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The son of a Hollywood executive, charged with murdering his wife and her parents, died over the weekend of what appeared to be a suicide a few days before the court hearing to decide whether he should be on trial or not.
Samuel Bond Haskell IV, 37, was found in his cell on Saturday at the Twin Towers Prison prison in Downtown, according to law enforcement agencies familiar with the investigation.
Haskell was arrested and charged in November 2023 on suspicion of murdering his wife Mei Haskell. and her mother, Yangxian Wang, 64; stepfather, Goshan Lee, 72.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Homicide Department has announced it is investigating Haskell’s death, and the cause will be determined by the LA County Medical Examiner’s Office.
Haskell’s body was found Saturday at 4:20am, sheriff’s officials said.
His death was ranked 26th in the Los Angeles County Jail System this year.
The county jail comes after what county superintendent Janice Hahn called “one of the deadliest startes in the recent history of the prison system.” In the first 20 weeks of 2025 alone, 20 incarcerated individuals died. This is more than twice the number of deaths at the same time last year, including three people per day.
“Our prisons are in danger,” Hearn said. “We have seen an astonishing increase in the deaths of those in our detention and those who care for us. We need to take urgent and decisive action to save lives.”
The 2024 survey found a common thread across all causes of death among people in detention: negligence, by both security guards and medical staff.
Haskell was scheduled to begin a preliminary hearing on Monday for three counts of murder involving special circumstances. He had previously pleaded not guilty. He faced life without the possibility of parole if he was found guilty of any of the three counts.
Haskell, his wife, and her parents all lived in a one-storey home in the 4100 block of Coldstream Terrace in Tarzana.
Police say on November 7, 2023, Haskell took her to a daytime worker to remove the bag from her home, which she said was a body part. $500 was paid and the worker who initially said he was carrying the rocks said the bag felt moist and tender as meat. The workers tried to return the money and contact the police, but by the time the officers arrived the bag was gone.
The next morning, the man found a human torso packed into a garbage can duffel bag in a parking lot in Encino, near Ventura Boulevard and Rubio Avenue, about five miles from Haskell’s home, police said.
Haskell was arrested after a horrifying discovery. Within Haskell’s home, detectives found blood and other evidence that matched the murder and dismantling, investigators said.
Atty, Los Angeles County. Nathan Hochman told TMZ that Haskell never revealed to authorities the location of his in-laws.
“What they found was literally his wife’s torso, torn apart,” Hochman said.
Top LA County prosecutors said investigators recovered the wood with three casualties, a cutting saw, a machete, a bullet and a blood from a .357 caliber handgun inside a rental car.
“They found blood on the mattress in the bedding throughout the house,” Hochmann said.
Defendant’s father, Sam Haskell, was an Emmy-winning producer and executive of William Morris’ talent agency before launching his own production company.
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