind of, you know, bouncing around from this to that, even though it's thought that, you know, he has all this money. He's a, he's an heir to Hollywood royalty, if you want to put it that way. It seems like a little bit of a smokescreen.
30:01 Speaker 00 Yeah. And you could, it's not a stretch to think that maybe May was getting tired of this, of him not carrying his share of the work and supporting the family. And maybe she had given him an ultimatum or had said enough was enough. And this could be the thing that made him snap finally and do what he did, knowing that he was the easy time he had with her supporting the family was over.
30:30 Speaker 01 Well, and we already know that he had a mistress on the side as well. So that, that could have played into it, too.
30:37 Speaker 00 Yeah, lots of potential motives here. According to their next door neighbor, El Benami, in an interview with KTLA 5, the couple didn't seem to be very warm with each other or affectionate, or have some great marriage. She said she didn't know of there being any issues between the two of them, saying, would I say they seem like a happy couple? No, but I definitely didn't expect anything like this. I never could have imagined what happened. She also told the Daily Mail that the two were very different in the sense that she was very outgoing, very social, and he's not, explaining that he's more reserved and quiet.
31:14 Speaker 01 According to the Daily Mail, May's friends know that she had wanted a divorce from Haskell for at least four years, but that she was too afraid to file or leave him. One of May's friends, Jenny, told the Daily Mail, May first brought up a divorce when I was getting one in 2019. Jenny explained that May felt trapped.
31:37 Speaker 01 But she just felt like she couldn't risk losing her boys. Because Haskell came from such a powerful and wealthy family, she feared that they would use the legal system to squeeze her out of the lives of her own children and take custody away from her. Jenny also claimed that May disclosed more than one instance of physical abuse during her marriage, saying, "She told me that he had hurt her. He had hit her." As for why Haskell snapped and killed May, her friend Jenny had a guess, saying, "Maybe she brought it up again, and then he snapped." And I understand, you know, what she's theorizing. You know, did May finally decide it was time to get out of her unhappy situation?
32:22 Speaker 01 Did she bring up divorce in a way that made Haskell realize that she was very serious this time? If May left, he would have to figure out how to pay for his own lifestyle. I think the fact that he never posted bonds shows that his parents weren't going to support him financially. Maybe she asked him about the $67,000 he had. You know, if she was the one kind of paying most of the bills, where'd he get that kind of money? Maybe she noticed it was missing. After searching his phone, investigators discovered that Sam Haskell was having an affair with a woman 10 years younger,
33:05 Speaker 01 the same woman he had bought tickets to Japan for. And there's no doubt, this could be yet another cause of friction between May and Sam Haskell.
33:15 Speaker 00 There's plenty of evidence that Sam Haskell IV premeditated the murders. According to his mistress, Haskell told her in October 2023, about a month before the murders, that his parents were going to start taking care of the three sons he and May had together. There are no reports about what his mistress said to him regarding this conversation, but the whole story is suspicious. Why would his parents take the kids when May's parents had moved all the way from China to help take care of them? And would May really be okay with just giving up her kids? Apparently, this woman didn't ask any questions about what was going to happen to May and their marriage. It seems like another indication of premeditation on Sam Haskell's part. He was thinking of who would take care of his kids
34:00 Speaker 00 when his wife and in-laws were gone.
34:02 Speaker 01 But the thing that jumped out to me was that it certainly wasn't going to be him, right? Taking care of the kids. He was talking about, you know, his parents doing it. Because why? He wasn't gonna be around. He was going to Japan with his mistress. That's what I'm taking away from it.
34:23 Speaker 00 Yeah, and it's, it's odd that he would, you know, again, trying to get into somebody like his mind, but he's going to kill his wife, the mother of his children, give the kids to his parents and then take off to Japan. Just a very strange plan. It almost seems like he's murdering May out of spite. And he doesn't even want to be with his kids. He's giving them to his parents. So just a very strange plan all around, I think.
34:55 Speaker 01 Yeah, I'm with you because if that's your ultimate goal is to leave that life behind and start a new life with this other woman. Why not just leave and go to Japan?
35:07 Speaker 00 Yeah, he could have simply divorced her and tried to start a new life. Why murder her? We just don't know what was going on, what his thoughts were.
35:18 Speaker 01 Sam Haskell sat in jail awaiting court proceedings. And on July 14th, 2025, the case was suddenly in the headlines again. Just after four in the morning on July 12th, Haskell was found dead in his cell at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles. It was just two days before an important hearing was scheduled. Most reports were vague and said no details were available. But a few outlets immediately reported that Haskell had taken his own life by hanging himself with a sheet. Haskell had been on suicide watch since his arrest and had to wear a suicide prevention smock when he went to court.
36:01 Speaker 01 During at least one hearing, he was completely shirtless without even the smock. Because according to his lawyer, he had a pre-existing medical condition, which prevented him from wearing it at the time. His lawyer. Claimed that Haskell had no thoughts of self harm and claimed that the sheriff's department was forcing him onto suicide watch and making him wear the smock publicly so that it would look like he had wanted to take his own life. If the case had gone to trial and he had been convicted, he was facing life in prison without the possibility of parole. Some reports mentioned that Haskell could have faced the death penalty, but there
36:42 Speaker 01 is currently a moratorium on the death sentence in the state of California by order of the governor. So this is very recent news, Morf. I mean, it's, you know, less than a month ago from the time that we're, you know, recording this episode. Yeah, I just wonder, given all of the evidence that we've talked about, Haskell had to know, there was no way that he was going to be acquitted of this murder. I mean, the prosecution had a mountain of evidence against him. And we know there are some people who decide that
37:24 Speaker 01 there's no way they're going to spend the rest of their life in prison.
37:28 Speaker 00 And it seems like Sam Haskell had no remorse and wasn't sorry for what he did. And rather than own up to it and pay for what he did, he chose a different path. And it's not surprising to me because he seems like the kind of person that wouldn't want to own up to this and, and take responsibility and, and show that he was sorry for what he did. Most people, including the authorities, believe that Sam Haskell didn't want to face the information he knew would come out at the upcoming hearing. He could have pleaded guilty from the beginning and avoided a trial altogether, but he chose to maintain his innocence. Maybe he didn't think investigators would discover everything, or maybe at the time...
38:11 Speaker 00 Or maybe the time he sat there behind bars, waiting for the truth to come out finally got to him. Speaking about Sam Haskell's death, Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan Hockman told Fox News, instead of standing before a judge and answering for the crimes he's been charged with, the defendant managed to escape justice. He called it one last cruel act by someone who did the most horrific things for reasons we will never entirely know. And District Attorney Hockman told ABC seven, the full motive for an individual to so violently and barbarically kill three people and chop up their bodies. Mr. Haskell has taken that motive to the grave with him.
38:49 Speaker 01 And I think that's the tough part for many, right? I don't know that anyone is weeping for Sam Haskell, doing what he did. But what comes along with that is the fact that some of the answers he took with him. Some of those things probably only he knew. And that's what makes, you know, a situation like this very tough.
39:17 Speaker 00 Yeah. In cases like this that are so revolting and shocking, when you can't have answers, when you can't fathom or understand how it came to this, it's very frustrating to not have those answers and not have some kind of understanding. And when the person with the answers decides they're going to not share them, it's just really frustrating.
39:43 Speaker 01 Hockman laid out the key points of the case he was planning to present. It turns out that it was actually one of the day laborers that Haskell tried to hire to move the body parts who called the police to report the body parts at Haskell's house. He had looked inside one of the bags because they were pretty heavy and also felt oddly wet, which was not at all what I guess they had expected. Haskell originally told the workers that they were going to be moving bags full of rocks. One of the workers told the Daily Mail, "We could tell they weren't rocks because the bags were soft and soggy." They drove about a block away from the home before they stopped their truck and decided
40:28 Speaker 01 to investigate. Looking inside one of the bags, a belly button was visible. When they realized what they were being asked to move, they decided not to do the job. The four laborers gave Haskell back his money and left. It seems that this is when Sam Haskell realized the men knew what was in the bags and got rid of them himself.
40:52 Speaker 00 The day laborers that Haskell tried to hire to do his dirty work didn't speak much English. They actually tried to report the body parts directly to a police officer in person, but ended up, for whatever reason, not being taken seriously. They spoke to the California Highway Patrol, as well as the Topanga Community Police Station, where the officer at the station didn't speak Spanish, and he couldn't figure out what they were trying to explain. Eventually, they had to call 911 to get someone to actually take a report about what was going on. This explains how Haskell had time to get rid of the bags and get out of the area before any officer arrived at his home, initially to check out the call. If the men had been taken seriously, Haskell may have been caught right-handed while he
41:37 Speaker 00 was loading bags full of body parts into his car.
41:39 Speaker 01 At best, it seems Haskell was risking the livelihoods of those workers, and at worst, he was trying to frame them. Their fingerprints would be on the bags. If they were found, it would be them and their vehicle captured on any surveillance footage. They didn't speak enough English to tell authorities that they needed help. How could they possibly defend themselves against an arrest? Sure, they would be entitled to a lawyer, but an arrest itself would be very expensive and potentially damage their reputations beyond repair. If any of them were undocumented, that's an extra layer of danger for them in being
42:20 Speaker 01 blamed for this crime, but also just in coming forward to sound the alarm about what was inside the bags. And my first thought was, what sense does it make to try to hire some people to move bags with body parts in them? But, you know, was... Haskell thinking, well, you know, these are possibly undocumented laborers, even if they somehow figure out what's in the bags. They won't go to the police. They can't because other than that, the logic there is just not making a lot of sense to me.
43:00 Speaker 00 Yeah, and this is a case without much logic as far as Sam Haskell is thinking. So it's in a way, it's not surprising to me, but you know, it's a good thing that they did at least make that call the night before because police connected it right away to the body found in the dumpster that turned out to be May. And they had a jump start on where to start looking and go back to that house versus waiting to officially identify her, you know, through DNA, which took some time. By the time that would have happened, Haskell could have been in Japan or someplace else. So I think these workers, you know, just making that 911 call at least early on gave
43:43 Speaker 00 the police, you know, a shorter time to get to Sam Haskell. LAPD Detective Efren Gutierrez explained to CBS Los Angeles, typically if someone, a murder suspect, is dismembering a body, it's to delay identification. According to Detective Gutierrez, when a killer chooses to dismember a body by implication, it would mean that they may have been known to each other. The response to the men trying to report what was in the bags at Haskell's home has been investigated, mainly the men should have never had to leave the station and call 911. Perhaps a change in policy or the way the situation was handled might prevent the same thing from happening in the future.
44:24 Speaker 01 Yashong Wang and Gao Xinli are still missing and May Haskell's head, legs and arms have never been recovered. The three young Haskell boys, none of them even teenagers yet are in the care of an unnamed family member as of the time of this recording. Samuel Haskell, the fourth official cause of death, has not been released to the public. So more of as we wrap this one up, you know, obviously you have a guy here in Sam Haskell, who although he was never convicted in a court of law, the evidence seems overwhelming that he murdered his wife and in-laws.
45:07 Speaker 01 But why? Again, right? That's something that he took to, you know, his grave with him. Now, we can theorize, and I don't think it's all that hard. Did he want out of the life he was living? Did he want to live a new life with his mistress? I mean, I think that's a pretty safe theory to operate from. You could also say possibly that, as in many cases, for whatever reason, in his mind, he thought it was better to kill his wife than to go through a divorce.
45:51 Speaker 01 And maybe, you know, have to give up some of his money, however much he had, or pay child support. Unfortunately, people make that decision all too often.
46:06 Speaker 00 Yeah, it's when spouses kill each other and it's normally that we're talking about husbands killing wives, although it happens the other way around sometimes. It always surprises me and shocks me why the divorce is just not the first thought. And murdering their spouse seems like a better option. I just, I don't know, it's maybe you have to get into these, the minds of people that do this. You have to, you know, go to a place where most of us don't go to. So it's hard to comprehend. I just, if something ever happened between my wife and I that was so bad that I couldn't live with her, you know, I would never harm her. I would get a divorce.
46:50 Speaker 00 So how these people come to the decision that this is a better option than divorce? It, I never can understand it because number one, it's just an awful horrible thing to do. But then if they get caught doing it, they lose their freedom. So it just bad decision all the way around to do something like this.
47:12 Speaker 01 You know, to me, in these types of cases, I always think of the word selfish. Like, these guys, to me, seem so selfish, only thinking about themselves, what they want, what's best for them. I get it. Sometimes, relationships don't work out. Sometimes you fall in love with someone else and you'd rather be with them. Well, there are options, right? Legal options, but some people are so selfish that they want it all.
47:51 Speaker 01 And to get it all, they're willing to, you know, carry out the most evil acts. But like you said, it's just hard to comprehend. It really is.
48:03 Speaker 00 Yeah, and it's, it's clear that this isn't even a case where something in the spur of the moment happened and he snapped. There's plenty of evidence that he was planning this, bought tools in advance, things that would help him commit this crime and then try and cover it up afterwards. So, we can't even say, give him the benefit of the doubt that this was a crime of passion that happened in the heat of the moment. You know, there's just too much that says otherwise.
48:31 Speaker 01 Yeah, I'm with you. And I don't have any doubt that he would have been convicted. I mean, the bloody knife, the revolver, you know, he's seen on surveillance camera, putting the body parts in a dumpster. You have these day laborers, basically saying they saw the body parts or body part in a trash bag. You have all the different receipts, you have the evidence from inside the house. It just seemed like it would be a slam dunk case if it had gone to trial.
49:11 Speaker 00 Yeah. And at the end of the day, it's just a really sad case because here you have May, who was a great mother by all accounts, who lived for her kids and her parents who gave up their lives in China to come over here to live here and help support their family and their grandkids. And all three of them wind up being murdered in such a heinous way. It's just, it's a real shame.
49:37 Speaker 01 Yeah, you feel for the kids, right? Because they're left with no immediate family. Now they're living with family members and I'm sure they'll be taken care of, but that's a huge loss for them. But that's it for our episode on Sam Haskell. If you love the show, haven't done so yet, go out, leave us a rating, leave a review. Also, keep telling your friends about the podcast. That word of mouth really helps out.
50:07 Speaker 00 If you want to find us on social media, we're available on all major platforms. Just search for Criminology Podcast. You can also go to our website, criminologypodcast.com. And if you want to join a Facebook discussion group with other listeners, search for Criminology Podcast Discussion and Fans.
50:23 Speaker 01 So that's it for another episode of Criminology, but Morph and I will be back with all of you next Saturday night with a brand new episode. So until then, for Mike
50:33 Speaker 00 And Morph.
50:34 Speaker 01 We'll talk to you next week.
50:36 Speaker 00 Take care, everyone.
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