Protege who beheaded CEO boss planned birthday for girlfriend despite knowing he wouldn’t get away with alleged $400K theft: witness
A protege who beheaded his tech CEO boss knew he’d get caught but still planned the “most memorable birthday” for the French exchange student who took his virginity, an expert testified at his trial Wednesday.
Dr. Barry Rosenfeld, a clinical forensic psychologist who teaches at Fordham University, testified about the romantic relationship between Tyrese Haspil, 25, and his then-girlfriend, Marine Chaveuz, who he dated for two years and was living in New York City at the time.
“It’s the first person he ever had sex with,” Rosenfeld said, recalling Haspil’s confession after speaking with him in Manhattan Supreme Court.
“He decided very quickly – this is the love of my life. [He] can’t live without this woman, she means everything to [him].”
Haspil had allegedly stolen $400,000 from his employer and worked to keep up a faux high-profile lifestyle with his girlfriend.
Rosenfeld, who interviewed Haspil three times, testified as the defense’s expert witness in their attempt to prove that Haspil hacked up 33-year-old Fahim Saleh at his Lower East Side apartment in July 2020 as a crime of passion due to “extreme emotional disturbance.”
To prove the insanity plea, Rosenfeld was brought in to detail Haspil’s tumultuous upbringing and shed light on his relationship which Chaveuz.
According to Rosenfeld, Haspil — who never met his father — said he was repeatedly told by family members that he was the “product of rape” and was sexually abused by his uncle multiple times while they watched anime cartoons together.
The expert said that Haspil lived a life of abuse, stemming from his childhood with a schizophrenic mother, to bouncing around homes and shelters and even finding himself sleeping on a bench at one point in his teens.
Haspil kept this a secret to himself, and was never able to settle down in any relationship in his life before he started dating Chaveuz in 2018, which is why he was so terrified of losing her, Rosenfeld said.
“He certainly doesn’t have any confidence that she will be with him if he isn’t who he seems to be,” Rosenfeld explained, detailing the inner mechanics of Haspil’s thinking.
Their relationship was a “little rocky” at the start when the two briefly broke up after a month of dating when Chaveuz complained to Haspil that he worked too much and wasn’t giving her enough “attention,” the psychologist testified, which left Haspil “miserable.”
He then became consumed with making time for her but it comes at a cost — he continued to embezzle from Saleh, a venture capitalist and the CEO of Nigeria-based motorbike startup Gokada — who once complained to Haspil that their working relationship was falling apart due to Haspil not working enough, the witness claimed.
Haspil thought that his romance with Chaveuz was going to end in May 2019 when she was supposed to head back to France, but she secured an internship which bought her another year in the Big Apple.
However, that meant Haspil had to keep up with his charade of milking his boss’s profits, and he eventually knew that was going to land him in trouble, Rosenfeld testified.
It was revealed that Haspil once footed the bill for Chaveuz and her friends to spend a weekend at a concert in Florida all on Saleh’s tabs, according to the defense’s expert, who also said that Haspil once stole $20,000 from a restaurant he worked at to fund a semester at Hofstra University.
Haspil’s attorney, Sam Roberts, said in his opening arguments that Haspil was worried he would be “abandoned” by Cheveuz if she found out he stole $400,000 from his boss, which prosecutors allege was the motive behind the gruesome 2020 Covid-19 murder.
At one point in the trial, jurors were shown receipts of purchases allegedly made by Haspil after the murder which included receipts from Louis Vuitton.
A beige Christian Louboutin shopping bag and a box of shoes were recovered at his loft-like spy-pad rental on Crosby Street, located across the block from Saleh’s $2.4 million apartment, according to evidence.
Haspil has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder charges which carry a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years to life behind bars if he is convicted.
His attorneys are hoping that a jury convicts him on manslaughter due to his “emotionally disturbed” defense, which carries a lighter sentence of five to 25 years.
“He wanted to get through Marine’s birthday. The phrase he used was he needed ‘runway,’ he needed to get a little more time with Marine to get through the birthday, and that’s all that matters,” Rosenfeld added.
“She’s supposed to go home a couple weeks after that anyway but he says, and I believe him, that he was convinced he’d get caught.”
His ex has since returned to France.
The expert will continue his testimony Thursday.
