Opinion ID: 1268888
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: facts

Text: Shortly after midnight on Thursday, May 13, 1999, Haselden's girlfriend, Rebecca Tindall, called 9-1-1 in Lexington County to report that she had found two-year old Joshua Haselden on the floor of his bedroom not breathing. When paramedics arrived, they found Tindall administering CPR on Joshua. Haselden advised paramedics they had checked on Joshua twenty minutes prior to calling 9-1-1 and he had been fine. Joshua had noticeable swelling and bruising throughout his abdomen, from the waistline to the ribcage. Joshua was taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead at 1:40 AM. At trial, Tindall testified she had just finished giving Joshua his bath and putting him to bed when Haselden arrived home from running an errand for her. She heard Haselden yell at Joshua to get his ass back to bed. She and Haselden then went to Joshua's room to check on him as he had a habit of sticking things up his nose. They retrieved a foreign object from his nose, after which Haselden hit Joshua in the head four or five times. Haselden had a golf ball on his key chain and he hit him in the top of the head with it. Then [Haselden] pulled [Joshua] up and was shaking him and then he pushed him at me and told me to put him to bed and not to kiss him good night either. Sometime around 11:00 PM, she went to put some laundry in the dryer. She heard Haselden yell Goddammit Josh, and heard a noise like a thud. She went into Josh's room and saw Haselden swinging his arm hitting Josh hard in the stomach area three or four times and hollering, Do you hear me boy, do you hear me? She grabbed Haselden's shirt and told him that was enough. Haselden told her he'd punish his son the way he wanted to, and pushed her, causing her to stumble and fall, knocking both her and Joshua to the ground. Haselden told her to get out and she complied. A few minutes later, she went back down the hallway and saw Joshua still lying on the floor. She started to go in and pick him up, but Haselden told her Josh was fine and to leave him alone. They went back to Haselden's bedroom and had sex, after which she snuck back into Joshua's room and found him limp and began screaming for Haselden. Haselden told her to call 9-1-1. An autopsy was performed on May 14, 1999. There was a bruise on the right side of Joshua's forehead which was consistent with being hit with a golf ball key chain. An internal examination of Joshua's scalp revealed a total of eight areas of bruising, only one of which was visible from the outside. There were a number of bruises on the lower legs, and significant bruises on the abdomen. The pathologist, Dr. Sexton, found extensive injuries inside the abdomen. He opined the abdominal bruises were consistent with a blow from the knuckles and, in his opinion, the bruising could not have resulted from doing CPR. He concluded that there were at least six blows to the abdomen. Further examination revealed internal bruising under the skin near the belly button, and a lot of blood in the abdominal cavity which had been caused by several areas of the intestine being separated from the mesentery (the structure that holds the intestines together). Dr. Sexton concluded there were two causes of death either of which could have been fatal; internal bleeding in the abdomen and swelling in the brain caused by the blows to the head. The jury convicted Haselden of murder and found the aggravating circumstances that the murder was committed while in the commission of physical torture, and that the murder was of a child under eleven years of age; it recommended a sentence of death. ISSUES 1. Did the trial court err in allowing the testimony of Haselden's ex-wife concerning his golfing and fishing habits? 2. Was Haselden entitled to a parole ineligibility charge? 3. Were autopsy photographs of Joshua improperly admitted?