Accused man takes stand in Han family murder trial, controversial expert testifies
Pierre Haobsh, 31, of Oceanside swears in Monday afternoon in the Han family murder trial in the Santa Barbara County Superior Court.
Pierre Haobsh, the Oceanside man on trial for the 2016 murders of Chinese herbalist Dr. Henry Han and his family, took the stand in a Santa Barbara County courtroom Monday.
Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s investigators say they caught Mr. Haobsh providing false statements in initial interviews days after the Han family’s murders.
But an hour before court’s adjournment Monday, Mr. Haobsh swore in — vowing to tell the truth.
His public defender Christine Voss began the direct examination with questions about his upbringing and education.
She gives him an opportunity to confirm a perceived weakness of his case: dates.
Mr. Haobsh says he was born in Plano, TX, but spent his adolescence between Georgia, Texas and Arizona. He didn’t move to California until he was 25, he said.
“I’ve always had a thirst for learning and knowledge,” he said. “School was always really slow for me.”
When his mom died from cancer when he was about 18 years old, he decided to pursue his interests, he said. He got his GED and did not attend college.
He said he started delving into an energy technology business from the age of 16. He was enthralled in the static fields produced by permanent magnets, the pressure of the opposing forces.
“It didn’t make sense to me that these magnets couldn’t be turned into some sort of energy source,” he said.
He claims he began researching quantum mechanics immediately. When he lived in Tempe, AZ, he purchased materials from the Arizona State University course catalogs and researched in the library.
He worked at a company in San Jose doing computer-aided design and met Bill Michael. They went into business using Mr. Haobsh’s idea for energy technology with a team of partners and incorporated as R.E.M. Group LLC.
Mr. Haobsh said he had a salary of $15,000 per month and a signing bonus of his choice of sports car.
Two men from the investigation, Lawrence Tang and Kang Hsu, were part of the company. Mr. Tang was a partner and Mr. Hsu was assigned to help Mr. Haobsh.
Mr. Haobsh made a living at the company through 2012 and part of 2013. He partnered with Mr. Tang beyond R.E.M., and teamed up with Mr. Hsu for a cannabinoid business in 2014.
Mr. Haobsh said he met Dr. Han through Mr. Hsu. Dr. Han invested in the cannabinoid business and became a partner in the business.
Dr. Han allegedly placed Mr. Hsu and Mr. Haobsh on payroll but left out the fourth partner, Dr. Juliana Barba.
Mr. Haobsh also said he thinks Dr. Han visited R.E.M. in Tempe.
He will continue testimony today. Monday opened with the introduction of a controversial defense witness, forensic scientist Dr. Brent Turvey.
Prosecutor Hilary Dozer questioned whether the defense’s expert witness was, indeed, an expert in the category of firearms and toolmarks examination.
Judge Brian Hill initially accepted the witness as an expert after reviewing a resume that included a history of testifying “more than 50” times in court.
His testimony targets the work of David Barber, assistant lab director of the California Department of Justice’s Santa Barbara lab. Mr. Barber examined the .22-caliber Ruger pistol, ammunition casings, bullets and a suspected silencer recovered in the course of the investigation.
Mr. Dozer watched, scribbling down notes with his right arm in a sling as Dr. Turvey admonished his lab’s methods. Dr. Turvey appeared via Zoom from Aguascalientes, Mexico.
Public defender Michael Hanley confirmed that Dr. Turvey doesn’t do firearm and toolmark examination in a lab.
“That’s a much lower level of analysis,” Dr. Turvey replied.
Prosecutor Benjamin Ladinig turned to look at Mr. Barber, who sat among reporters and guests. The two raised their eyebrows, eyes wide.
The comment wouldn’t be the last attempted display of dominance from Dr. Turvey, who furrowed his brow into a smirk as he listened to the court and loosely clasped his hands in front of his chest.
Mr. Dozer asked the witness if he has ever qualified as a firearms and toolmarks expert in a case.
“No,” Dr. Turvey replied. “That would be redundant to my overall expertise,” he said.
Dr. Turvey gave few yes-or-no answers to the many yes-or-no questions.
By 3 p.m., the judge shook his head in annoyance at the witness’s answers, which seemed to walk around the prosecution’s questions.
“Dr. Turvey, just answer the question. We don’t need a long narrative,” Judge Hill said.
The proceedings became a stalemate, only triaged by the judge’s orders to “move it along.”
Dr. Turvey’s testimony leaned on the conclusions of the 2016 President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology report and the 2009 National Academy of Sciences report to Congress. Both seek to provide an error rate for forensic feature examination.
The Department of Justice released a statement in January 2021 regarding the 2016 report after the use of it in court limited the scope of testimony.
“Casework error rates cannot be established through the exclusive and non-severable application of PCAST’s experimental design criteria. No single error rate is applicable to all labs, examiners, or cases,” the statement says.
Mr. Dozer asked Dr. Turvey if he was aware of the press release and the Department of Justice’s position.
He said he was “not surprised.” He says the Department of Justice serves law enforcement. He repeatedly blasted what he described as law enforcement’s effectiveness in a laboratory setting during his testimony.
“The law enforcement community has been too involved with this work. It should be done by scientists, not law enforcement,” he said.
He believes examiners should look for ways to disprove evidence before identifying a match.
But he sees a problem with the specialty of firearm and toolmark examination because casings fired in a lab setting have small variations.
Mr. Dozer read him a definition from course materials cited in his curriculum vitae that said an identification can be made when unknown ammunition shares the same amount of similarities to a test round as two test rounds compared side-by-side. This was the process Mr. Barber used.
But Dr. Turvey didn’t agree with the definition.
“There has to be a reason you can explain that difference,” he said. If it is a known variance in a gun model, he expects to see scientific studies of the variation.
Mr. Dozer attacked Dr. Turvey’s stance as an expert, eyeing the school Dr. Turvey established with a partner in Aguascalientes.
The school is not accredited to give degrees but it can give professional diplomas.
Mr. Dozer also looked at Dr. Turvey’s history in two defamation lawsuits with the Sitka Police Department. Dr. Turvey attempted to sue the police department twice and settled.
The trial resumes today.
email: ahanshaw@newspress.com
