LAPD launches probe into whether laborers 'who were paid $500 to dump body parts in dumpster for Sam Haskell' were turned away from police station and told to call 911 when they tried to report it

Los Angeles cops have launched a probe into whether laborers who reported being paid $500 to dump body parts for accused killer Samuel Haskell were turned away from the police station and told to call 911 instead. 

Haskell, 35, the son of a Hollywood hotshot of the same name, has been charged with three counts of murder in connection to the disappearance of his wife Mei Haskell, 37, and her parents. 

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 children, aged six, eight and 12. 

Now, LAPD is questioning why the Spanish-speaking laborers who became entangled in the case were apparently redirected and turned away from two police stations when they tried to report the bags  of body parts. 

Police Chief Michel Moore said he couldn't think of any valid reason why cops at the stations would not have taken their reports, as the department investigates potential failings. 

'They didn't have those bags with them, (which) were back at the individual's home or location where they had been asked to do this service, and they believed that the bags, as I understand it, contained potentially human remains,' Moore said during a news conference.

'My concern is that very act right there, of having them go outside and call 911 versus summoning a unit via other available channels and ensuring that the people remain there with their cooperation. 

'The desk officer has at his or her disposal the watch commander on scene, so the supervisor there, they have radio communications that they can summon, communications that issue or dispatch units.'

Officers were eventually dispatched to look for the body bags but came back empty-handed - until a dismembered torso, believed to belong to Mei, was discovered in a dumpster miles away the next day.  

The Spanish-speaking laborers said Haskell tried to trick them into removing the 50-pound sacks from his Tarzana home on November 7, after being told they were full of rocks and trash. 

'When we picked up the bags, we could tell they weren't rocks,' one of the workers, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told NBC Log Angeles in Spanish. 

The men said the bags felt soft and soggy like meat as they loaded them into their pickup truck, and each weighed around 50 pounds. This aroused their suspicions, so they parked up and took a look inside the bags.   

'I started seeing body parts, a belly button,' the worker said. 'I was astonished. Of course, I felt bad. We had been tricked.'

The laborers said they drove back to Haskell's home on Coldstream Terrace in Tarzana, about 25 miles northwest of Los Angeles, left the bags on his driveway and returned the money. 

They said they told Haskell they didn't want to be involved - and he tried to pass the body parts off as Halloween props. 

The laborers immediately made a beeline for the nearest police station - the California Highway Patrol station on De Soto Avenue in Woodland Hills - where officers redirected them to the LAPD. 

They tried again to report the chilling events of the day - this time at LAPD's Topanga Station - but the station officer said he didn't understand Spanish, advising them to leave and call 911 from the courtyard. 

Feeling inadvertently entangled in a horrific crime while seemingly left high and dry by police, the men said they feared for their lives. 

'God was watching over us,' one worker recalled. 

Haskell was charged in court on Monday with the murder of his wife along with her mother, Yanxiang Wang, 64, and her father, Gaoshan Li, 72.

The headless body of one woman was discovered in a dumpster near his office in Encino, California, while the others are still missing. 

'These shocking and gruesome crimes have sent shockwaves through our community. We stand with the victims' loved ones during this unimaginably difficult time and will do everything in our power to ensure justice is served,' District Attorney George Gascón said while announcing them.

The investigation is still ongoing. LAPD officers returned to the Haskell home and his office on Tuesday.

When straggly-haired blond Haskell appeared in court on Monday afternoon he was bare-chested under a blue suicide vest, showing off his heavily tattooed arms.

Judge Kimberley Baker Guillemet allowed a DailyMail.com photographer in the court – but then ordered that Haskell's face could not be photographed.

She ordered him held without bond and pushed his arraignment back to December 8.

Haskell is the son of Samuel Haskell III, a former executive vice-president and worldwide head of television for the talent agency William Morris Endeavor. 

His clients included Dolly Parton, George Clooney, Kathie Lee Gifford, Whoopi Goldberg and King Charles's brother, Prince Edward. He quit in 2004, and went on to found Magnolia Hill Productions.

The suspect's father was also CEO of the Miss America organization from 2015-17, but resigned after he was found to have criticized some of the contestants in private emails, ridiculing one for gaining weight and describing another as promiscuous.

Mei's friends have revealed the supposed fear she lived in for years given the family's connections. 

'Mei first brought up a divorce when I was getting one in 2019,' one friend named Jenny exclusively told DailyMail.com. 'I told her she could do it, but she just felt like she couldn't risk losing her boys.'

'Mei felt trapped,' said longtime friend Jenny who would only give her first name in fear of retaliation from the prominent Haskell family. 

'She said she couldn't leave because of the boys. She was afraid that her husband would take away the kids with the help of his very rich and influential father.'

'She said it wasn't happening. That there was no way she could get a divorce.

'Maybe she brought it up again and then he snapped.'

'There was also physical abuse,' added Jenny. 'She told me that he had hurt her. He had hit her.'

Jenny also claimed that Mei had told her that her husband did not get along with her mother Wang and father Li. 

The parents had moved into their home in Tarzana, 25 miles north of Los Angeles, about five years ago to help look after the couple's three young sons aged six, eight and 12.

'She said he was rude to them and ignored them. That they made him angry,' one friend said.

'They couldn't speak English, but he made no effort to interact with them.

'When Mei's youngest son was born, her parents moved from China to help take care of the baby. They were very helpful with the kids.

'Mei doesn't have any other family here except for her parents.'

Mei's friends described her husband as 'weird'. 'He would make these sudden moves with his arms and just blurt things out,' one person, who did not want to be named, said. 

'When I first met him, I immediately thought of Jeffrey Dahmer, that same creepy vibe. He would walk really fast with his head down, rarely looking up and never make eye contact. 

'We are absolutely devastated. Mei was such a bright light and loved her kids so much. She wanted to create a wonderful world for them and she did.

'Mei was the one we would all go to if we needed help or advice. She was always there for us. She was always so positive. She never complained. Her boys were her everything and the boys loved her so much.'