The son of a Hollywood executive who dismembered his wife and her parents has died by suicide in his jail cell days before he was due to appear again in court.
Samuel Bond Haskell IV, 37, died on Saturday while awaiting trial on three counts of murder following the horrifying discovery of his wife Mei’s torso in a dumpster near his office in November 2023.
Lt. Michael Modica of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department confirmed Haskell’s death to KABC on Monday ahead of a scheduled court hearing.
He is the son of Emmy winning producer and Hollywood agent Sam Haskell, who has represented high profile clients from Dolly Parton to Whoopi Goldberg and George Clooney.
District Attorney Nathan Hochman slammed Haskell’s suicide on Monday, describing it as ‘one last cruel act by someone who did the most horrific things for reasons we will never entirely know.
‘Instead of standing before a judge and answering for the crimes he’s been charged with, the defendant managed to escape justice,’ he said.
‘A family that has been dealing with unimaginable loss now has been robbed of their chance to face him, hold him accountable for his barbaric actions, and openly share their grief and their cherished memories of their loved ones.’
Haskell in January 2024 pleaded not guilty to murdering 37-year-old Mei, her mother Yanking Wang, 64 and father, Gaoshan Li, 72.
Li and Wang’s remains were never found, but the headless torso of his wife and the mother of his three children was discovered in a dumpster near Haskell’s office in Encino.
He had been caught on camera dumping the contents of a bag into the trash can on November 7.
The trio were last seen alive on November 6, 2023.
Prosecutors said on the day following the murders, Haskell hired four day laborers to remove black trash bags from the house.
One worker revealed that he was paid $500 to remove three large trash bags – adding that Haskell claimed they were filled with rocks before later pretending the body parts were ‘Halloween props’.
‘When we picked up the bags, we could tell they weren’t rocks,’ he said, noting that the bags were soft and soggy.’
He and his co-workers looked inside the bags and inside they saw ‘body parts, a belly button.’
The men then returned the bags and the money to Haskell’s home, telling him they did not ‘want to be involved’, and reported him to police.
By the time police arrived at the home, the trash bags were gone.
Mei’s friends told DailyMail.com she had wanted to divorce Haskell for at least four years, but feared his powerful agent father would persuade courts to give him custody of their three sons Samuel, 11, James, eight and six year-old William.
‘Mei first brought up a divorce when I was getting one in 2019,’ her friend Jenny said. ‘I told her she could do it, but she just felt like she couldn’t risk losing her boys.’
‘Mei felt trapped.’
Jenny also claimed Mei had told her that her husband did not get along with her parents who had moved into their home in Tarzana, 25 miles north of Los Angeles, about five years prior to their deaths to help look after the couple’s young boys.
‘She said he was rude to them and ignored them. That they made him angry,’ a friend said.
Haskell had been on suicide watch inside LA’s notorious Twin Towers jail since his arrest, twice appearing in court in a blue gown which indicated he was on ‘suicide and mental restriction.’
He faced the death penalty if convicted.
