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WILKES-BARRE — Just how old is Todd Tarselli, exactly?
That’s the question that dominated testimony over the the course of a two-day hearing before Luzerne County Judge Michael T. Vough on Tuesday and Wednesday this week.
Tarselli, who is officially 45, has been serving a life term for the 1992 death of Mark Bunchalk, 17, during a robbery at a Kentucky Fried Chicken location on Broad Street in Hazleton.
The man, who later pleaded guilty to the crime, was officially 18, but Tarselli claims he was actually 17 at the time. Tarselli, whose birth name was Hyung-Rae, was born in South Korea and adopted by an American family, and he claims that, due to a difference between how age is counted in Korea and the United States, he wasn’t actually 18 at the time.
This matters due to a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision which blocks mandatory life sentences for minors, but they still could be given life sentences if the trial judge deems it appropriate.
But the two-day hearing didn’t address Tarselli’s sentence, as it was all about providing a basis to show that he was a minor at the time.
Defense attorney William Jennings Watt III started proceedings Wednesday of Namjin Lee, a citizen of South Korea who is a permanent resident of the United States. Lee is a professor at the College of Charleston in South Carolina, and delivered his testimony over the phone Wednesday morning.
According to Lee, the way Koreans measure age is “very different” from Americans.
“When a child is born, he or she is 1 year old,” he said. “In addition, people become one year older on Jan. 1.”
Lee said that this method of aging isn’t officially sanctioned in any way, but it’s almost universally followed.
Tarselli himself took the stand, claiming that the issue is further complicated by his belief that the orphanage he went to got his birth date wrong.
According to him, he first arrived at the orphanage on Nov. 14, 1979, and told those in charge that he was 6 years old, using (without knowing it at the time) the Korean aging system.
“They said that was the birthday, then they subtracted six years,” he said, leading to his official birth date of Nov. 14, 1973, which Tarselli now believes was incorrect.
During cross-examination by Assistant District Attorney Jim McMonagle asked Tarselli when he believes his birthday truly is.
“If you’re referring to the month and day, I do not know,” he said. “I cannot tell you.”
It will ultimately be up to Vough to determine whether or not the evidence presented is substantial enough to suggest Tarselli truly was a minor at the time of the crime.
Even if he is determined to have been a minor, though, that’s not the end of the road. An additional hearing would then be held to determine whether or not Tarselli’s sentence should be changed; it’s entirely within the realm of possibility that the original life sentence would be upheld.
The defense team will have until Oct. 7 to file any additional legal arguments in defense of Tarselli, with prosecutors getting until Nov. 6 to reply. An order from Vough will come at some point after.