Jump to content

Charles Manson: Difference between revisions

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Browse history interactively
← Previous editNext edit →
Content deleted Content added
VisualWikitext
m rvv from edits by 71.210.184.149 to version by Lectonar
m rv BLP And AFL CIO to last correct edit made by subject's biological father
Line 1: Line 1:
{{Cleanup|date=June 2007}}
{{unreferenced|date=September 2006}}
{{Split}}


{{Infobox Criminal
{{Infobox Celebrity
| subject_name = Charles Manson
| name = Charles Manson
| image = Charles_Manson.jpg
| height = 5'2" [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0543909/bio]
| caption =
| image_name = Charles-mansonbookingphoto.jpg
| birth_date = [[November 12]], [[1934]]
| image_caption = Charles Manson booking photo
| date_of_birth = [[November 12]], [[1934]] (age 72)
| birth_place = [[Cincinnati, Ohio]], [[United States]] {{Flagicon|USA}}
| death_date =
| place_of_birth = [[Cincinnati, Ohio]], USA
| date_of_death =
| death_place =
| occupation = Habitual criminal
| place_of_death =
| charge = murder and conspiracy
| salary =
| networth =
| penalty = death, reduced by abolition of death penalty to life in prison
| status = ineligible for parole until 2012
| spouse = -
| occupation = prisoner
| children =
| website =
| parents = Kathleen Maddox, Colonel Scott (father), William Manson (stepfather)
| footnotes =
| spouse = Rosalie Jean Willis, Candy Stevens, Mary Brunner
}}
}}
'''Charles Milles <!--Please don't alter this middle name, it is Milles --> Manson''' (born [[November 12]], [[1934]]) is an [[United States|American]] convict and career criminal, most known for his participation in the Tate-LaBianca murders of the late 1960s.
'''Charles Milles <!--Please don't alter this middle name, it is Milles --> Manson''' (born [[November 12]], [[1934]]; first proper name Charles Milles Maddox) was leader of what came to be known as the '''Manson Family''', a cult-like commune that began to form around him in the U.S. city of [[San Francisco, California|San Francisco]] in 1967.<ref> [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonaccount.html The Charles Manson ([[Sharon Tate|Tate]]-LaBianca Murder) Trial] by Doug Linder. 2002. University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law. Retrieved [[7 April]] [[2007]].</ref><ref>Bugliosi, Vincent with Gentry, Curt, ''Helter Skelter -- The True Story of the Manson Murders 25th Anniversary Edition'', W.W. Norton & Company, 1994. ISBN 0-393-08700-X. Pages 163-4, 313.</ref><ref> [http://charliesfamily.tripod.com/journal.html A Case Study of the Charles Manson Group Marriage Commune] Smith, David E. and Rose, Alan J., Journal of the American Society of Psychosomatic Dentistry and Medicine, 1970;17(3):99-106.</ref> He was convicted of [[conspiracy (crime)|conspiracy]] to commit the Tate-LaBianca [[murders]], which members of the commune carried out at his instruction. Though there was no evidence Manson personally killed any of the victims, he was also found guilty of the murders themselves, through the joint-responsibility rule of conspiracy.<ref>[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument.html Prosecution's closing argument] 2Violent.com. Retrieved [[16 April]] [[2007]].</ref>


Manson had spent most of his adult life in [[prison]], initially for offenses such as [[car theft]], [[forgery]] and [[credit card fraud]]. He also worked some time as a [[pimp]]. In the late 1960s, he became the leader of a group known as "The Family", and masterminded several brutal murders, most notoriously that of movie actress [[Sharon Tate]] (wife of the Polish movie director [[Roman Polański]]), who was eight and a half months pregnant at the time. He was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder in what came to be known as the "Tate-LaBianca case", named after the victims, although he was not accused of committing the murders in person. He is serving a [[life sentence]] in California's [[Corcoran State Prison]], and will be up for [[parole]] in 2007 at the age of 73. Manson has always maintained his innocence of the crimes.
==Background==
Born to the unwed Kathleen Maddox in Cincinnati General Hospital, [[Cincinnati, Ohio]], Charles Manson was first known as "no name Maddox."<ref>Bugliosi, 136.</ref><ref>[http://www.wargs.com/other/manson.html Provisional ancestry of Charles Manson] Compiled by William Addams Reitwiesner. Retrieved [[26 April]] [[2007]].</ref> No more than three weeks after his birth, he was Charles Milles Maddox.<ref> [http://www.mansondirect.com/birthcert.html Photocopy of Manson birth certifcate] MansonDirect.com. Retrieved [[26 April 2007.</ref> Although the record that includes that name indicates his mother was then eighteen, she was more likely sixteen.<ref>Bugliosi, 136.</ref>


Manson was also friends with several notable musicians before the murders were committed, including [[Dennis Wilson]] of [[The Beach Boys]], and was a marginally successful musician himself who recorded several albums and whose songs have since been covered by many artists.
For a period after her son’s birth, Kathleen Maddox was married to a William Manson, who is named as the boy’s father in the aforementioned record and whose last name the boy was given; but Charles Manson’s biological father appears to have been a "Colonel Scott," against whom Maddox won an [[stipulated judgment|agreed judgment]], 1937, in a Kentucky [[bastardy]] suit. Possibly, Charles Manson never really knew him.<ref>Bugliosi, 136-7.</ref><ref> [http://www.internet.is/bret/manson-mother-interview.htm 1971 newspaper interview with Charles Manson's mother]mansonfamilytoday.info. Retrieved [[June 5]], [[2007]].</ref>


Since his trial and conviction, Manson's name and image have been integrated into American [[pop culture]], typically as a symbol of [[evil]].
According to a story supposedly transmitted by Charles Manson himself, his mother, allegedly a drinker,<ref>Bugliosi, 136.</ref> once sold him for a pitcher of beer to a childless waitress, from whom his uncle retrieved him some days later.<ref>Emmons, Nuel; Manson, Charles; ''Manson in His Own Words''; Grove Press; 1988. ISBN 0802130240. Page 29.</ref> When his mother and her brother were sentenced to five years imprisonment for robbing a service station in 1939, Manson was placed in the West Virginia home of an aunt and uncle who were very religious. Upon his mother's 1942 parole, Manson was returned to his mother and lived with her in run-down hotel rooms.<ref>Bugliosi, 137.</ref>


==Early life==
A 1947 effort by Maddox to have her son placed in a [[Foster care|foster home]] failed because no such home was available; the court placed Manson in Gibault School for Boys, [[Terre Haute, Indiana|Terre Haute]], [[Indiana]]. After ten months, he fled from the place to his mother, who rejected him. In burgling a grocery store, he obtained cash that enabled him to rent a room.<ref>Bugliosi, 137.</ref>
Charles Milles Maddox was born at Cincinnati General Hospital in [[Cincinnati, Ohio]], on [[November 12]], [[1934]] to a 16-year-old unwed girl named Kathleen Maddox visiting from Catlettsburg, KY at the time. Shortly after her son's birth, Kathleen married William Manson, who provided the last name by which he is now known. William Manson was Charles' stepfather; by most accounts Manson's biological father, as declared by a court decision, was an Ashland, KY politician, [[Colonel Scott]].


In 1939, his mother and his uncle, Luther Maddox, were convicted of [[sexual assault]] and holdup of a gas station. Luther served five years in Moundsville, WV prison, dying there in 1949.
A string of burglaries of other stores, from one of which he stole a box of tampons, ended when he was at last caught in the act and sent to an Indianapolis juvenile center. His escape after one day led to his recapture and his placement in [[Boys Town]], from which he escaped with another boy four days after his arrival. The pair committed two armed robberies on their way to the home of the other boy's uncle.<ref>Bugliosi, 137-8.</ref>


Many hardened criminals blame their crimes on their parents, but few have as clear a case as Charles Manson. His mother was an alcoholic prostitute who sold him for a pitcher of beer. In and out of reform school as a youngster, he had an [[IQ]] of 109 and became a kind of institutional politician and manipulator by age 19. Charles Manson spent much of his childhood around Ashland, Kentucky and West Virginia where he was passed from relative to relative due to his lack of parents. He was once member of an outlaw motorcycle club at Huntington, WV.
Caught during the second of two subsequent break-ins of grocery stores, Manson was sent to the Indiana School for Boys at age 13. After many failed tries, he escaped with two other boys in 1951. In [[Utah]], having burgled gas stations all along the way, the trio were caught driving to California in cars they had stolen. For the federal crime of taking a stolen car across a state line, Manson was sent to the [[Washington, D.C.]], National Training School for Boys. Here, testing showed that although his [[IQ]] was a respectable 109 (later tested at 121)<ref>Bugliosi, 141.</ref> and he had had four years of schooling, he was illiterate; a [[caseworker]] concluded he was aggressively antisocial.<ref>Bugliosi, 138.</ref>


From then on his continuous scrapes with the law landed him in prison. His record there described Manson as having "a tremendous drive to call attention to himself."
===First imprisonment===
Less than a month before a scheduled February 1952 parole hearing, Manson sodomized another boy while holding a razor blade against his throat. He was transferred to the Federal Reformatory, Petersburg, Virginia, where he was considered "dangerous." In September 1952, a number of other serious disciplinary offenses resulted in his transfer to the Federal Reformatory at [[Chillicothe]], Ohio, a more secure institution.<ref>Bugliosi, 139.</ref>


Manson attended [[Walnut Hills High School]] as a child. When he was thirteen, his mother (who had become an [[alcoholic]]) attempted to put him in a [[Foster care|foster home]]. When she was unable to find one for him, he ended up at Gibault School for Boys, a [[reform school]] in [[Terre Haute, Indiana|Terre Haute]], [[Indiana]]. Within a year he ran away and back to his mother, who rejected him. He began living on the streets, supporting himself by petty theft; in 1951, after a string of arrests and escapes, Manson fled to California, where he was apprehended and placed in the [[National Training School for Boys]] in Washington, D.C., a Federal juvenile facility, for driving a stolen car across state lines. At least one psychiatrist there observed marked [[anti-social]] tendencies, and in that same year, Manson [[rape]]d another boy. By 1952, Manson already had eight assault charges against him. After being transferred to the Federal Reformatory in Petersburg, Virginia, and later to [[Chillicothe]], Ohio, Manson became a model inmate, resulting in his [[parole]] in 1954 at the age of 20. Following his release, however, he continued along a criminal path. His crimes quickly escalated to major offenses, including [[Mann Act]] violations. [Prior to the Tate-LaBianca murders, Manson had already spent more than half his life (approximately 17 years) in Federal prison &mdash; at one point in 1967 asking not to be released.] In January 1955, Manson married 17-year-old Rosalie Jean Willis, and decided to move to [[California]]. Soon after the wedding, Manson stole a car and was arrested. Willis became pregnant in April. Manson's parole was revoked in 1956 when he missed a court date. Soon after his arrest, Willis gave birth to their son, Charles Milles Manson, Jr. She then left town with a truck driver and Charles Jr., who committed [[suicide]] in 1993.
About a month after the transfer, Manson became almost a model resident. Good work habits and a rise in his educational level from the lower fourth to the upper seventh grade won him a May 1954 [[parole]].<ref>Bugliosi, 140.</ref>


Manson's prison and probation reports showed a consistent theme:
After temporarily honoring a parole condition that he live with his aunt and uncle in West Virginia, Manson moved in with his mother in that same state. In January 1955, he married Rosalie Jean Willis, a hospital waitress, whom he supported via smalltime jobs and [[motor vehicle theft|grand theft auto]]. Around October, about three months after he and his pregnant wife arrived in [[Los Angeles]] in a car he had stolen in Ohio, he was again charged with a federal crime; after a psychiatric evaluation, he was given five years [[probation]]. His subsequent failure to appear at a Los Angeles hearing on an identical charge filed in Florida resulted in his March 1956 arrest in Indianapolis. His probation was revoked; he was sentenced to three years imprisonment at [[Federal Correctional Institution, Terminal Island|Terminal Island]], San Pedro, California.<ref>Bugliosi, 140-1.</ref>
:''(1950-52)'' "Tries to give the impression of trying hard although actually not putting forth any effort ...marked degree of rejection, instability and psychic [[Psychological trauma|trauma]] ... constantly striving for status ... a fairly slick institutionalized youth who has not given up in terms of securing some kind of love and affection from the world ... dangerous ... should not be trusted across the street ... assaultive tendencies ... safe only under supervision ... unpredictable ... in spite of his age he is criminally sophisticated and grossly unsuited for retention in an open reformatory type institution"; ''(1958-59)'' "Almost without exception [he] will let down anyone who went to bat for him ... an almost classic case of correctional institutional inmate ... a very difficult case and it is almost impossible to predict his future adjustment ... a very shaky probationer and it seems just a matter of time before he gets into further trouble".


Manson was paroled in 1958 after serving two years of a three-year sentence. In 1959, he was arrested again for passing stolen checks. Once again, he was given probation, which was revoked nine months later.
Charles Manson, Jr., Manson's son by Rosalie, was born while Manson was in prison. During his first year at Terminal Island, Manson received visits from his wife and mother, who were now living together in Los Angeles; but in March 1957, when the visits from his wife ceased, his mother informed him Rosalie was living with another man. After Manson was caught trying to escape by stealing a car less than two weeks before a scheduled parole hearing the next month, five years probation was added to his sentence; parole was denied.<ref>Bugliosi, 141.</ref>


On [[June 1]], [[1960]], Manson was arrested for [[solicitation]] of prostitution. He was ordered to serve his 10-year suspended sentence for passing stolen cheques at the federal prison on [[McNeil Island]] in [[Washington]] state. While at McNeil, Manson was a cellmate of notorious 1930s bank robber [[Alvin Karpis]] who taught Manson to read music and to play the guitar. It is interesting what Karpis wrote about Manson in his memoirs "On the Rock: Twenty-five Years at Alcatraz" (written with Robert Livesey, published in 1980):
===Second imprisonment===
Manson received five years parole in September 1958, the same year in which Rosalie received a decree of divorce. By November, he was [[pimp|pimping]] a sixteen-year-old girl and was receiving additional support from a girl with wealthy parents. Pleading guilty in September 1959 to a charge of attempting to cash a forged U.S. Treasury check, he received a ten-year [[suspended sentence]] and probation after a young woman with an arrest record for prostitution tearfully told the court she and Manson were in love and would marry if Manson were freed.<ref>Bugliosi, 142-3</ref>


:''"This kid approaches me to request music lessons. He wants to learn guitar and become a music star. 'Little Charlie' is so lazy and shiftless, I doubt if he'll put the time required to learn. The youngster has been in institutions all of his life--first orphanages, then reformatories, and finally federal prison. His mother, a prostitute, was never around to look after him. I decide it's time someone did something for him, and to my surprise, he learns quickly. He has a pleasant voice and a pleasing personality, although he's unusually meek and mild for a convict. He never has a harsh word to say and is never involved in even an argument."''
After Manson took that same woman and another girl from California to New Mexico for purposes of prostitution before the year's end, he was held and questioned for violation of the [[Mann Act]]. Though he was released, he evidently suspected, rightly, that the investigation had not ended. When he disappeared, in violation of his probation, a [[bench warrant]] was issued; an indictment for violation of the Mann Act was issued in April 1960.<ref>Bugliosi, 143.</ref>


After Manson had become somewhat proficient on the guitar, he asked Karpis for help in getting a job playing in Las Vegas as Karpis had contacts with nightclub and casino owners there. Manson even told him he would be bigger than the Beatles, but in the end Karpis decided to leave Manson on his own regarding his music career. Manson was moved to a Los Angeles facility in 1967, a step which proved to be one of the most ominous prison transfers ever. Later Karpis added "The history of crime in the United States might have been considerably altered if 'Little Charlie' had been given the opportunity to find fame and fortune in the music industry."
Arrested in Laredo, Texas, in June 1960 when one of his girls was arrested for prostitution, Manson was returned to Los Angeles. For violation of his probation on the check-cashing charge, he was ordered to serve his ten-year sentence.<ref>Bugliosi, 143.</ref>


Manson was finally released [[March 21]], [[1967]], against his own expressed wish to remain in prison. While either in prison or on probation, he had, among other things, raped another inmate at razor point, stolen cars, [[pimp|pimped]] inmates, and [[forgery|forged]] federal cheques. His prison reports continued with the same message:
In July 1961, after a year he spent unsuccessfully appealing the revocation of his probation, Manson was transferred from the Los Angeles County Jail to the United States Penitentiary at [[McNeil Island]], Washington. Although the charge for violation of the Mann Act had been dropped, the attempt to cash the Treasury check was still a federal offense. His September 1961 annual review noted he had a "tremendous drive to call attention to himself," an observation echoed in September 1964.<ref>Bugliosi, 143-5.</ref>
:''(1961-62)'' "He hides his resentment and hostility behind a mask of superficial ingratiation ... even his cries for help represent a desire for attention with only superficial meaning"; ''([[1964]])'' "Pattern of instability continues ... intense need to call attention to himself ... fanatical interests"; then finally, ''([[1966]])'' "Manson is about to complete his ten-year term. He has a pattern of criminal behavior and confinement that dates to his teen years ... little can be expected in the way of change."


He was 33 years old and more than half of his life had been spent in institutions. He protested his freedom. "Oh, no, I can't go outside there...I knew that I couldn't adjust to that world."
In June 1966, Manson was sent, for the second time in his life, to [[Federal Correctional Institution|Terminal Island]], in preparation for early release. On [[March 21]], [[1967]], his release day, he had spent less than half of his thirty-two years outside of institutions.<ref>Bugliosi, 146.</ref> Telling the authorities that prison had become his home, he requested, unsuccessfully, that he be permitted to stay,<ref>Bugliosi, 146.</ref> a fact touched on in a 1981 television interview:
:[[Tom Snyder]]: Let's go back to 1967, the time you were winding up serving a term of a number of years, ten years, and written accounts indicate that you told the authorities, "Don't let me out, I can't cope with the outside world." Do you have a recollection of that? And do you --


Manson started to attract a group of followers, many of whom were very young women with troubled emotional lives who were rebelling against their parents and society in general. This was the core of the Manson Family execution team whom he ordered to kill pregnant actress Sharon Tate, her wealthy house guests, and the well-to-do LaBiancas, which was part of a plot by Manson to start a global race war.
:Manson: You're making a desperate plea out of something, man. There's no desperate plea out of it. I said I can't handle the maniacs outside, let me back in.


== The murders==
:Snyder: I didn't use the word desperate; that's your word, Charles.
The Manson Family was responsible for several murders, known collectively as the Tate-LaBianca murders.


===The Tate murders===
:Manson: Yeah, well, your inflection and your voice tones were, uh, implications there.<ref>[http://www.charliemanson.com/tom-snyder-1981.htm 1981 Tom Snyder interview with Charles Manson] Transcribed by Aaron Bredlau. CharlieManson.com. Retrieved 26 April 2007.</ref>
On the night of [[August 9]], [[1969]], Manson directed some members of the Family, including [[Charles "Tex" Watson]], [[Patricia Krenwinkel]], [[Susan Atkins]], and [[Linda Kasabian]] to go to the former residence of an acquaintance, record producer [[Terry Melcher]], and kill whoever was on the premises. It was stated at trial that others, including Catherine Gillies, wanted to go as well, but didn't because there "was no room in the car." There is no proof that they were under influence of drugs or that any of them challenged Manson’s wishes.


They left their [[Spahn Ranch]] compound and arrived at midnight at the grounds of the [[Beverly Hills]] home of the [[film director]] [[Roman Polański]] and his wife [[Sharon Tate]]. Polański, highly acclaimed for his recent hit ''[[Rosemary's Baby]]'', was in London working on his next film and had asked friends to stay with Tate, who was eight and a half months pregnant. Before entering the house, the Manson family members shot dead [[Steven Parent]], an 18-year-old friend of Tate's gardener, [[William Garretson]], who was leaving the property and had unwittingly seen the intruders while getting in his car. Kasabian, who was acting as the getaway driver, expressed horror at the murder of Parent and was told to remain outside and keep watch while the others entered the house.
==Rise of the Family==<!-- This section is linked from [[The Manson family]] -->
On his release day, Manson requested and was granted permission to move to San Francisco, where, with the help of a prison acquaintance, he obtained an apartment in Berkeley. In prison, he had been taught to play guitar by 1930s bank robber [[Alvin Karpis]];<ref>Bugliosi, 145.</ref><ref>Karpis, Alvin with Robert Livesey, ''On the Rock: Twenty-five Years at Alcatraz'', 1980</ref> now, living mostly by [[panhandling]], he soon got to know one [[Mary Brunner]], a twenty-three-year-old [[University of Wisconsin, Madison]], graduate working as an assistant librarian at [[UC Berkeley]]. After moving in with her, he overcame her resistance to his bringing other women in to live with them. Before long, they were sharing Brunner's residence with eighteen other women.<ref>Bugliosi, 163.</ref>


The quotation, "I am the [[devil]], and I have come to do the devil's work" has been attributed to Watson when [[Wojciech Frykowski| Wojciech "Wojtek" Frykowski]] awoke from his slumber on the living room couch. They assembled the four occupants of the house into the living room. The intruders asked if anyone had money, and, in replying that she did, [[Abigail Folger]], [[heiress]] to the [[Folgers|Folgers Coffee Company]], was led to her bedroom to empty her purse. She was led back to the living room where the four occupants of the house were tied together. [[Jay Sebring]], a noted hairstylist and friend of the Polańskis was visiting, and when he attempted to defend Tate, he was [[shot]] by Watson, who then kicked him several times in the face.
Manson also took to playing the [[guru]] in San Francisco's [[Haight-Ashbury]] which, during 1967's [[Summer of Love]], was emerging as the signature [[hippie]] locale. Holding forth with a philosophy that included a bit of the [[Scientology]] he had studied in prison, he soon had his first group of young followers, most of them female.<ref>Bugliosi, 164.</ref>


Frykowski and Folger, who were staying in the [[house]] until Polański's return from [[London]], were able to escape from the [[living room]] and were each pursued as they ran onto the front lawn. Quickly overtaken by the attackers, Frykowski was stabbed fifty-one times, shot twice, and pistol-whipped 13 times in the head; Folger was stabbed twenty-eight times. Tate remained in the living room and begged for the life of her unborn baby. Susan Atkins later testified that she had replied, "Look bitch, I don't care about you. I don't care if you are having a baby. You are going to die and I don't feel a thing about it," before stabbing her to death. Before leaving the house Atkins used a towel to soak up some of Sharon Tate's blood and then used it to write "PIG" on the front door. This was allegedly inspired by the Beatles song [[Piggies]].
Before the summer was out, Manson and eight or nine of his enthusiasts piled into an old school bus they had re-wrought in [[hippie]] style, with colored rugs and pillows in place of the many seats they had removed. Hitting the road, they roamed as far north as Washington State, then southward through [[Los Angeles]], [[Mexico]], and the southwest. Returning to the Los Angeles area, they lived in [[Topanga, California|Topanga Canyon]], Malibu, and Venice -- western parts of the city and county.<ref>Bugliosi, 164 and 174.</ref>


Linda Kasabian later received [[immunity (legal)|immunity]] for submitting evidence against the group. She told Manson, "I'm not you, Charlie. I can't kill anybody," and evinced shock and horror at finally seeing the pictures of the killings in court.
(By an alternate account, which includes no mention of the eighteen girls at Brunner’s place, Manson, apparently accompanied by Brunner, acquired Family members during some months of travels that were undertaken in part in a Volkswagen van; it was November when the school bus, maybe acquired in Sacramento, set out from San Francisco with the enlarged group.)<ref>Sanders, Ed, ''The Family'', Thunder's Mouth Press, New York, 2002. ISBN 1-56025-396-7. Pages 13-20.</ref>


===The LaBianca murders===
===Involvement with Wilson, Melcher, et al.===
{{main|Leno LaBianca}}
The events that would culminate in the murders were set in motion in late spring 1968, when [[Dennis Wilson]], of [[The Beach Boys]], picked up two hitchhiking Manson girls and brought them to his [[Pacific Palisades]] house for a few hours. Returning home in the early hours of the following morning from a night recording session, Wilson was greeted in the driveway of his own residence by Manson, who emerged from the house. Uncomfortable, Wilson asked the stranger whether he intended to hurt him. Assuring him he had no such intent, Manson began kissing Wilson's feet. Inside the house, Wilson discovered twelve strangers, mostly girls.<ref>Bugliosi, 250-51.</ref>
The following night in the [[Los Feliz, Los Angeles, California|Los Feliz]] section of [[Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles]], [[California]], wealthy supermarket executive [[Leno LaBianca]] and his wife Rosemary were killed in their home, once again by members of the Family (Watson, Krenwinkel and [[Leslie Van Houten]]). On this occasion, Manson apparently went along to "show them how to do it" with less tumult, and pacified the victims, tying them up before returning to the car to tell his followers to commit the killings. Watson apparently killed Mr. LaBianca, and Krenwinkel and Van Houten took turns stabbing Mrs. LaBianca when she began to struggle. Between them, the two girls stabbed Mrs. LaBianca 41 times, including more than 20 stab wounds made after the woman was dead. Krenwinkel then added to the butchery, using a carving fork to cut the word "WAR" into Mr. LaBianca's stomach. She then left the fork embedded in his stomach, soaking up some blood on a piece of paper and writing the phrases "RISE" and "DEATH TO PIGS" on the walls, as well as the misspelled "HEALTER SKELTER" on the refrigerator.


There was a strong link between the "Tate" and "LaBianca" murders: motive; the instigator (Manson); the two main assassins (Watson and Krenwinkel); and witnesses common to both cases. The witnesses included police, medical and scientific witnesses, and civilian witnesses. All of the crimes committed on both nights were prosecuted by Los Angeles assistant district attorney [[Vincent Bugliosi]] in a single combined trial.
Over the next few months, as their number doubled, the Family members who had made themselves part of Wilson's Sunset Boulevard household cost him approximately $100,000. This included a large medical bill for treatment of their [[gonorrhea]] and $21,000 in the accidental destruction of an uninsured car of his they borrowed.<ref>Watkins, Paul with Soledad, Guillermo, ''My Life with Charles Manson'', Chapter 4</ref> Wilson would sing and talk with Manson, whose girls were servants to them both.<ref>Bugliosi, 250-51.</ref>


===Other murders===
Wilson paid for studio time to record songs written and performed by Manson; he introduced Manson to acquaintances of his with roles in the entertainment business. These included [[Gregg Jakobson]], [[Terry Melcher]], and Rudi Altobelli.<ref>Bugliosi, 251.</ref> Jakobson, who was impressed by "the whole Charlie Manson package" of artist/metaphysician, also paid to record Manson material.<ref>Bugliosi, 155-6, 185.</ref><ref>Bugliosi, 214.</ref><ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-009.php Watson, Charles as told to Hoekstra, Ray, ''Will You Die for Me?'', Chapter 9] Watson website. Retrieved May 3, 2007.</ref>
Members of the Manson Family had previously been responsible for the death of Gary Hinman, a high school music teacher in nearby [[Topanga, California|Topanga Canyon]]. Manson ordered the killing of Hinman after he denied the Manson Family money that Charles claimed Hinman owed them. [[Bobby Beausoleil]] was arrested for Hinman's murder a few days before the Tate slaying; later [[Susan Atkins]] confessed her part in the plot.


On [[August 16]], [[1969]], Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies descended upon Spahn Ranch and arrested Manson and most of the Family members on suspicion of auto theft (the Family were not, as yet, suspected of the Tate or LaBianca killings). Ranch hand Donald "Shorty" Shea offered to tell the deputies what he knew about the Family's activities, but disappeared before he could give them a statement. It is believed that on August 25 or 26, after the Family members were released due to lack of evidence, Manson directed Family members, including Steve "Clem Tufts" Grogan, to kill Shea. One of the enduring Family myths, presumably used to frighten members into submission, was that Shea was dismembered and his body parts buried in different places around the ranch. In 1977, the incarcerated and extremely remorseful Grogan directed law enforcement officials to Shea's body, and it was found in one piece, contrary to the horror story passed down through the Family. Grogan, who was paroled in 1985, is still the only former Family member to have been paroled after being convicted of a Manson-ordered murder.
===Spahn Ranch===
By August 1968, when Wilson had his manager clear the Family members from his house, Manson had established a base for the group at [[Spahn Ranch|Spahn's Movie Ranch]], near Topanga Canyon.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-006.php Watson, Ch. 6]</ref><ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-007.php Watson, Ch. 7]</ref> The evictees joined the rest of the Family there.<ref>Bugliosi, 251.</ref>


They claimed a total of some 35 killings, but most were not tried either for lack of evidence or because the perpetrators were already sentenced to life for the Tate/La Bianca killings.
Located in (or near) [[Chatsworth, Los Angeles, California|Chatsworth]], the ranch had once been a location for the shooting of Western films; then, with its old movie sets run down, it was primarily doing business in horseback rides. While Family members did helpful work around the place, Manson kept the near-blind, octogenarian owner, George Spahn, on his side by having [[Lynette Fromme]] act as Spahn's eyes and attend Spahn sexually along with other girls.<ref>Bugliosi, 100-1.</ref><ref>Watkins, Ch. 3</ref> For a tiny squeal she would emit when Spahn would pinch her thigh, Fromme, one of the early Family members who had boarded the school bus in San Francisco,<ref>Bugliosi, 174.</ref> won from Spahn the nickname [[Lynette Fromme|Squeaky]].<ref>Watkins, Ch. 4</ref>


===Capture===
The Family was soon joined at Spahn by [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Charles Watson]], who had met Manson at Dennis Wilson's house. A small-town Texan who had quit college and moved to California,<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-004.php Watson, Ch. 4]</ref> Watson had given a lift to Wilson, hitchhiking because his cars had been wrecked.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-006.php Watson, Ch. 6]</ref> Watson's drawl earned him, too, a George Spahn nickname, [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Tex]].<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-007.php Watson, Ch. 7]</ref>
[[Barker Ranch]], on the outskirts of California's [[Death Valley]], is known as the last hideout of Manson and "the Family" after the gruesome Los Angeles murder spree. The local county sheriff's department and [[National Park Service]] officers had arrested Manson and his group in 1969 on suspicion of [[trespassing]] and [[vandalism]]. Some of the members of the cult were seen burning a mass of road-grading material and arson investigators suspected the crime to have come from Manson. At the time of the Manson arrests, the officers were unaware of other criminal actions by those they had in custody. They wanted to apprehend and prosecute the persons responsible for vandalizing road repair equipment in Death Valley National Park farther north, not knowing that they had Manson and his followers. Manson was ultimately discovered hiding beneath a sink in the Barker Ranch bathroom.


===Helter Skelter===
==Possible motives==
The murders initially seemed random, but some key motives were later identified:
{{main|Helter Skelter (Manson scenario)}}
# Manson suffered from [[antisocial personality disorder]], a disorder that makes the sufferer unable to feel remorse for their actions and lack a conscience.
In the first days of November 1968, Manson established the Family at alternate headquarters near [[Death Valley]], where they occupied two unused (or little-used) ranches, Myers and Barker.<ref> [http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-009.php Watson, Ch. 9]</ref><ref>Watkins, Ch. 10</ref> The former, to which the group had initially headed, was owned by the grandmother of a new girl in the Family; the latter was owned by an elderly, local woman to whom Manson presented himself and a male Family member as musicians in need of a place congenial to their work. When the woman agreed to let them stay there if they'd fix up things, Manson honored her with one of the [[Beach Boys]]' [[gold record|gold records]],<ref>Watkins, Ch. 10</ref> several of which he'd been given by Dennis Wilson.<ref>Watkins, Ch. 11</ref>
# Manson was hostile towards society; Manson got a "kick" out of death and control. During the trial, one witness commented that "he [Manson] doesn't know about love... love is not his trip. Death is his trip".
# Manson had been rejected by the music industry and wanted revenge. In 1968, Manson was introduced to record producer [[Terry Melcher]], son of actress [[Doris Day]], by [[Dennis Wilson]] of the [[The Beach Boys|Beach Boys]], who had picked up a couple of the Family members as they were [[hitchhiking]]. Manson and the Family moved into Wilson's house, where they lived for a year, and the Beach Boys recorded a song Manson wrote, calling it '[[Never Learn Not To Love]]'. At the time, Melcher and his girlfriend, actress [[Candice Bergen]], were living at the Tate house, and it was there Manson met him. Manson auditioned for Melcher, but Melcher decided not to sign him to a contract. Although Manson knew that Melcher and Bergen had moved to [[Malibu, California|Malibu]], Bugliosi suggested that Manson targeted the house because it represented his rejection by the show business community he wanted to enter, and that it was of no interest to him who his actual victims would be. It has also been rumored that Manson unsuccessfully auditioned for [[the Monkees]], but this is an [[urban legend]] as he was in prison at the time of the auditions in 1965-66.
# The killers were attempting to clear the blame from [[Bobby Beausoleil]], who had been arrested a few days earlier as a suspect in the Gary Hinman murder. This was a motive stated by the killers during interviews with them, featured in a 1972 Manson film [[documentary film|documentary]]. They claimed that the motive for the murders was to clear fellow Family member Bobby Beausoleil, whom they described as a brother to them. Stating that they were willing to sacrifice their lives, (meaning the death penalty) to clear his name, they committed copycat murders to cast doubt on Beausoleil's guilt. This motive was substantially discredited during the penalty phase of the trial, where it became apparent that the "free Beausoleil" motive was contradicted by other testimony of the killers. Additionally, despite declaring they would die for Manson, the other people accused claim to have waited until the main trial was over and the death penalty was being discussed, and then only on [[redirect examination]], to introduce this as a motive. It was dismissed by the prosecution as an attempt to clear Manson by means of the other defendants taking the blame.
# Manson regarded as foretold, by [[The Beatles]], on ''[[The Beatles (album)|The White Album]]'',[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonbeatles.html] an apocalyptic war of which he was destined to be both the uncanny cause and the ultimate beneficiary.[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansontestimony-w.html] When, by his music, he (Manson) would have drawn to him the young, white female [[hippies]] of San Francisco's [[Haight-Ashbury]] district, black men, thus deprived of the white women whom the political changes of the 1960s had made sexually available to them, would be without an outlet for their frustrations and would lash out in violent crimes against whites.[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument26.html] After a resultant murderous rampage against blacks by frightened whites would have been exploited by the [[Black Muslims]] to trigger a war of mutual near-extermination between racist and non-racist whites over the treatment of blacks, the Black Muslims would arise to finish off sneakily the few whites they would know to have survived. In this epic sequence of events, which Manson told his followers would take place in the summer of 1969 and which he termed [[Helter Skelter]], after the White Album track of that name, the Family had little to fear; they would wait out the war in a secret city that was underneath California's [[Death Valley]] and that they would reach through a hole in the ground. As the actual remaining whites upon the war's true conclusion, they would emerge from underground to rule the now-satisfied blacks, who, as the vision went, would be incapable of running the world; Manson "would scratch [the black man's] fuzzy head and kick him in the butt and tell him to go pick the cotton and go be a good nigger." Laid out by Manson repeatedly, this scenario became such a part of the Family members’ communal belief that they stocked up supplies and searched for the hole in the ground before the crimes were envisioned; but by mid-1969, Manson was heard to say blacks did not know how to start the events. He would have to show them.
# FBI agent John Douglas, who spent significant time interviewing Manson during his tenure as a special agent, submitted the theory that Manson really was innocent of plotting the initial set of murders in a series of books chronicling his life as an FBI agent. Douglas believes that initially, Manson's sole goal in leading "The Family" was to live out the rest of his days as an isolated demi-god ruling over a group of impressionable young people who would do his every bidding. In order to ensure that they remained loyal to him, Manson convinced them that he really was a deistic figure who would protect them during the coming Armageddon and rule over them in a peaceful society afterwards. Douglas' theory goes on to state that Manson's followers took his prophesying more literally than intended and carried out the Sharon Tate murders in order to spark Armageddon. According to Douglas, once Manson learned about the Tate murders, he felt he had no choice but to act as if he were still in control and go along with the LaBianca killings in order to protect his image and prevent his followers from turning on him.


In the trial, the prosecutor, [[Vincent Bugliosi]], placed the fifth as the main motive. [http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument27.html] Evidence included testimony that, on the night of the LaBianca murders, Manson considered discarding on the street a wallet he apparently obtained in the LaBianca house; he "wanted a black person to pick it up and use the credit cards so that the people, [[the establishment]] would think it was some sort of an organized group that killed these people." [http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument21.html]
Before the end of December, while back at Spahn, Manson and [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Tex Watson]] visited a Topanga Canyon acquaintance who played for them [[The Beatles]]' [[The Beatles (album)|''White Album'']], then recently released.<ref>In an interview, [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Tex Watson]] has indicated he and Manson first heard the album on December 1, 1968;[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/mrhmso/mrhmso-002.php] but this does not appear to match recollections in his autobiography, in which, among other things, he seems to indicate he and Manson first heard the album on a Saturday (which December 1 was not).[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-009.php] In an autobiography of his own, the late [[Paul Watkins (Manson Family)|Paul Watkins]], another Family member, seemed to think Manson first heard the album near December’s end. (Watkins, Ch. 12)</ref> Although Manson was twenty-nine years old and imprisoned when [[The Beatles]] first came to America in 1964, he had been all but obsessed with the group. At [[McNeil Island|McNeil]], he had told fellow inmates, including [[Alvin Karpis]], that he could surpass the group in fame;<ref>Bugliosi, 145.</ref><ref>Sanders, 11.</ref> to the Family, he spoke of the group as "the soul" and "part of 'the hole in the infinite.'"<ref> Watkins, Ch. 12</ref>


==Investigation and trial==
Manson had also been telling Family members that racial tension between blacks and whites was growing, and that blacks would soon rise up in rebellion in America's cities.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-011.php Watson, Ch. 11]</ref><ref>[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonbeatles.html The Influence of the Beatles on Charles Manson] UMKC Law. Retrieved [[7 April]] [[2006]].</ref> He had emphasized [[Martin Luther King, Jr.]]'s assassination, which had taken place in April 1968.<ref>Watkins, Ch. 10</ref>
The two cases were not well investigated by police, principally due to rivalries between the Tate team (older) and the La Bianca team (younger): the Tate team were not open to suggestions that the two cases were connected. As a result of this, Bugliosi himself played a significant and active role in gathering the evidence needed to convict.


Ronald Hughes, a young lawyer with an extensive knowledge of [[1960s counterculture]] but no trial experience, was the final state-appointed attorney for defendants Manson and Van Houten (several other attorneys were appointed and then dismissed during the trial). He suggested to Manson that he should obtain a different attorney for himself, [[Irving Kanarek]], and continued to defend Van Houten, apparently feeling that he could defend Van Houten more effectively. He hoped to show that Van Houten was acting under the influence of Manson, and to portray Manson as controlling her actions. This may have cost Hughes his life. In late November [[1970]], Hughes went camping near Sespe Hot Springs. He disappeared, and his decomposed body was discovered four months later. It is thought that other members of the Family killed him in reprisal for impugning Manson in court. One member of the Family described this as "the first of the retaliation killings".
On a bitter cold New Year's Eve at Myers Ranch, the Family members, gathered outside around a large, almost-tribal fire, listened as Manson explained that the social turmoil he had been predicting had also been predicted by [[The Beatles]].<ref>Watkins, Ch. 12</ref> [[The Beatles (album)|''White Album'']] songs, he declared, told it all, although in code; in fact, the album was directed at the Family itself, an elect group that was being instructed to preserve the worthy from the impending disaster.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-011.php Watson, Ch. 11]</ref><ref>[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonbeatles.html The Influence of the Beatles on Charles Manson] UMKC Law. Retrieved [[7 April]] [[2006]].</ref>


During the trial, Manson and his followers courted media attention. Manson appeared at the trial with an "X" he had carved into his forehead with a knife. This was copied by his followers the next day. The pattern was modified several times and copied by his followers each time. Eventually the pattern was turned into a [[swastika]] and is now a permanent scar. At one point during the trial, Manson shaved his head, his followers again mimicking. The defendants, acting in concert with each other, deliberately disrupted the proceedings to the point where Judge [[Charles Older]] had them removed from the courtroom on several occasions. A monitor system was rigged up in the lockup so that the defendants could follow the proceedings. On several occasions, Manson verbally threatened both the judge and prosecutor Bugliosi in court, and at one point attempted to physically attack the judge. The defendants eventually became so disruptive that Judge Older banned them from the courtroom altogether.
In early January 1969, the Family escaped Death Valley's cold by establishing yet another base, at a canary-yellow home in [[Canoga Park]], not far from Spahn. Because this locale would allow the Family to remain "submerged beneath the awareness of the outside world," Manson called it the [[Yellow Submarine (song)|Yellow Submarine]], another Beatles reference. There, they prepared for the impending apocalypse, which, around the campfire, Manson had termed Helter Skelter, after the [[The Beatles (album)|White Album]] [[Helter Skelter (song)|song]] of that name.


Manson's followers tried to dissuade an estranged follower, Barbara Hoyt, from testifying against Manson at the trial by giving her a free trip to Hawaii - and a hamburger laced with LSD once she arrived there (the conspirators were under the mistaken belief that an LSD overdose was fatal). Hoyt was found in a drugged semi-stupor on a street near a Honolulu beach, hospitalized, and identified herself as a witness in the Tate-LaBianca trial once she recovered from her LSD trip. The involuntary overdose ultimately made Hoyt an even stronger witness for the prosecution, and she testified about Family discussions about the murders.
By February, Manson's vision was complete. The Family would create an album whose songs, as subtle as those of [[The Beatles]], would trigger the predicted chaos. Ghastly murders of whites by blacks would be met with retaliation; a split between racist and non-racist whites would yield whites' self-annihilation. Blacks' triumph, as it were, would merely precede their being ruled by the Family, which would ride out the conflict in "the bottomless pit," a secret city beneath Death Valley.<ref> [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansontestimony-w.html Testimony of Paul Watkins in the Charles Manson Trial] UMKC Law. Retrieved [[7 April]] [[2007]].</ref>


Although Manson himself was not present at the Tate/La Bianca killings, he was convicted on seven counts of murder and one count of conspiracy to commit murder on [[January 25]], [[1971]], for ordering and directing them, and on [[March 29]], [[1971]] was sentenced to death. Atkins and Krenwinkel were convicted on the same counts, as was Watson (who was tried separately from the others due to extradition problems), and Van Houten was convicted of two counts of murder and one count of conspiracy. Some members of Manson's "Family" have claimed that the killers tried to implicate Manson in order to appear less guilty themselves. The death sentence was automatically commuted to life in prison after the [[California Supreme Court]]'s ''[[People v. Anderson]]'' decision resulted in the invalidation of all [[Capital punishment in the United States|death sentences]] imposed in California prior to 1972. The killers, giggling in court, were asked if they felt remorse, and gave answers that indicated they did not.
At the [[Canoga Park]] house, while Family members worked on vehicles and pored over maps to prepare for their desert escape, they also worked on songs for their world-changing album to be. When, as they understood it, [[Terry Melcher]] was to come to the house to hear the songs, the girls prepared a meal and cleaned the place. Melcher never arrived.


==Aftermath==
===Encounter with Tate===
On [[March 23]] [[1969]],<ref>Bugliosi, 228.</ref> Manson entered uninvited upon [[10050 Cielo Drive]], which he had known as the residence of [[Terry Melcher]].<ref>Bugliosi, 156-7.</ref> By that date, Melcher was no longer residing there; since that February,<ref>Bugliosi, 28.</ref> the tenants had been actress [[Sharon Tate]] and her husband, director [[Roman Polanski]].


On [[March 6]], [[1970]], Manson released an album titled ''[[Lie: The Love & Terror Cult]]'' to help finance his defense. The album was put out by [[ESP-Disk|ESP]] Records and included the song that had previously been recorded by the Beach Boys.
Manson was addressed by Shahrokh Hatami, a professional photographer who was a friend of Tate and was there to photograph her in advance of her departure for Rome the next day. Having seen Manson through a window as Manson approached the main house, Hatami had gone onto the front porch to ask him what he wanted.<ref>Bugliosi, 229-30.</ref>


The Family survived the incarceration of Manson. After his arrest, [[Lynette Fromme|Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme]], one of Manson's shrewdest, toughest and most obedient followers, effectively took command of the management of the Family in his absence. With a handful of other followers, mostly women, she perched on the steps of the Los Angeles courthouse during the trial, shaved her head to protest his conviction and, copying Manson, gouged an X into her forehead as a sign of loyalty. She later explained: "We have X'ed ourselves out of this world." In 1970 the Charles Manson family recorded an album titled ''[[The Family Jams]]'' of songs written by Manson, although he didn't appear on the album.
When Manson told Hatami he was looking for someone whose name Hatami didn't recognize -- maybe Melcher -- Hatami informed him the place was the Polanski residence; he advised him to try "the back alley," by which he meant the path to the guest house, beyond the main house.<ref>Bugliosi, 230.</ref>


On [[November 13]], [[1972]], Michael Monfort, James Craig, Priscilla Cooper, Nancy Laura Pitman and Lynnette Alice "Squeaky" Fromme were held for the murder of James T. Willett and his wife.
By this time, Hatami, concerned that a stranger had entered upon the property, was down on the front walk, to confront Manson. When Tate appeared behind Hatami, in the house's front door, and asked "Who is it?", he told her a man was looking for someone. Hatami and Tate maintained their positions while Manson, without a word, went back to the guest house, returned a minute or two later, and left.<ref>Bugliosi, 230.</ref>


By 1974, the original Manson "family" had dwindled to only Fromme and Sandra Good. Motivated by Manson's new ideology, they sent a series of threatening letters to heads of corporations, making threats unless they stopped polluting the environment.
That evening, Manson reentered the property and again went back to the guest house, where, presuming to enter the enclosed porch, he spoke with Rudi Altobelli, who was just coming out of the shower. Altobelli, owner of the property, was the lessor to Melcher and then to the Polanskis.<ref>Bugliosi, 228, 231.</ref>


On [[September 5]], [[1975]], Fromme unsuccessfully attempted to assassinate US President [[Gerald Ford]] in [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] [http://www.charliemanson.com/news-archive/news-1975-09-15.htm]. It appears that, although she managed to get close to Ford, by mistake the chamber of her Colt .45 pistol was empty. She was heard to say, "It didn't go off. Can you believe it? It didn't go off!" She stated she had committed the crime so that Manson would appear as a witness at her trial, and thus have a worldwide platform from which to talk about his apocalyptic vision. She escaped prison in December [[1987]], apparently to try to reach Manson, but was recaptured two days later.
Possibly, Manson was aware of Melcher's departure from the place and had actually come in search of Altobelli;<ref>Bugliosi, 226, 377.</ref> but he asked Altobelli for Melcher. Altobelli said Melcher had moved to Malibu; he said, falsely, that he did not know the address. In response to a question from Manson, Altobelli said he himself was in the entertainment business, although he was sure Manson already knew that. Altobelli had met Manson the previous year at Dennis Wilson's home, where Wilson had been playing some Manson musical recordings on which Altobelli had then complimented Manson lukewarmly.<ref>Bugliosi, 228.</ref>


Manson gave two notable interviews in the 1980s: the first on [[June 13]], [[1981]] at [[California Medical Facility]] by [[Tom Snyder]] for NBC's ''[[The Tomorrow Show]]'', and the second at [[San Quentin Prison]] by [[Charlie Rose]] for ''CBS News Nightwatch'' (aired [[March 7]], [[1986]]). Rose's interview won the national news [[Emmy Award]] for "Best Interview" in 1987. [http://www.nathanslunch.com/diary_aprilmay_2005.htm]
When Altobelli informed Manson he was going out of the country the next day, Manson said he'd like to speak with him upon his return; Altobelli lied that he would be gone for more than a year. In response to a direct question from Altobelli, Manson explained that he had been directed to the guest house by the persons in the main house; Altobelli expressed the wish that Manson not disturb his tenants.<ref>Bugliosi, 228.</ref>


Manson is currently incarcerated in California's [[Corcoran State Prison]]. His CDC inmate number is B33920. All of his applications for [[parole]] have been denied, most notably in 1986 when he appeared before the parole board with a [[swastika]] evident on his forehead. He is known for his theatrics when given the opportunity to appear in the media, and in one taped parole hearing said he wanted to go to the moon. He has been overheard in conversations with at least one of his former "Family" members saying that it doesn't matter what he says or does because he knows he will be kept in prison for the rest of his life, implying that at least some of his fanatical behavior is deliberate. During his imprisonment, Manson has received more mail than any other prisoner in the United States prison system. It is said that he gets over 50,000 pieces of mail a year&ndash;a combination of fan mail, hate mail, and mail from curiosity-seekers.
Manson left. As Altobelli flew with Tate to Rome the next day, Tate asked him whether "that creepy-looking guy" had gone back to the guest house the day before.<ref>Bugliosi, 229.</ref>


In January 2000, Manson was publishing messages on a now-defunct website run by Manson followers St. George and Sandra Good.
==The crimes==
===Hinman murder===
At Spahn Ranch, in June, Manson told a male Family member Helter Skelter was "ready to happen." Remarking that "blackie never did anything without whitey showin' him how," he said, "[I]t looks like we're gonna have to show blackie how to do it."<ref>Watkins, Ch. 15</ref>


:''News cuttings and other material related to the Manson family and the activities of its members from 1969 - 2005 available from [http://www.charliemanson.com/news-archive/index.htm charliemanson.com].''
On July 27, the murders that would be notorious were heralded, so to say, when Family member [[Bobby Beausoleil]] stabbed to death Family acquaintance Gary Hinman in a dispute over money. Before Beausoleil killed him on Manson's instruction, Hinman had been held by Beausoleil, [[Mary Brunner]], and [[Susan Atkins]] at his Topanga Canyon residence for two days, during which Manson showed up with a sword, to slash his ear. Before leaving the house, Beausoleil wrote "Political piggy" on the wall, in Hinman's blood.<ref>Bugliosi, 33, 102-3.</ref>


==Parole hearings==
On August 6, Beausoleil was arrested after he was caught driving Hinman's car, whose tire well held the murder weapon.<ref>Bugliosi, 33.</ref> On August 8, Manson told Family members at Spahn Ranch, "Now is the time for Helter Skelter."<ref>[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument4.html Prosecution's closing argument]</ref><ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-013.php Watson, Ch. 13] Retrieved [[28 April]] [[2007]].</ref>
Manson was entitled to a parole hearing in 2002, and was denied early release, in particular due to a "litany" of offenses ranging from [[drug trafficking]] to [[arson]] to assaulting guards. He is next eligible for parole in 2007.


Fromme, eligible for parole since 1985 following the 1975 incident, has consistently waived her right to a hearing.
===Tate murders===
On the night of [[August 8]], [[1969]], Manson directed [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Tex Watson]] to take Family members [[Susan Atkins|Atkins]], [[Linda Kasabian]], and [[Patricia Krenwinkel]] (one of the hitchhikers picked up by Dennis Wilson)<ref>Bugliosi, 250.</ref> to "that house where Melcher used to live" and "totally destroy everyone in [it], as gruesome as you can."<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-014.php Watson, Ch. 14]</ref><ref>Bugliosi, 465.</ref> He told the girls to do as Tex would instruct them.<ref>Bugliosi, 176, 259.</ref>


==Covers and tributes==
When the four arrived at the entrance to the [[10050 Cielo Drive|Cielo Drive]] property, Watson, who'd been to the house, on Family business,<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-009.php Watson, Ch. 9]</ref> climbed a telephone pole near the gate and cut the phone line. It was now around midnight and into [[August 9]].
* The band [[Alkaline Trio]], released a song on their album ''[[Crimson (album)|Crimson]]'' called "Sadie" about [[Susan Atkins]], a murderer in the Charles Manson family who took part in the [[Sharon Tate]] murders in 1969.
* In 1976, [[Throbbing Gristle]] made a film entitled "After Cease To Exist", inspired by a Manson song title
* In 1982, Boston hardcore punk band [[Negative FX]] featured a picture of Charles Manson, with their logo digitally "carved" into his head, on their self-titled LP. It also featured pictures of Manson family members on the back.
* Since 2003, a Orange county NY based Noise-punk band known as "Sparrows with Machine-guns" has done a cover of "Home is where your happy" at live gigs only. They plan to record the cover for a 2007 full lenght album.
* Sonic Youth, in cooperation with director [[Richard Kern]], produced a video clip for their song "Death Valley '69," in which some of the band members acted out gory scenes reminiscent of the Tate/LaBianca murders.
* Neo-psychedlica band [[The Brian Jonestown Massacre]] references the life of Manson in their songs "Arkansas Revisited" and "The Ballad of Jim Jones".
* UK underground electronic music pioneers, [[Cabaret Voltaire (band)|Cabaret Voltaire]], used Manson's voice from various radio interviews, which they used in their tracks "Hell's Home", "Kickback" and "Golden Halos" featured on their album "The Covenant, The Sword And The Arm Of The Lord" released in 1985.
* [[System of a Down]] wrote the song "ATWA" on their ''[[Toxicity (album)|Toxicity]]'' album about the media's viewpoints on Manson. (ATWA is an acronym used by Manson, meaning both "Air-Trees-Water-Animals" and "all the way alive.").
* [[Ozzy Osbourne]] recorded "Bloodbath in Paradise" on his ''[[No Rest for the Wicked (Ozzy)|No Rest for the Wicked]]'' album about the California murders.
* The music video for "Gave Up" by [[Nine Inch Nails]] was shot entirely at 10050 Cielo Drive in the summer of 1993 while its lead singer, [[Trent Reznor]], leased the property in Benedict Canyon from Rudi Altobelli. The video shoot was done in the living room of the main house and also includes some exterior shots of the house and grounds. Also in the video is a young Marilyn Manson (who gave Trent Reznor the idea), who also shot a video at Cielo. While Reznor claimed to have no knowledge of the slaughter that took place at the house, he did dub the studio "Le Pig" and recorded the album ''[[The Downward Spiral]]'' there, on which two of the tracks were named "Piggy" and "March of the Pigs".
* In 1969, months prior to the Tate-LaBianca murders, The Beach Boys covered "Cease to Exist", retitling it "Never Learn Not to Love" and releasing it on the album ''20/20'' (with sole songwriting credit given to [[Dennis Wilson]]).
* [[John Moran]] and [[Iggy Pop]] collaborated on ''The Manson Family: An Opera'', which was produced by [[Philip Glass]].
* [[Crispin Glover]] performs a cover of "Always is Always Forever" on his album "The Big Problem"
* [[Devendra Banhart]] covers "Home Is Where You're Happy" as a part of a medley with [[Lauryn Hill]]'s [[Doo Wop (That Thing)]]. He performed it at [[Bonnaroo]] and the [[Pitchfork Music Festival]] in 2006.
* [[Guns N' Roses]] covered a Manson song on their album "[[The Spaghetti Incident?]]". The song does not apear on the track listings of the CD; it is a "secret song" that plays at the end of the last track. At the end of the song Axl thanks Manson, stating "thanks Chaz".
* [[Skinny Puppy]] have used samples of Manson speaking and singing [[The Beatles]]' "[[Helter Skelter]]" (as well as samples of the actual song) in their song, "Worlock," from 1989's [[Rabies (album)|Rabies]]. Samples of Manson speaking can also be heard on "Convulsion," from 1990's [[Too Dark Park]] Members of Skinny Puppy (as [[Download (band)|Download]]) also recorded a soundtrack for the [[Jim Van Bebber]] film [[The Manson Family (film)|Charlie's Family]] (a.k.a. [[The Manson Family (film)|The Manson Family]]).
* Hip Hop duo '[[Heltah Skeltah]]', a break off from The [[Boot Camp Clik]] - share the same name as the infamous 'Manson Family' murder signature.
* Cleveland, Ohio based alternative metal band [[Mushroomhead]] reference Manson in the song "Bwomp", off of their sophomore album "[[Superbuick]]". They say throughout the song "If it was up to me, I'd free Charles Manson".
* The British band [[Kasabian (band)|Kasabian]] takes its name from Linda Kasabian, getaway driver and member of the Manson Family.
* Argentine rock band [[Babasonicos]] have a song titled "Sharon Tate," after the actress murdered by Charles Manson and his followers.
* [[Neil Young]]'s 1974 album On the Beach included a song Young had written from Manson's point of view titled "Revolution Blues". Young had met Manson while living in Topanga Canyon.
* American skinhead band People Haters recorded a song "Charlie Manson´s eyes" for their 1995 released debut cd "A collection of hate".


==Pop culture references and parodies==
Backing their car down to the bottom of the hill that led up to the place, they parked it there and walked back up. Thinking the gate might be electrified or rigged with an alarm,<ref>Bugliosi, 177.</ref> they climbed a brushy embankment at its right and dropped onto the grounds. Just then, headlights came their way, from farther within the angled property. Telling the girls to lie in the bushes, Watson stepped out, shouted "Halt!," and shot to death [[Steven Parent]], eighteen-year-old driver of the approaching car.<ref>Bugliosi, 23.</ref> After Watson had prepared their entry to the main house by cutting the screen of an open window through which he could slip to let the others in through the door, he told Kasabian to wait down by the gate.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-014.php Watson, Ch. 14]</ref><ref>Bugliosi, 177, 260.</ref> He proceeded to get himself and the other two girls into the house.
* [[Marilyn Manson (person)|Marilyn Manson]] derived his stage name from the names of [[Marilyn Monroe]] and Charles Manson.
* [[horrorcore|Death Rap]] artist [[Necro]] utilizes the image and voice of Charles Manson quite frequently in his work. He is also known to reference the Tate-La Bianca murders on many of his songs. Most notably, the album ''[[The Pre-Fix For Death]]'' features an intro by Manson himself, whose presence is maintained throughout the whole of the album.
* The Tate-La Bianca Murders have been dramatized in movies several times, most notably in 1976's ''[[Helter Skelter (film)|Helter Skelter]]'', starring [[Steve Railsback]] as Manson, and its 2004 [[TV movie]] remake, which starred [[Jeremy Davies (actor)|Jeremy Davies]] as Manson, Bruno Kirby as Bugliosi, and [[Clea DuVall]] as Kasabian.
* Manson appeared as a cartoon character in a ''[[South Park]]'' episode, "[[Merry Christmas Charlie Manson!]]", in which Manson returns to jail willingly after seeing several Christmas specials.
* In the early nineties, The Ben Stiller Show filmed a mock episode of Lassie entitled "Manson," in which Charles Manson is portrayed as the family dog, and goes on to save Timmy from a snake bite down at the creek.
* American Death Metal Band [[Deicide (band)|Deicide]], wrote the song "Lunatic of God's Creation" about the Charles Manson Murders.
* Although the names were changed a movie about the Manson Murders was made called Live Freaky, Die Freaky. Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day played Charles Manson. Other punk rock icons were also parts in the movie as well.


==Discography==
"I’m the devil, and I’m here to do the devil’s business,"<ref>Bugliosi, 177.</ref> Watson told Polanski friend [[Wojciech Frykowski]],<ref>Bugliosi, 32.</ref> who was awakened from his sleep on the living-room couch as Watson whispered to Atkins. This was after he kicked him in the head. On Watson’s direction, Atkins found and, with Krenwinkel's help,<ref>Bugliosi, 178, 297.</ref> brought to the living room the house’s three other occupants – [[Sharon Tate|Tate]], eight-and-a-half months' pregnant;<ref>Bugliosi, 34, 313.</ref> her once-lover [[Jay Sebring]], a noted hairstylist;<ref>Bugliosi, 26-7, 30.</ref> and Frykowski’s lover [[Abigail Folger]], heiress to the [[Folgers Coffee|Folger coffee fortune]].<ref>Bugliosi, 31.</ref> As Watson began to tie the necks of Tate and Sebring together with rope he'd brought and slung up over a beam, Sebring’s act of chivalry, his second, in protesting rough treatment of Tate won him a bullet from Watson. After Folger was taken momentarily back to her bedroom for her purse, which proved to hold about seventy dollars, Watson stabbed the groaning Sebring seven times.<ref>Bugliosi, 31.</ref>
===Albums===
*''[[Lie: The Love & Terror Cult]]'' (LP, Performance, 1970. Reissued on LP/CD/MC on various labels). Recorded in 1968.
*''White Rasta'' (MC). Contains the same tracks as ''Live At San Quentin'', in a different order.
*''Poor Old Prisoner Boy : The 55th Anniversary Album'' (LP, Remote Control Records). Contains 55 minutes of jail recordings. Edition of 555 copies.
*''Son Of Man'' (LP, 1992). The A side contains jail recordings, while the B side is etched with a reproduction of a drawing of faces done by Manson. Also includes liner notes of poetry attributed to Manson.
*''Live At San Quentin'' (CD, Grey Matter, 1993). Songs and improvisations recorded in jail in 1983. Cover art apes The Beach Boys' ''Pet Sounds'' album.
*''Charles Manson'' (CD, Grey Matter, 1993). A combination of ''Lie'' and ''The Manson Family Sings'', packaged to look like The Beatles' ''White Album''.
*''Commemoration'' (CD, White Devil Records, 1994). Released to commemorate Manson's 60th birthday and "sixty years of struggle against cowardice, stupidity and lies".
*''Manson Speaks'' (2CD, White Devil Records, 1995). Contains one disc of recitals by Manson of poetry and the Bible and one disc of Manson's opinions of actual events at the time of the release.
*''The Way Of The Wolf'' (CD, Pale Horse, 1998). Music and some bonus conversation recorded in jail in the 1980's.
*''Unplugged 9.11.67 Volume 1'' (CD, Archer C.A.T. Productions Inc.). Recordings done by Manson in 1967 as well as spoken words between Manson and some people at the recording session.
*''A Taste of Freedom'' (CD-R, 2000(?)). Contains telephone conversations with Charles Manson recorded in late 1999 and early 2000. Very limited edition.
*''All The Way Alive'' (CD, People's Temple Records, 2003). Previously unreleased studio recordings from 1967. Edition of 1000 copies.
*''One Mind'' (CD, FamilyJams.com, 2005). New recordings of songs, guitar, impromptu poetry and words.
*''Sings'' (CD, ESP Disk, 2006). Digitally remastered combination of ''Lie'' and 12 of the 13 tracks on ''All The Way Alive''.


===Singles===
Frykowski, whose hands had been bound with a towel, got free and began struggling with Atkins, who had been guarding him. As he fought his way toward and out the front door, onto the porch, Watson, who joined in against him, struck him over the head with the gun multiple times, stabbed him repeatedly, and shot him twice. Around this time, Kasabian, drawn up from the driveway by the victims’ screams, arrived outside the door and, in a vain effort to halt the goings-on, lied to Atkins that someone was coming.
*"I'm On Fire" (a.k.a. "My Feelings Begin To Growing") / "The Hallways of Always" (7", White Devil Records). Tracks taken from ''Live At San Quentin'' and ''Commemoration'' respectively.
*"Look At Your Game, Girl" / "Your Home Is Where You're Happy" (7", White Devil Records)


===Recordings by the Family not featuring Charles Manson===
Inside the house, Folger had got away from Krenwinkel and fled out a bedroom door to the pool area.<ref>Bugliosi, 273, 344.</ref> Pursued to the front lawn by Krenwinkel, who stabbed and, finally, tackled her, she was finished off by Watson’s knife, her stab wounds totaling twenty-eight.<ref>Bugliosi, 32.</ref> As Frykowski struggled across the lawn, he, too, was dispatched with Watson’s stabs, which, added to ones he’d received from Watson and Atkins earlier, brought his stab wounds to fifty-one.<ref>Bugliosi, 32.</ref> Back in the house, Tate, who pleaded for her own life and that of the child she was carrying, was stabbed to death by Atkins, Watson, or both, her wounds totaling sixteen.<ref>Bugliosi, 29.</ref>
*''The Manson Family Sings The Songs Of Charles Manson'' (LP). 1970 recordings of Manson's songs performed by Steve Grogan as lead singer, along with Red, Blue, Gypsy, Brenda, Ouisch and Capistrano.
*''The Family Jams'' (2CD, Transparency 0011). The first disc is called ''The Family Jams'' and contains all the music on ''Manson Family Sings The Songs Of Charles Manson'', while the second disc entitled ''Family Jams Too'' features previously unreleased recordings also dating from 1970.


==References and further reading==
As the four Family members had been heading out from Spahn Ranch, Manson had told the girls to "leave a sign… something witchy." Using the towel that had bound Frykowski’s hands, Atkins wrote "pig" on the house’s front door, in Tate's blood.

As they rode home, the killers changed out of bloody clothes, which, along with their weapons, they ditched in the hills.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-014.php Watson, Ch. 14]</ref><ref>Bugliosi, 84-6, 95-6, 177-81, 261-3.</ref>

===LaBianca murders===
The next night, six Family members, including the four from night one, rode out at Manson’s instruction. Displeased by the panic of the victims at Cielo Drive, Manson accompanied the six, "to show [them] how to do it."

After a few hours’ ride, in which he considered a number of murders and even attempted one of them, Manson gave Kasabian directions that brought the group to 3301 Waverly Drive, home of supermarket executive [[Leno LaBianca]] and his wife, Rosemary, dress shop co-owner.<ref>Bugliosi, 24-5, 44.</ref> Located in the [[Los Feliz]] section of Los Angeles, this was next door to a house at which Manson and Family members had attended a party the previous year.<ref>Bugliosi, 182, 207</ref>

After going up the driveway and looking in a window, Manson took Watson with him through the unlocked back door. Rousing the sleeping Leno LaBianca from the couch at gunpoint, Manson had Watson bind his hands with a leather thong. After Rosemary was brought briefly into the living room from the bedroom, Watson followed Manson’s instructions to cover the couple’s heads with pillowcases, which he bound in place with lamp cord. Manson left, sending Krenwinkel and [[Leslie Van Houten]] into the house with instruction that the couple be killed.

Before leaving Spahn, Watson had complained to Manson of the inadequacy of the previous night's weapons;<ref>Bugliosi, 266.</ref> now, sending the girls from the kitchen to the bedroom, to which Rosemary had been returned, he went to the living room and began stabbing Leno with a chrome-plated bayonet, the first thrust going into the man's throat. Sound of a scuffle in the bedroom drew him there to discover Rosemary was keeping the girls at bay by swinging the lamp tied to her head. Striking her down with several stabs of the bayonet, he returned to the living room and gave Leno the balance of a dozen stabs, after administering the last of which he carved “War” in the man’s exposed stomach. Returning to the bedroom, where Krenwinkel was stabbing Rosemary with a knife from the LaBianca kitchen, Watson, following Manson’s instruction to make sure each of the girls played a part, told Van Houten to stab her, too. She did, on the exposed buttocks and elsewhere, possibly post-mortem,<ref>Bugliosi, 206, 297, 341-42, 380, 404, 406-7, 433</ref> to bring the total number of stab wounds to forty-one.

While Watson cleaned off the bayonet and showered, Krenwinkel wrote "Rise" and "Death to pigs" on the walls; she wrote "Healter [sic] Skelter" on the refrigerator door. All the script was in blood. Krenwinkel gave the vanquished Leno fourteen puncture wounds with an ivory-handled, two-tined carving fork, which she left jutting out of his stomach; she planted a steak knife in his throat.<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-015.php Watson, Ch. 15]</ref><ref>Bugliosi, 39, 43-5, 182-84, 266-69, 283</ref>

Hoping for a double crime, Manson had gone on to direct Kasabian to drive to the Venice home of an actor acquaintance of hers, another "piggy." Depositing the second trio of Family members at the man's apartment building, he drove back to Spahn, leaving them and the LaBianca killers to hitchhike home.<ref>Bugliosi, 183, 267, 269-70</ref> Kasabian thwarted this murder by deliberately knocking on the wrong apartment door and waking a stranger. Though the murder plan was abandoned, [[Susan Atkins]] preserved the effort from total loss by defecating in the stairwell.<ref>Bugliosi, 270-71</ref>

==Investigation and arrest==
On [[August 10]] – while the Tate autopsies were under way and the LaBianca bodies were yet to be discovered – detectives of the [[Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department|sheriff's office]], which had jurisdiction in the Hinman case, informed [[LAPD]] detectives assigned to the Tate case of the bloody writing at the Hinman house; they even mentioned that the Hinman suspect, Beausoleil, was associated with a group of [[hippies]] led by “a guy named Charlie.” The Tate team, thinking the Tate murders a consequence of a drug transaction, ignored the information.<ref>Bugliosi, 33.</ref>

[[Steven Parent|Parent]], the shooting victim in the Tate driveway, was determined to have been an acquaintance of [[William Garretson]], a youngster hired by Rudi Altobelli to take care of the property while Altobelli himself was away;<ref>Bugliosi, 34.</ref> at the time of the killers' arrival, he had been leaving Cielo Drive, after a visit to Garretson.<ref>Bugliosi, 22, 35.</ref> Held briefly as a Tate [[suspect]], Garretson, who lived in the guest house and told police he had neither seen nor heard anything on the murder night, was released on August 11.<ref>Bugliosi, 10, 35, 42.</ref>

On [[August 12]], LAPD told the press it had ruled out any connection between the Tate and LaBianca homicides.<ref>Bugliosi, 48.</ref> On August 16, the sheriff’s office raided Spahn Ranch and arrested Manson and twenty-five others, “suspects in a major auto theft ring” that had been stealing Volkswagens and converting them into dune buggies. Weapons were seized; but because the warrant had been misdated, the group was released a few days later.<ref>Bugliosi, 56.</ref>

By the end of August, when virtually all leads had gone nowhere, a report by the LaBianca detectives, generally younger than the Tate team, noted a possible connection between the bloody writings at the LaBianca house and “the singing group the Beatles’ most recent album.” <ref>Bugliosi, 65.</ref>

In mid-October, the LaBianca team, still working separately from the Tate team, checked with the sheriff’s office about possible similar crimes and learned, at last, of the Hinman case. They also learned that the Hinman detectives had now spoken with Beausoleil’s girlfriend, who had been arrested a few days earlier, with members of “the Manson Family.”<ref>Bugliosi, 75-6.</ref>

The arrests had taken place at the desert ranches, to which the Family had moved and where, unknown to authorities, its members had been in the midst of a search for a hole in the ground, access to the Bottomless Pit.<ref>Bugliosi, 233.</ref><ref> Watkins, Ch. 21</ref> Known to authorities was that someone had set fire to a piece of earthmoving equipment in the area.<ref>Bugliosi, 125.</ref><ref>Watkins, Ch. 22</ref> Raiding the Myers and Barker ranches, authorities had found stolen dune buggies and other vehicles and had arrested two dozen persons, including Manson. Manson was found hiding beneath a bathroom sink at Barker.<ref>Bugliosi, 75, 126-7.</ref>

A month after speaking with Beausoleil's girlfriend themselves, the LaBianca detectives made contact with members of a motorcycle gang she told them Manson had tried to enlist as his bodyguard while the Family was at Spahn.<ref>Bugliosi, 77.</ref> While the gang members were providing information that was suggesting a link between Manson and the murders,<ref>Bugliosi, 88-94, 100-113.</ref> a dormitory mate of [[Susan Atkins]] succeeded in informing LAPD of the Family’s involvement in the crimes.<ref>Bugliosi, 99 & 106.</ref> One of those arrested at Barker, Atkins had been booked for the Hinman murder after she’d confirmed to the sheriff’s detectives that she’d been involved in it, as Beausoleil’s girlfriend had told them.<ref>Bugliosi, 76.</ref> Transferred to a detention center in Los Angeles, she had begun talking to two women with whom she bunked.<ref>Bugliosi, 82-3, 94-6.</ref>

On [[December 1]] [[1969]], having acted on the information from these sources, LAPD announced warrants for the arrest of Watson, Krenwinkel, and Kasabian in the Tate case; the suspects' involvement in the LaBianca murders was noted. Manson and Atkins, already in custody, were not mentioned; the connection between the LaBianca case and Van Houten, who was also among those arrested near Death Valley, had not yet been recognized.<ref>Bugliosi, 159, 126, 171, 182-3.</ref>

Watson and Krenwinkel, too, were already under arrest, authorities in Texas and Alabama having picked them up on notice from LAPD.<ref>Bugliosi, 156, 158-9</ref> On December 2, in New Hampshire, Kasabian turned herself in.<ref>Bugliosi, 161.</ref>

==Conviction and sentencing==
At the trial, which began [[June 15]] [[1970]],<ref>Bugliosi, 300.</ref> the prosecution's main witness was Kasabian, who, along with Manson, Atkins, and Krenwinkel, had been charged with seven counts of murder and one of conspiracy.<ref>Bugliosi, 188.</ref> Not having participated in the killings, she was granted immunity in exchange for testimony that detailed the nights of crime.<ref>Bugliosi, 219, 252-3, 318, 330, 332.</ref>

The prosecution placed the triggering of Helter Skelter as the main motive.<ref>[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument27.html Prosecution's closing argument]</ref> The crime scenes' bloody ''[[White Album]]'' references -- ''pig'', ''rise'', ''helter skelter'' -- were correlated with testimony about Manson predictions that the murders blacks would commit at the outset of Helter Skelter would involve the writing of “pigs” on walls in victims’ blood.<ref>Bugliosi, 245, 451.</ref> Testimony as to Manson's having declared "now is the time for Helter Skelter" was supplemented with Kasabian’s testimony that, on the night of the LaBianca murders, Manson considered discarding on the street a wallet (Rosemary's) he obtained in the LaBianca house;<ref>Bugliosi, 269.</ref> he "wanted a black person to pick it up and use the credit cards so that the people, [[the establishment]] would think it was some sort of an organized group that killed these people." “I want to show blackie how to do it,” Manson had said as the Family members had driven along after the departure from the LaBianca house.<ref>[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument20.html Prosecution's closing argument]</ref>

On [[January 25]] [[1971]], guilty verdicts were returned against the defendants on all counts. This included the three counts against Van Houten, who had been charged with the two LaBianca murders and conspiracy to commit them.<ref>Bugliosi, 411-13.</ref>

In the body of the trial, the defendants had shocked the courtroom by resting without calling a single witness; the lawyers for the women had been unwilling to let Manson engineer a defense in which their clients would testify, to take all guilt upon themselves.<ref>Bugliosi, 383 & 387.</ref> In the penalty phase, the jurors got a glimpse of the defense Manson had had in mind. Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten testified that the murders had been conceived as “copycat” versions of the Hinman murder, for which Atkins now took credit. The murders, they explained, had been intended to draw police suspicion away from the imprisoned Bobby Beausoleil, by resembling the crime with which he had been charged. This masterly plan had been conceived by, and carried out under the guidance of, not Manson but someone in love with Beausoleil – none other than Linda Kasabian (i.e. the person who had testified against Manson and them).<ref>Bugliosi, 424-33.</ref>

The narrative had weak points, not the least conspicuous of which was Atkins's inability to explain why, as she was maintaining, she had written "political piggy" at the Hinman house in the first place.<ref>Bugliosi, 431, 450-51.</ref> At any rate, the account captured the imagination of the jurors less effectively than Helter Skelter had affected the members of the Family; on March 29, 1971, all four defendants received verdicts of death.<ref>Bugliosi, 455.</ref>

In between the body of the trial and the closing arguments, Ronald Hughes, who had been representing Leslie van Houten, had disappeared, unreturned from a weekend trip. He had been one of the attorneys who had stood up to Manson and refused to let his client testify; on the day the verdicts of death were returned, his badly-decomposed body was found wedged between two boulders in [[Ventura County]].<ref>Bugliosi, 387, 393-95, 457.</ref>

==Aftermath==
Protracted [[extradition]] of [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Tex Watson]] from his native Texas,<ref>Bugliosi, 204-5, 356.</ref><ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-018.php Watson, Ch. 18]</ref> where he resettled a month before his arrest,<ref>[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-016.php Watson, Ch. 16]</ref> resulted in his being tried separately. The trial commenced in August 1971; by October, he, too, had been found guilty on seven counts of murder and one of conspiracy. He, too, was sentenced to death.<ref>Bugliosi, 463, 465-6.</ref>

In February 1972, the five convicts' [[Capital punishment in the United States|death sentences]] were automatically reduced to life in prison by ''[[California v. Anderson]]'' [[Case citation|64 Cal.2d 633]], 414 P.2d 366, ([[Supreme Court of California|Cal.]] 1972), in which the [[California Supreme Court|Supreme Court of California]] abolished the death penalty in that state.<ref>Bugliosi, 488.</ref>

In a trial whose guilt phase appears to have extended from August to November 1971,<ref> [http://www.charliemanson.com/news-headlines.htm List of news headlines related to Charles Manson]CharlieManson.com. Retrieved June 10, 2007.</ref> Manson was found guilty of the murders of Gary Hinman and Spahn Ranch horse wrangler or stuntman Donald "Shorty" Shea, the latter having been killed approximately ten days after the August 16, 1969, sheriff's raid on the ranch. Manson participated in the Shea murder, of which, in separate trials, two Family members were also found guilty; he was sentenced to life imprisonment.<ref>Bugliosi, 106-7, 466, 488.</ref><ref>Sanders, 68, 472, 454, 475.</ref><ref> [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonparole.html Transcript of Charles Manson's 1992 parole hearing] University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law. Retrieved [[May 24]] [[2007]].</ref> (Manson had apparently been of the view that Shea was trying to get George Spahn to run the Family off the ranch. He was also annoyed the white Shea had married a black woman; and he seems, too, to have suspected Shea helped set up the August 16 raid. In addition, Shea possibly knew about the Tate-LaBianca killings.)<ref>Bugliosi, 107.</ref><ref>Sanders, 271-2.</ref>

Before the conclusion of Manson's trial for the Tate and LaBianca murders, a reporter for the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' tracked down Manson's mother, remarried and living in the [[Pacific Northwest]]. The once Kathleen Maddox indicated that, in childhood, her son had known no neglect; he had even been "pampered by all the women who surrounded him."<ref>Bugliosi, 419.</ref><ref> [http://www.internet.is/bret/manson-mother-interview.htm 1971 newspaper interview with Charles Manson's mother]mansonfamilytoday.info. Retrieved [[June 3]], [[2007]].</ref>

On [[September 5]] [[1975]], [[Lynette Fromme|Squeaky Fromme]] attempted to assassinate US President [[Gerald Ford]] in [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]], to which she and Manson follower [[Sandra Good]] had moved to be near Manson while he was incarcerated at [[Folsom State Prison]]. A subsequent search of the apartment shared by Fromme, Good, and a Family recruit turned up evidence that, coupled with later actions on the part of Good, resulted in Good's conviction for conspiring to send threatening communications through the United States mail and transmitting death threats by way of interstate commerce. (The threats that were involved were against corporate executives and US government officials and had to do with supposed environmental dereliction on their part.)<ref>Bugliosi, 502-4.</ref>

In his 1978 autobiography (as told to Ray Hoekstra), [[Charles "Tex" Watson|Charles Watson]] stated that he stabbed [[Sharon Tate]] and that [[Susan Atkins]] did not.<ref> [http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/wydfm/wydfm-014.php Watson, Ch. 14]</ref>

In the 1980s, Manson gave three notable interviews. The first, recorded at [[California Medical Facility]] and aired [[June 13]], [[1981]], was by [[Tom Snyder]] for NBC's ''[[The Tomorrow Show]]''; the second, recorded at [[San Quentin Prison]] and aired [[March 7]], [[1986]], was by [[Charlie Rose]] for ''CBS News Nightwatch''. Rose's interview won the national news [[Emmy Award]] for "Best Interview" in 1987.<ref>[http://www.nathanslunch.com/diary_aprilmay_2005.htm]</ref> The last, with [[Geraldo Rivera]] in 1988, was part of that journalist's sensationalist prime-time special on [[satanism]], and, though appealing to a large popular audience, did not garner the critical acclaim of the Rose piece.

In December 1987, [[Lynette Fromme|Fromme]], serving a life sentence for the assassination attempt, escaped briefly from [[Alderson Federal Prison Camp]]. She was trying to reach Manson, whom she had heard had cancer; she was apprehended within days.<ref>Bugliosi, 503, 509-10.</ref>

In a 1994 conversation with Manson prosecutor [[Vincent Bugliosi]], once-Manson-follower Catherine Share stated that her testimony in the penalty phase of Manson’s trial was a fabrication intended to save Manson from the [[gas chamber]] and was given on Manson’s explicit direction.<ref>Bugliosi, 511.</ref> Share’s testimony had introduced the copycat-motive story, which the testimony of the three female defendants echoed and according to which the Tate-LaBianca murders had been the idea of Linda Kasabian.<ref>Bugliosi, 424-5.</ref> In a 1997 segment of the [[tabloid]] television program ''[[Hard Copy]]'', Share seemed to indicate her testimony had been given under a Manson threat of physical harm.<ref> [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR-EqsE8lHc Catherine Share with Vincent Bugliosi, ''Hard Copy'', 1997] youtube.com. Retrieved [[May 30]] [[2007]].</ref>

In January 1996, a Manson web site whose status is difficult to determine was established by latter-day Manson follower George Stimson, who was helped by [[Sandra Good]]. The latter had been released from prison in 1985, after she had served two-thirds of her fifteen-year sentence for the death threats.<ref>Bugliosi, 504, 510.</ref><ref> [http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/1997/04/3182 "Manson's Family Affair Living in Cyberspace"]wired.com, [[April 16]] [[1997]]. Retrieved [[May 29]] [[2007]].</ref>

In a 1998-9 interview in ''Seconds'' magazine, [[Bobby Beausoleil]] rejected the view that Manson ordered him to kill Gary Hinman.<ref> [http://www.beausoleil.net/mminterview.html Interview with Bobby Beausoleil, ''Seconds'' Magazine, 1998-9.]Retrieved May 29, 2007.</ref> He stated Manson did come to Hinman's house and slash Hinman with a sword; in a 1981 interview with ''Oui'' magazine, he denied this. Beausoleil stated that when he read about the Tate murders in the newspaper, "I wasn't even sure at that point -- really, I had no idea who had done it until Manson's group were actually arrested for it. It had only crossed my mind and I had a premonition, perhaps. There was some little tickle in my mind that the killings might be connected with them...." In the ''Oui'' magazine interview, he had stated, "When [the Tate-LaBianca murders] happened, I knew who had done it. I was fairly certain."<ref> [http://www.charliemanson.com/beausoleil.htm 1981 ''Oui'' magazine interview with Bobby Beausoleil]CharlieManson.com. Retrieved [[May 29]] [[2007]].</ref>

In a program broadcast in July 1999 on ''[[E!]]'', [[William Garretson]], once the young caretaker at [[10050 Cielo Drive|Cielo Drive]], indicated he had, in fact, seen and heard a portion of the Tate murders from his location in the property’s guest house. This comported with the unofficial results of a [[polygraph]] examination that had been given to Garretson on August 10, 1969, and that had effectively eliminated him as a [[suspect]].<ref> [http://www.charliemanson.com/documents/garretson-polygraph.htm Transcript of William Garretson polygraph exam]CharlieManson.com. Retrieved June 10, 2007.</ref> The [[LAPD]] officer who conducted the examination had concluded Garretson was "clean" on participation in the crimes but "muddy" as to his having heard anything.<ref>Bugliosi, 34-37.</ref> The ''E!'' show included no direct statement from Garretson why he had withheld his knowledge of the events.<ref> [http://www.charliemanson.com/garretson-1999.htm Transcript and synopsis of William Garretson comments]"The Last Days of Sharon Tate," ''The E! True Hollywood Story''. CharlieManson.com. Retrieved June 10, 2007.</ref>

===Recordings by Charles Manson===
{{main|Recordings by Charles Manson}}
On [[March 6]] [[1970]], to help finance his defense, Manson released an album entitled ''[[Lie: The Love & Terror Cult]]''. Put out by [[ESP-Disk|ESP]] Records, it included [[Never Learn Not to Love|"Cease to Exist"]], which, as "[[Never Learn Not to Love]]", had been recorded by the [[Beach Boys]]. Several recordings by Manson have been released since.

In 1993, American hard rock band [[Guns N' Roses]] included Manson's song "Look at Your Game Girl" on their cover album [[The Spaghetti Incident?]]. Though Guns N' Roses' lead singer [[Axl Rose]] has said recently that he would remove the track, Manson's song remains on the album as of 2007.

===Charles Manson in popular culture===
{{main|Charles Manson in popular culture}}
As early as June 1970, when he appeared on the cover of ''[[Rolling Stone]]'' magazine,<ref> [http://www.rollingstone.com/photos/gallery/5392212/1970_rolling_stone_covers/photo/12/large/vanmorrison Manson on cover of ''Rolling Stone''] rollingstone.com. Retrieved May 2, 2007.</ref> Manson was connected to [[pop culture]], in which his presence is enduring.<ref>[http://www.metal-observer.com/articles.php?lid=1&sid=1&id=9790 The Metal Observer] Retrieved [[26 April]] [[2007]].</ref> The ''Rolling Stone'' story framed the vexed and similarly-enduring question of the Family's relationship to the [[1960s counterculture]] in which it emerged: "Is Manson a hippie or isn't he?"<ref> [http://www.charliemanson.com/rolling-stone-1.htm ''Rolling Stone'' story on Manson, June 1970] CharlieManson.com. Retrieved May 2, 2007.</ref>
<p>
American musician [[Marilyn Manson]] derived his stage name from Manson's name and [[Marilyn Monroe]]'s.

==Parole hearings==
At his last parole hearing, on May 23, 2007, he was denied parole until 2012 and did not attend the hearing.<ref> [http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-manson24may24,1,2790817.story?coll=la-headlines-pe-california "72-year-old Manson again denied parole..."] Associated Press report, May 24, 2007. latimes.com. Retrieved July 12, 2007.</ref>

==Further reading==
===Books===
===Books===
*''[[Helter Skelter (book)|Helter Skelter]]: The True Story of the Manson Murders'' by [[Vincent Bugliosi]] with [[Curt Gentry]] (Norton, 1974; Arrow books, 1992 edition, ISBN 0-09-997500-9; W. W. Norton & Company, 2001, ISBN 0-393-32223-8)
*''[[Helter Skelter (book)|Helter Skelter]]: The True Story of the Manson Murders'' by [[Vincent Bugliosi]] with [[Curt Gentry]] (Norton, 1974; Arrow books, 1992 edition, ISBN 0-09-997500-9; W. W. Norton & Company, 2001, ISBN 0-393-32223-8)
Line 241: Line 203:
*''[[Manson: The Unholy Trail of Charlie and the Family]]'' by [[John Gilmore]], (Amok Books, 2000, ISBN 1-878923-13-7)
*''[[Manson: The Unholy Trail of Charlie and the Family]]'' by [[John Gilmore]], (Amok Books, 2000, ISBN 1-878923-13-7)
*''[[5 to Die]]'' by Jerry LeBlanc & Ivor Davis, Holloway House Publishing, 1971, ISBN 0-87067-306-8
*''[[5 to Die]]'' by Jerry LeBlanc & Ivor Davis, Holloway House Publishing, 1971, ISBN 0-87067-306-8
* ''[[Labyrinth13: True Tales of the Occult, Crime & Conspiracy]]'', by Curt Rowlett, Chapter 10, ''Charles Manson, Son of Sam and the Process Church of the Final Judgment: Exploring the Alleged Connections''. 2006. Lulu Press. ISBN 1-4116-6083-8.


===Films===
===Films===
Line 252: Line 213:
*''[[Manson Family Movies]]'' written, directed, produced by [[John Aes-Nihil]] (2003)
*''[[Manson Family Movies]]'' written, directed, produced by [[John Aes-Nihil]] (2003)
*''[[Live Freaky! Die Freaky!]]'' directed by [[John Roecker]] (2003)
*''[[Live Freaky! Die Freaky!]]'' directed by [[John Roecker]] (2003)
*"[[Merry Christmas Charlie Manson!]]" ''[[South Park]]'' season two (1998)
<!-- ARe these all documentaries? If any of them are not, they aren't appropriate for listing here (and, heck, "further reading" isn't what you do with them anyway) -->

==References==

===Footnotes===

{{reflist|2}}


==External links==
==External links==
{{wikiquote}}
{{wikiquote}}
*[http://www.charliemanson.com Major site for information on Charles Manson]
*[http://crimemagazine.com/04/manson,1212.htm "The Manson Myth"] by Denise Noe. CrimeMagazine.com [[12 December]] [[2004]].
*[http://web.archive.org/web/20010514150113/http://www.atwa.com/ Manson's official website (archive.org copy)]
*[http://www.2violent.com/closing_argument.html Prosecution's closing argument in trial of Charles Manson] 2Violent.com. Retrieved [[16 April]] [[2007]].
*{{musicbrainz artist|id=db3d7002-d9e8-4803-82c4-d85dad3f29bb|name=Charles Manson}}
*[http://www.aboundinglove.org/sensational/sen-007.php ''Will You Die for Me?''] Charles Watson autobiography as told to Ray Hoekstra; presented at Watson website. Retrieved [[16 April]] [[2007]].
*[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonaccount.html An Account of the Charles Manson Trial of 1970-71.]
*[http://www.mansonfamilytoday.info/manson.htm The Manson Family Today, News and details] mansonfamilytoday.info. Retrieved [[6 May]] [[2007]].
*[http://www.mansondirect.com/ Manson Direct] - A frequently updated website on Charles Manson
*[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/manson.htm Famous Trials - The Trial of Charles Manson] by Douglas Linder. University of Missouri at Kansas City Law School. 2002. [[7 April]] [[2007]].
*[http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/notorious/manson/murder_1.html Crime Library - Charles Manson] by Marilyn Bardsley. Crime Library. Courtroom Television Network, LLC. [[7 April]] [[2006]].
*[http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3403991172883873966&q=citizen+shane Citizen Shane]Streaming documentary containing ten-minute audio of July 2003 telephone conversation with Manson. (In hour-long video, Manson-related segment begins at 21:30; telephone audio runs from approximately 25:00 - 35:00.)
*[http://www.gadflyonline.com/archive/October98/archive-manson.html "If Christ Came Back as a Con Man"]1998 article by David Dalton, co-author of 1970 ''[[Rolling Stone]]'' story on Manson. gadflyonline.com. Retrieved June 21, 2007.
*[http://online.ceb.com/calcases/CA3/61CA3d102.htm Decision in appeal by Manson, Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten from Tate-LaBianca convictions]''People v. Manson'', [[Case citation|61 Cal. App. 3d 102]] (California Court of Appeal, Second District, Division One, August 13, 1976). Retrieved June 19, 2007.
*[http://online.ceb.com/calcases/CA3/71CA3d1.htm Decision in appeal by Manson from Hinman-Shea conviction]''People v. Manson'', [[Case citation|71 Cal. App. 3d 1]] (California Court of Appeal, Second District, Division One, June 23, 1977). Retrieved June 19, 2007.


[[Category:American murderers|Manson, Charles]]
{{Manson Family}}
[[Category:Former Scientologists|Manson, Charles]]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Manson, Charles}}
[[Category:Manson Family|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:Americans convicted of murder]]
[[Category:Cult leaders|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:Manson Family]]
[[Category:History of Los Angeles|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:Self-declared messiahs]]
[[Category:People from Ohio|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:Charismatic religious leaders]]
[[Category:Prisoners serving life sentences|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:History of Los Angeles]]
[[Category:The Beach Boys|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:People from Ohio]]
[[Category:1934 births|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:Prisoners serving life sentences]]
[[Category:Living people|Manson, Charles]]
[[Category:1934 births]]
[[Category:Living people]]


[[cs:Charles Manson]]
[[ca:Charles Manson]]
[[ca:Charles Manson]]
[[cs:Charles Manson]]
[[da:Charles Manson]]
[[da:Charles Manson]]
[[de:Charles Manson]]
[[de:Charles Manson]]
Line 296: Line 244:
[[it:Charles Manson]]
[[it:Charles Manson]]
[[he:צ'ארלס מנסון]]
[[he:צ'ארלס מנסון]]
[[lt:Charles Manson]]
[[hu:Charles Manson]]
[[hu:Charles Manson]]
[[nl:Charles Manson]]
[[nl:Charles Manson]]

Revision as of 06:06, 16 July 2007

Charles Manson
File:Charles Manson.jpg
BornNovember 12, 1934
Cincinnati, Ohio, United States United States
OccupationHabitual criminal
Spouse-

Charles Milles Manson (born November 12, 1934) is an American convict and career criminal, most known for his participation in the Tate-LaBianca murders of the late 1960s.

Manson had spent most of his adult life in prison, initially for offenses such as car theft, forgery and credit card fraud. He also worked some time as a pimp. In the late 1960s, he became the leader of a group known as "The Family", and masterminded several brutal murders, most notoriously that of movie actress Sharon Tate (wife of the Polish movie director Roman Polański), who was eight and a half months pregnant at the time. He was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder in what came to be known as the "Tate-LaBianca case", named after the victims, although he was not accused of committing the murders in person. He is serving a life sentence in California's Corcoran State Prison, and will be up for parole in 2007 at the age of 73. Manson has always maintained his innocence of the crimes.

Manson was also friends with several notable musicians before the murders were committed, including Dennis Wilson of The Beach Boys, and was a marginally successful musician himself who recorded several albums and whose songs have since been covered by many artists.

Since his trial and conviction, Manson's name and image have been integrated into American pop culture, typically as a symbol of evil.

Early life

Charles Milles Maddox was born at Cincinnati General Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio, on November 12, 1934 to a 16-year-old unwed girl named Kathleen Maddox visiting from Catlettsburg, KY at the time. Shortly after her son's birth, Kathleen married William Manson, who provided the last name by which he is now known. William Manson was Charles' stepfather; by most accounts Manson's biological father, as declared by a court decision, was an Ashland, KY politician, Colonel Scott.

In 1939, his mother and his uncle, Luther Maddox, were convicted of sexual assault and holdup of a gas station. Luther served five years in Moundsville, WV prison, dying there in 1949.

Many hardened criminals blame their crimes on their parents, but few have as clear a case as Charles Manson. His mother was an alcoholic prostitute who sold him for a pitcher of beer. In and out of reform school as a youngster, he had an IQ of 109 and became a kind of institutional politician and manipulator by age 19. Charles Manson spent much of his childhood around Ashland, Kentucky and West Virginia where he was passed from relative to relative due to his lack of parents. He was once member of an outlaw motorcycle club at Huntington, WV.

From then on his continuous scrapes with the law landed him in prison. His record there described Manson as having "a tremendous drive to call attention to himself."

Manson attended Walnut Hills High School as a child. When he was thirteen, his mother (who had become an alcoholic) attempted to put him in a foster home. When she was unable to find one for him, he ended up at Gibault School for Boys, a reform school in Terre Haute, Indiana. Within a year he ran away and back to his mother, who rejected him. He began living on the streets, supporting himself by petty theft; in 1951, after a string of arrests and escapes, Manson fled to California, where he was apprehended and placed in the National Training School for Boys in Washington, D.C., a Federal juvenile facility, for driving a stolen car across state lines. At least one psychiatrist there observed marked anti-social tendencies, and in that same year, Manson raped another boy. By 1952, Manson already had eight assault charges against him. After being transferred to the Federal Reformatory in Petersburg, Virginia, and later to Chillicothe, Ohio, Manson became a model inmate, resulting in his parole in 1954 at the age of 20. Following his release, however, he continued along a criminal path. His crimes quickly escalated to major offenses, including Mann Act violations. [Prior to the Tate-LaBianca murders, Manson had already spent more than half his life (approximately 17 years) in Federal prison — at one point in 1967 asking not to be released.] In January 1955, Manson married 17-year-old Rosalie Jean Willis, and decided to move to California. Soon after the wedding, Manson stole a car and was arrested. Willis became pregnant in April. Manson's parole was revoked in 1956 when he missed a court date. Soon after his arrest, Willis gave birth to their son, Charles Milles Manson, Jr. She then left town with a truck driver and Charles Jr., who committed suicide in 1993.

Manson's prison and probation reports showed a consistent theme:

(1950-52) "Tries to give the impression of trying hard although actually not putting forth any effort ...marked degree of rejection, instability and psychic trauma ... constantly striving for status ... a fairly slick institutionalized youth who has not given up in terms of securing some kind of love and affection from the world ... dangerous ... should not be trusted across the street ... assaultive tendencies ... safe only under supervision ... unpredictable ... in spite of his age he is criminally sophisticated and grossly unsuited for retention in an open reformatory type institution"; (1958-59) "Almost without exception [he] will let down anyone who went to bat for him ... an almost classic case of correctional institutional inmate ... a very difficult case and it is almost impossible to predict his future adjustment ... a very shaky probationer and it seems just a matter of time before he gets into further trouble".

Manson was paroled in 1958 after serving two years of a three-year sentence. In 1959, he was arrested again for passing stolen checks. Once again, he was given probation, which was revoked nine months later.

On June 1, 1960, Manson was arrested for solicitation of prostitution. He was ordered to serve his 10-year suspended sentence for passing stolen cheques at the federal prison on McNeil Island in Washington state. While at McNeil, Manson was a cellmate of notorious 1930s bank robber Alvin Karpis who taught Manson to read music and to play the guitar. It is interesting what Karpis wrote about Manson in his memoirs "On the Rock: Twenty-five Years at Alcatraz" (written with Robert Livesey, published in 1980):

"This kid approaches me to request music lessons. He wants to learn guitar and become a music star. 'Little Charlie' is so lazy and shiftless, I doubt if he'll put the time required to learn. The youngster has been in institutions all of his life--first orphanages, then reformatories, and finally federal prison. His mother, a prostitute, was never around to look after him. I decide it's time someone did something for him, and to my surprise, he learns quickly. He has a pleasant voice and a pleasing personality, although he's unusually meek and mild for a convict. He never has a harsh word to say and is never involved in even an argument."

After Manson had become somewhat proficient on the guitar, he asked Karpis for help in getting a job playing in Las Vegas as Karpis had contacts with nightclub and casino owners there. Manson even told him he would be bigger than the Beatles, but in the end Karpis decided to leave Manson on his own regarding his music career. Manson was moved to a Los Angeles facility in 1967, a step which proved to be one of the most ominous prison transfers ever. Later Karpis added "The history of crime in the United States might have been considerably altered if 'Little Charlie' had been given the opportunity to find fame and fortune in the music industry."

Manson was finally released March 21, 1967, against his own expressed wish to remain in prison. While either in prison or on probation, he had, among other things, raped another inmate at razor point, stolen cars, pimped inmates, and forged federal cheques. His prison reports continued with the same message:

(1961-62) "He hides his resentment and hostility behind a mask of superficial ingratiation ... even his cries for help represent a desire for attention with only superficial meaning"; (1964) "Pattern of instability continues ... intense need to call attention to himself ... fanatical interests"; then finally, (1966) "Manson is about to complete his ten-year term. He has a pattern of criminal behavior and confinement that dates to his teen years ... little can be expected in the way of change."

He was 33 years old and more than half of his life had been spent in institutions. He protested his freedom. "Oh, no, I can't go outside there...I knew that I couldn't adjust to that world."

Manson started to attract a group of followers, many of whom were very young women with troubled emotional lives who were rebelling against their parents and society in general. This was the core of the Manson Family execution team whom he ordered to kill pregnant actress Sharon Tate, her wealthy house guests, and the well-to-do LaBiancas, which was part of a plot by Manson to start a global race war.

The murders

The Manson Family was responsible for several murders, known collectively as the Tate-LaBianca murders.

The Tate murders

On the night of August 9, 1969, Manson directed some members of the Family, including Charles "Tex" Watson, Patricia Krenwinkel, Susan Atkins, and Linda Kasabian to go to the former residence of an acquaintance, record producer Terry Melcher, and kill whoever was on the premises. It was stated at trial that others, including Catherine Gillies, wanted to go as well, but didn't because there "was no room in the car." There is no proof that they were under influence of drugs or that any of them challenged Manson’s wishes.

They left their Spahn Ranch compound and arrived at midnight at the grounds of the Beverly Hills home of the film director Roman Polański and his wife Sharon Tate. Polański, highly acclaimed for his recent hit Rosemary's Baby, was in London working on his next film and had asked friends to stay with Tate, who was eight and a half months pregnant. Before entering the house, the Manson family members shot dead Steven Parent, an 18-year-old friend of Tate's gardener, William Garretson, who was leaving the property and had unwittingly seen the intruders while getting in his car. Kasabian, who was acting as the getaway driver, expressed horror at the murder of Parent and was told to remain outside and keep watch while the others entered the house.

The quotation, "I am the devil, and I have come to do the devil's work" has been attributed to Watson when Wojciech "Wojtek" Frykowski awoke from his slumber on the living room couch. They assembled the four occupants of the house into the living room. The intruders asked if anyone had money, and, in replying that she did, Abigail Folger, heiress to the Folgers Coffee Company, was led to her bedroom to empty her purse. She was led back to the living room where the four occupants of the house were tied together. Jay Sebring, a noted hairstylist and friend of the Polańskis was visiting, and when he attempted to defend Tate, he was shot by Watson, who then kicked him several times in the face.

Frykowski and Folger, who were staying in the house until Polański's return from London, were able to escape from the living room and were each pursued as they ran onto the front lawn. Quickly overtaken by the attackers, Frykowski was stabbed fifty-one times, shot twice, and pistol-whipped 13 times in the head; Folger was stabbed twenty-eight times. Tate remained in the living room and begged for the life of her unborn baby. Susan Atkins later testified that she had replied, "Look bitch, I don't care about you. I don't care if you are having a baby. You are going to die and I don't feel a thing about it," before stabbing her to death. Before leaving the house Atkins used a towel to soak up some of Sharon Tate's blood and then used it to write "PIG" on the front door. This was allegedly inspired by the Beatles song Piggies.

Linda Kasabian later received immunity for submitting evidence against the group. She told Manson, "I'm not you, Charlie. I can't kill anybody," and evinced shock and horror at finally seeing the pictures of the killings in court.

The LaBianca murders

Main article: Leno LaBianca

The following night in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles, California, wealthy supermarket executive Leno LaBianca and his wife Rosemary were killed in their home, once again by members of the Family (Watson, Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten). On this occasion, Manson apparently went along to "show them how to do it" with less tumult, and pacified the victims, tying them up before returning to the car to tell his followers to commit the killings. Watson apparently killed Mr. LaBianca, and Krenwinkel and Van Houten took turns stabbing Mrs. LaBianca when she began to struggle. Between them, the two girls stabbed Mrs. LaBianca 41 times, including more than 20 stab wounds made after the woman was dead. Krenwinkel then added to the butchery, using a carving fork to cut the word "WAR" into Mr. LaBianca's stomach. She then left the fork embedded in his stomach, soaking up some blood on a piece of paper and writing the phrases "RISE" and "DEATH TO PIGS" on the walls, as well as the misspelled "HEALTER SKELTER" on the refrigerator.

There was a strong link between the "Tate" and "LaBianca" murders: motive; the instigator (Manson); the two main assassins (Watson and Krenwinkel); and witnesses common to both cases. The witnesses included police, medical and scientific witnesses, and civilian witnesses. All of the crimes committed on both nights were prosecuted by Los Angeles assistant district attorney Vincent Bugliosi in a single combined trial.

Other murders

Members of the Manson Family had previously been responsible for the death of Gary Hinman, a high school music teacher in nearby Topanga Canyon. Manson ordered the killing of Hinman after he denied the Manson Family money that Charles claimed Hinman owed them. Bobby Beausoleil was arrested for Hinman's murder a few days before the Tate slaying; later Susan Atkins confessed her part in the plot.

On August 16, 1969, Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies descended upon Spahn Ranch and arrested Manson and most of the Family members on suspicion of auto theft (the Family were not, as yet, suspected of the Tate or LaBianca killings). Ranch hand Donald "Shorty" Shea offered to tell the deputies what he knew about the Family's activities, but disappeared before he could give them a statement. It is believed that on August 25 or 26, after the Family members were released due to lack of evidence, Manson directed Family members, including Steve "Clem Tufts" Grogan, to kill Shea. One of the enduring Family myths, presumably used to frighten members into submission, was that Shea was dismembered and his body parts buried in different places around the ranch. In 1977, the incarcerated and extremely remorseful Grogan directed law enforcement officials to Shea's body, and it was found in one piece, contrary to the horror story passed down through the Family. Grogan, who was paroled in 1985, is still the only former Family member to have been paroled after being convicted of a Manson-ordered murder.

They claimed a total of some 35 killings, but most were not tried either for lack of evidence or because the perpetrators were already sentenced to life for the Tate/La Bianca killings.

Capture

Barker Ranch, on the outskirts of California's Death Valley, is known as the last hideout of Manson and "the Family" after the gruesome Los Angeles murder spree. The local county sheriff's department and National Park Service officers had arrested Manson and his group in 1969 on suspicion of trespassing and vandalism. Some of the members of the cult were seen burning a mass of road-grading material and arson investigators suspected the crime to have come from Manson. At the time of the Manson arrests, the officers were unaware of other criminal actions by those they had in custody. They wanted to apprehend and prosecute the persons responsible for vandalizing road repair equipment in Death Valley National Park farther north, not knowing that they had Manson and his followers. Manson was ultimately discovered hiding beneath a sink in the Barker Ranch bathroom.

Possible motives

The murders initially seemed random, but some key motives were later identified:

  1. Manson suffered from antisocial personality disorder, a disorder that makes the sufferer unable to feel remorse for their actions and lack a conscience.
  2. Manson was hostile towards society; Manson got a "kick" out of death and control. During the trial, one witness commented that "he [Manson] doesn't know about love... love is not his trip. Death is his trip".
  3. Manson had been rejected by the music industry and wanted revenge. In 1968, Manson was introduced to record producer Terry Melcher, son of actress Doris Day, by Dennis Wilson of the Beach Boys, who had picked up a couple of the Family members as they were hitchhiking. Manson and the Family moved into Wilson's house, where they lived for a year, and the Beach Boys recorded a song Manson wrote, calling it 'Never Learn Not To Love'. At the time, Melcher and his girlfriend, actress Candice Bergen, were living at the Tate house, and it was there Manson met him. Manson auditioned for Melcher, but Melcher decided not to sign him to a contract. Although Manson knew that Melcher and Bergen had moved to Malibu, Bugliosi suggested that Manson targeted the house because it represented his rejection by the show business community he wanted to enter, and that it was of no interest to him who his actual victims would be. It has also been rumored that Manson unsuccessfully auditioned for the Monkees, but this is an urban legend as he was in prison at the time of the auditions in 1965-66.
  4. The killers were attempting to clear the blame from Bobby Beausoleil, who had been arrested a few days earlier as a suspect in the Gary Hinman murder. This was a motive stated by the killers during interviews with them, featured in a 1972 Manson film documentary. They claimed that the motive for the murders was to clear fellow Family member Bobby Beausoleil, whom they described as a brother to them. Stating that they were willing to sacrifice their lives, (meaning the death penalty) to clear his name, they committed copycat murders to cast doubt on Beausoleil's guilt. This motive was substantially discredited during the penalty phase of the trial, where it became apparent that the "free Beausoleil" motive was contradicted by other testimony of the killers. Additionally, despite declaring they would die for Manson, the other people accused claim to have waited until the main trial was over and the death penalty was being discussed, and then only on redirect examination, to introduce this as a motive. It was dismissed by the prosecution as an attempt to clear Manson by means of the other defendants taking the blame.
  5. Manson regarded as foretold, by The Beatles, on The White Album,[1] an apocalyptic war of which he was destined to be both the uncanny cause and the ultimate beneficiary.[2] When, by his music, he (Manson) would have drawn to him the young, white female hippies of San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district, black men, thus deprived of the white women whom the political changes of the 1960s had made sexually available to them, would be without an outlet for their frustrations and would lash out in violent crimes against whites.[3] After a resultant murderous rampage against blacks by frightened whites would have been exploited by the Black Muslims to trigger a war of mutual near-extermination between racist and non-racist whites over the treatment of blacks, the Black Muslims would arise to finish off sneakily the few whites they would know to have survived. In this epic sequence of events, which Manson told his followers would take place in the summer of 1969 and which he termed Helter Skelter, after the White Album track of that name, the Family had little to fear; they would wait out the war in a secret city that was underneath California's Death Valley and that they would reach through a hole in the ground. As the actual remaining whites upon the war's true conclusion, they would emerge from underground to rule the now-satisfied blacks, who, as the vision went, would be incapable of running the world; Manson "would scratch [the black man's] fuzzy head and kick him in the butt and tell him to go pick the cotton and go be a good nigger." Laid out by Manson repeatedly, this scenario became such a part of the Family members’ communal belief that they stocked up supplies and searched for the hole in the ground before the crimes were envisioned; but by mid-1969, Manson was heard to say blacks did not know how to start the events. He would have to show them.
  6. FBI agent John Douglas, who spent significant time interviewing Manson during his tenure as a special agent, submitted the theory that Manson really was innocent of plotting the initial set of murders in a series of books chronicling his life as an FBI agent. Douglas believes that initially, Manson's sole goal in leading "The Family" was to live out the rest of his days as an isolated demi-god ruling over a group of impressionable young people who would do his every bidding. In order to ensure that they remained loyal to him, Manson convinced them that he really was a deistic figure who would protect them during the coming Armageddon and rule over them in a peaceful society afterwards. Douglas' theory goes on to state that Manson's followers took his prophesying more literally than intended and carried out the Sharon Tate murders in order to spark Armageddon. According to Douglas, once Manson learned about the Tate murders, he felt he had no choice but to act as if he were still in control and go along with the LaBianca killings in order to protect his image and prevent his followers from turning on him.

In the trial, the prosecutor, Vincent Bugliosi, placed the fifth as the main motive. [4] Evidence included testimony that, on the night of the LaBianca murders, Manson considered discarding on the street a wallet he apparently obtained in the LaBianca house; he "wanted a black person to pick it up and use the credit cards so that the people, the establishment would think it was some sort of an organized group that killed these people." [5]

Investigation and trial

The two cases were not well investigated by police, principally due to rivalries between the Tate team (older) and the La Bianca team (younger): the Tate team were not open to suggestions that the two cases were connected. As a result of this, Bugliosi himself played a significant and active role in gathering the evidence needed to convict.

Ronald Hughes, a young lawyer with an extensive knowledge of 1960s counterculture but no trial experience, was the final state-appointed attorney for defendants Manson and Van Houten (several other attorneys were appointed and then dismissed during the trial). He suggested to Manson that he should obtain a different attorney for himself, Irving Kanarek, and continued to defend Van Houten, apparently feeling that he could defend Van Houten more effectively. He hoped to show that Van Houten was acting under the influence of Manson, and to portray Manson as controlling her actions. This may have cost Hughes his life. In late November 1970, Hughes went camping near Sespe Hot Springs. He disappeared, and his decomposed body was discovered four months later. It is thought that other members of the Family killed him in reprisal for impugning Manson in court. One member of the Family described this as "the first of the retaliation killings".

During the trial, Manson and his followers courted media attention. Manson appeared at the trial with an "X" he had carved into his forehead with a knife. This was copied by his followers the next day. The pattern was modified several times and copied by his followers each time. Eventually the pattern was turned into a swastika and is now a permanent scar. At one point during the trial, Manson shaved his head, his followers again mimicking. The defendants, acting in concert with each other, deliberately disrupted the proceedings to the point where Judge Charles Older had them removed from the courtroom on several occasions. A monitor system was rigged up in the lockup so that the defendants could follow the proceedings. On several occasions, Manson verbally threatened both the judge and prosecutor Bugliosi in court, and at one point attempted to physically attack the judge. The defendants eventually became so disruptive that Judge Older banned them from the courtroom altogether.

Manson's followers tried to dissuade an estranged follower, Barbara Hoyt, from testifying against Manson at the trial by giving her a free trip to Hawaii - and a hamburger laced with LSD once she arrived there (the conspirators were under the mistaken belief that an LSD overdose was fatal). Hoyt was found in a drugged semi-stupor on a street near a Honolulu beach, hospitalized, and identified herself as a witness in the Tate-LaBianca trial once she recovered from her LSD trip. The involuntary overdose ultimately made Hoyt an even stronger witness for the prosecution, and she testified about Family discussions about the murders.

Although Manson himself was not present at the Tate/La Bianca killings, he was convicted on seven counts of murder and one count of conspiracy to commit murder on January 25, 1971, for ordering and directing them, and on March 29, 1971 was sentenced to death. Atkins and Krenwinkel were convicted on the same counts, as was Watson (who was tried separately from the others due to extradition problems), and Van Houten was convicted of two counts of murder and one count of conspiracy. Some members of Manson's "Family" have claimed that the killers tried to implicate Manson in order to appear less guilty themselves. The death sentence was automatically commuted to life in prison after the California Supreme Court's People v. Anderson decision resulted in the invalidation of all death sentences imposed in California prior to 1972. The killers, giggling in court, were asked if they felt remorse, and gave answers that indicated they did not.

Aftermath

On March 6, 1970, Manson released an album titled Lie: The Love & Terror Cult to help finance his defense. The album was put out by ESP Records and included the song that had previously been recorded by the Beach Boys.

The Family survived the incarceration of Manson. After his arrest, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, one of Manson's shrewdest, toughest and most obedient followers, effectively took command of the management of the Family in his absence. With a handful of other followers, mostly women, she perched on the steps of the Los Angeles courthouse during the trial, shaved her head to protest his conviction and, copying Manson, gouged an X into her forehead as a sign of loyalty. She later explained: "We have X'ed ourselves out of this world." In 1970 the Charles Manson family recorded an album titled The Family Jams of songs written by Manson, although he didn't appear on the album.

On November 13, 1972, Michael Monfort, James Craig, Priscilla Cooper, Nancy Laura Pitman and Lynnette Alice "Squeaky" Fromme were held for the murder of James T. Willett and his wife.

By 1974, the original Manson "family" had dwindled to only Fromme and Sandra Good. Motivated by Manson's new ideology, they sent a series of threatening letters to heads of corporations, making threats unless they stopped polluting the environment.

On September 5, 1975, Fromme unsuccessfully attempted to assassinate US President Gerald Ford in Sacramento [6]. It appears that, although she managed to get close to Ford, by mistake the chamber of her Colt .45 pistol was empty. She was heard to say, "It didn't go off. Can you believe it? It didn't go off!" She stated she had committed the crime so that Manson would appear as a witness at her trial, and thus have a worldwide platform from which to talk about his apocalyptic vision. She escaped prison in December 1987, apparently to try to reach Manson, but was recaptured two days later.

Manson gave two notable interviews in the 1980s: the first on June 13, 1981 at California Medical Facility by Tom Snyder for NBC's The Tomorrow Show, and the second at San Quentin Prison by Charlie Rose for CBS News Nightwatch (aired March 7, 1986). Rose's interview won the national news Emmy Award for "Best Interview" in 1987. [7]

Manson is currently incarcerated in California's Corcoran State Prison. His CDC inmate number is B33920. All of his applications for parole have been denied, most notably in 1986 when he appeared before the parole board with a swastika evident on his forehead. He is known for his theatrics when given the opportunity to appear in the media, and in one taped parole hearing said he wanted to go to the moon. He has been overheard in conversations with at least one of his former "Family" members saying that it doesn't matter what he says or does because he knows he will be kept in prison for the rest of his life, implying that at least some of his fanatical behavior is deliberate. During his imprisonment, Manson has received more mail than any other prisoner in the United States prison system. It is said that he gets over 50,000 pieces of mail a year–a combination of fan mail, hate mail, and mail from curiosity-seekers.

In January 2000, Manson was publishing messages on a now-defunct website run by Manson followers St. George and Sandra Good.

News cuttings and other material related to the Manson family and the activities of its members from 1969 - 2005 available from charliemanson.com.

Parole hearings

Manson was entitled to a parole hearing in 2002, and was denied early release, in particular due to a "litany" of offenses ranging from drug trafficking to arson to assaulting guards. He is next eligible for parole in 2007.

Fromme, eligible for parole since 1985 following the 1975 incident, has consistently waived her right to a hearing.

Covers and tributes

  • The band Alkaline Trio, released a song on their album Crimson called "Sadie" about Susan Atkins, a murderer in the Charles Manson family who took part in the Sharon Tate murders in 1969.
  • In 1976, Throbbing Gristle made a film entitled "After Cease To Exist", inspired by a Manson song title
  • In 1982, Boston hardcore punk band Negative FX featured a picture of Charles Manson, with their logo digitally "carved" into his head, on their self-titled LP. It also featured pictures of Manson family members on the back.
  • Since 2003, a Orange county NY based Noise-punk band known as "Sparrows with Machine-guns" has done a cover of "Home is where your happy" at live gigs only. They plan to record the cover for a 2007 full lenght album.
  • Sonic Youth, in cooperation with director Richard Kern, produced a video clip for their song "Death Valley '69," in which some of the band members acted out gory scenes reminiscent of the Tate/LaBianca murders.
  • Neo-psychedlica band The Brian Jonestown Massacre references the life of Manson in their songs "Arkansas Revisited" and "The Ballad of Jim Jones".
  • UK underground electronic music pioneers, Cabaret Voltaire, used Manson's voice from various radio interviews, which they used in their tracks "Hell's Home", "Kickback" and "Golden Halos" featured on their album "The Covenant, The Sword And The Arm Of The Lord" released in 1985.
  • System of a Down wrote the song "ATWA" on their Toxicity album about the media's viewpoints on Manson. (ATWA is an acronym used by Manson, meaning both "Air-Trees-Water-Animals" and "all the way alive.").
  • Ozzy Osbourne recorded "Bloodbath in Paradise" on his No Rest for the Wicked album about the California murders.
  • The music video for "Gave Up" by Nine Inch Nails was shot entirely at 10050 Cielo Drive in the summer of 1993 while its lead singer, Trent Reznor, leased the property in Benedict Canyon from Rudi Altobelli. The video shoot was done in the living room of the main house and also includes some exterior shots of the house and grounds. Also in the video is a young Marilyn Manson (who gave Trent Reznor the idea), who also shot a video at Cielo. While Reznor claimed to have no knowledge of the slaughter that took place at the house, he did dub the studio "Le Pig" and recorded the album The Downward Spiral there, on which two of the tracks were named "Piggy" and "March of the Pigs".
  • In 1969, months prior to the Tate-LaBianca murders, The Beach Boys covered "Cease to Exist", retitling it "Never Learn Not to Love" and releasing it on the album 20/20 (with sole songwriting credit given to Dennis Wilson).
  • John Moran and Iggy Pop collaborated on The Manson Family: An Opera, which was produced by Philip Glass.
  • Crispin Glover performs a cover of "Always is Always Forever" on his album "The Big Problem"
  • Devendra Banhart covers "Home Is Where You're Happy" as a part of a medley with Lauryn Hill's Doo Wop (That Thing). He performed it at Bonnaroo and the Pitchfork Music Festival in 2006.
  • Guns N' Roses covered a Manson song on their album "The Spaghetti Incident?". The song does not apear on the track listings of the CD; it is a "secret song" that plays at the end of the last track. At the end of the song Axl thanks Manson, stating "thanks Chaz".
  • Skinny Puppy have used samples of Manson speaking and singing The Beatles' "Helter Skelter" (as well as samples of the actual song) in their song, "Worlock," from 1989's Rabies. Samples of Manson speaking can also be heard on "Convulsion," from 1990's Too Dark Park Members of Skinny Puppy (as Download) also recorded a soundtrack for the Jim Van Bebber film Charlie's Family (a.k.a. The Manson Family).
  • Hip Hop duo 'Heltah Skeltah', a break off from The Boot Camp Clik - share the same name as the infamous 'Manson Family' murder signature.
  • Cleveland, Ohio based alternative metal band Mushroomhead reference Manson in the song "Bwomp", off of their sophomore album "Superbuick". They say throughout the song "If it was up to me, I'd free Charles Manson".
  • The British band Kasabian takes its name from Linda Kasabian, getaway driver and member of the Manson Family.
  • Argentine rock band Babasonicos have a song titled "Sharon Tate," after the actress murdered by Charles Manson and his followers.
  • Neil Young's 1974 album On the Beach included a song Young had written from Manson's point of view titled "Revolution Blues". Young had met Manson while living in Topanga Canyon.
  • American skinhead band People Haters recorded a song "Charlie Manson´s eyes" for their 1995 released debut cd "A collection of hate".

Pop culture references and parodies

  • Marilyn Manson derived his stage name from the names of Marilyn Monroe and Charles Manson.
  • Death Rap artist Necro utilizes the image and voice of Charles Manson quite frequently in his work. He is also known to reference the Tate-La Bianca murders on many of his songs. Most notably, the album The Pre-Fix For Death features an intro by Manson himself, whose presence is maintained throughout the whole of the album.
  • The Tate-La Bianca Murders have been dramatized in movies several times, most notably in 1976's Helter Skelter, starring Steve Railsback as Manson, and its 2004 TV movie remake, which starred Jeremy Davies as Manson, Bruno Kirby as Bugliosi, and Clea DuVall as Kasabian.
  • Manson appeared as a cartoon character in a South Park episode, "Merry Christmas Charlie Manson!", in which Manson returns to jail willingly after seeing several Christmas specials.
  • In the early nineties, The Ben Stiller Show filmed a mock episode of Lassie entitled "Manson," in which Charles Manson is portrayed as the family dog, and goes on to save Timmy from a snake bite down at the creek.
  • American Death Metal Band Deicide, wrote the song "Lunatic of God's Creation" about the Charles Manson Murders.
  • Although the names were changed a movie about the Manson Murders was made called Live Freaky, Die Freaky. Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day played Charles Manson. Other punk rock icons were also parts in the movie as well.

Discography

Albums

  • Lie: The Love & Terror Cult (LP, Performance, 1970. Reissued on LP/CD/MC on various labels). Recorded in 1968.
  • White Rasta (MC). Contains the same tracks as Live At San Quentin, in a different order.
  • Poor Old Prisoner Boy : The 55th Anniversary Album (LP, Remote Control Records). Contains 55 minutes of jail recordings. Edition of 555 copies.
  • Son Of Man (LP, 1992). The A side contains jail recordings, while the B side is etched with a reproduction of a drawing of faces done by Manson. Also includes liner notes of poetry attributed to Manson.
  • Live At San Quentin (CD, Grey Matter, 1993). Songs and improvisations recorded in jail in 1983. Cover art apes The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds album.
  • Charles Manson (CD, Grey Matter, 1993). A combination of Lie and The Manson Family Sings, packaged to look like The Beatles' White Album.
  • Commemoration (CD, White Devil Records, 1994). Released to commemorate Manson's 60th birthday and "sixty years of struggle against cowardice, stupidity and lies".
  • Manson Speaks (2CD, White Devil Records, 1995). Contains one disc of recitals by Manson of poetry and the Bible and one disc of Manson's opinions of actual events at the time of the release.
  • The Way Of The Wolf (CD, Pale Horse, 1998). Music and some bonus conversation recorded in jail in the 1980's.
  • Unplugged 9.11.67 Volume 1 (CD, Archer C.A.T. Productions Inc.). Recordings done by Manson in 1967 as well as spoken words between Manson and some people at the recording session.
  • A Taste of Freedom (CD-R, 2000(?)). Contains telephone conversations with Charles Manson recorded in late 1999 and early 2000. Very limited edition.
  • All The Way Alive (CD, People's Temple Records, 2003). Previously unreleased studio recordings from 1967. Edition of 1000 copies.
  • One Mind (CD, FamilyJams.com, 2005). New recordings of songs, guitar, impromptu poetry and words.
  • Sings (CD, ESP Disk, 2006). Digitally remastered combination of Lie and 12 of the 13 tracks on All The Way Alive.

Singles

  • "I'm On Fire" (a.k.a. "My Feelings Begin To Growing") / "The Hallways of Always" (7", White Devil Records). Tracks taken from Live At San Quentin and Commemoration respectively.
  • "Look At Your Game, Girl" / "Your Home Is Where You're Happy" (7", White Devil Records)

Recordings by the Family not featuring Charles Manson

  • The Manson Family Sings The Songs Of Charles Manson (LP). 1970 recordings of Manson's songs performed by Steve Grogan as lead singer, along with Red, Blue, Gypsy, Brenda, Ouisch and Capistrano.
  • The Family Jams (2CD, Transparency 0011). The first disc is called The Family Jams and contains all the music on Manson Family Sings The Songs Of Charles Manson, while the second disc entitled Family Jams Too features previously unreleased recordings also dating from 1970.

References and further reading

Books

Films

Wikiquote has quotations related to Charles Manson.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Charles_Manson&oldid=144944548"