The Manson Family

Formation -

Upon his released from prison on March 21, 1967, Manson received permission to move to San Francisco, where, with the help of a prison acquaintance, he moved into an apartment in Berkley. In prison, bank robber Alvin Karpis had taught Manson to play the steel guitar. Living mostly by begging, he soon got to know Mary Brunner, a 23-year old graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Manson moved in with her. According to a second-hand account, Manson overcame her resistance to him bringing other women to live with them. Before long, they were sharing Brunner's residence with 18 other women. He soon had the first of his group of followers, which have been called the Manson Family, most of them female.

Manson taught his followers that they were the reincarnation of the original christians, and that the romans were the establishment. He strongly implied that he was christ, he often told a story envisioning himself on the cross with he nails in his feet and hands. Sometime around 1967, he began using the alias "Charles Willis Manson."

Before the summer ended, Manson and 10 of his followers piled into a old school bus that he re-wrought in hippie style. They roamed as far north as Washington State, then south towards Los Angeles, Mexico and the southwest. Returning to the Los Angeles area, they lived in Topanga Canyon, Malibu and Venice.

In 1967, Brunner had become pregnant by Manson and, on April 15, 1968, gave birth to a son she named Valentine Michael, nicknamed "Pooh Bear", in a condemned house in Topanga Canyon, assisted during the birth by several of the young women from the family. Brunner, like most of the members of the family, acquired a number of aliases and nicknames, including; "Marioche", "Och", "Mother Mary", "Mary Manson", "Linda Dee Manson" and "Christine Marie Euchts."

Presentation of himself -

Through Phil Kaufman, Manson got an introduction to young universal studios producer Gary Stromberg, then working of a film adaptation of the life of Jesus and southern redneck romans. Stromberg thought Manson made interesting suggestions about what Jesus might do in a situation, seeming strangely attuned to the role, to illustrate the place of women, he had one of his women kiss his feet, but then kissed hers in return.

At the beach one day, Stromberg watched while Manson preached against a materialistic outlook only to be questioned about his well-furnished bus. Nonchalant, Manson tossed the bus keys to the doubter who promptly drove it away while Manson watched, apparently unconcerned. According to Stromberg, Manson had a dynamic personality with an ability to read a person's weakness and "play" them. Trying to co-opt an influential individual from a motorcycle gang by granting him access to the women of the family, Manson claimed the be sexually pathetic and convinced the biker that his outsized endowment was all that kept the "family" females with him. On one occasion, the enraged father of a runaway girl who had joined the family pointed a shotgun at Manson and told him he was about the die, Manson quietly invited him in.

Involvement with Dennis Wilson -

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 women, Patricia Krenwinkle and Ella Jo Bailey, and brought them to his pacific palisades house for a few hours. Returning home in the early house of the following morning from a late night recording session, Wilson was greeted by Manson in the driveway. 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 12 strangers, mostly women.

Over the next few months, as the number of women in Wilson's house doubled, the family members who made themselves part of his sunset boulevard household cost him approximately $100,000. This included a large medical bill for treatment of their gonorrhea and $21,000 for the accidental destruction of his uninsured car, which they borrowed. Wilson would sing and talk with Manson, while the women were treated as servants to them both.

Wilson paid for studio time to record songs written and performed by Manson. Wilson introduced Manson to entertainment business acquaintances. These included Gregg Jakobson, Terry Melcher and Rudi Altobelli, the last of whom owned a house he would soon rent to actress Sharon Tate and her husband Roman Polanski. Jakobson, who was impressed by Manson also paid to record Manson material.

Spahn Ranch -

Manson established a base for the group at Spahn's Movie Ranch, no far from Topanga Canyon Boulevard, in August 1968, after Wilson's manager evicted the family. The entire family relocated to the ranch. The ranch had been a television and movie set for western productions. However, by the late 1960's, the buildings had deteriorated and the ranch was earning money primarily by selling horseback rides.

Family members did helpful work around the grounds. Also, Manson ordered the family's women, including Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, to occasionally have sex with the newly blind, 80-year old owner, George Spahn. The women also acted as seeing-eye guides for Spahn. In exchange, Spahn allowed Manson and his group to live at the ranch for free.

Charles Watson soon joined the group at Spahn's ranch. Watson, a small town texan who had quit college and moved to California, met Manson at Dennis Wilson's house. Watson gave Wilson a ride while Wilson was hitchhiking after his car was wrecked. Spahn nicknamed Watson "Tex" because of his pronounced texan drawl.

Helter Skelter -

In the first days of November 1968, Manson established the family at alternative headquarters in death valley's environs, where they occupied two unused of little-used ranches, Myers Ranch and Barker Ranch. The Myers ranch was owned by a new follower, Catherine Gillies, grandmother. The Barker ranch was owned by an elderly woman, Arlene Barker, to whom Manson presented himself and a male family member as musicians in need of a place to stay that was congenial of their work. When the woman agreed to let them stay if they'd fix things up, Manson honored her with one of the Beach Boys' gold records, several of which he had been given by Wilson.

While back at Spahn Ranch, Manson and Watson visited a Topanga Canyon, acquaintance who played them the Beatles recently released double album, The Beatles, also known as The White Album. Manson became obsessed with the group. At McNeil Island Prison, he had told fellow inmates, including Alvin Karpis, that he could surpass the group in fame.

For some time, Manson had been saying that racial tension between blacks and whites was growing and that blacks would soon rise up in rebellion. On a bitterly cold New Years Eve at Myers Ranch, the family members gathered around a large fire, listening to Manson explain that the social turmoil he had predicted had also been predicted by the Beatles. The White album songs, he declared, told it all, although in code.

In early January of 1969, the family escaped the desert's cold and positioned themselves to monitor L.A.'s supposed tensions by moving to a canary-yellow home in Canoga Park, not far from Spahn Ranch. Manson called this location "The Yellow Submarine", another Beatles reference.

By February, Manson's vision was complete. The family would create an album whose songs would trigger the predicted chaos.

Alternative Theory -

There are alternative theories to the Helter Skelter scenario and if it was the actual motive behind the murders. According to a Manson family associate, Bobby Beausoleil, it was actually Beausoleil's arrest for the torture and murder of Gary Hinman that instigated the murder spree, enacted to convince police that Hinman's murderer was still at large.

This has been substantiated by interviews of Beausoleil conducted by Truman Capote and Ann Louise Bardach in 1981.

Encounter with Sharon Tate -

On March 23, 1969, Manson, uninvited, entered 10050 Cielo Drive, which he had known as Melcher's residence. This was Rudi Altobelli's property, Melcher was only a previous tenant. As of February 1969, the tenants were Sharon Tate and her husband Roman Polanski.

Manson was met by Shahrokh Hatami, an Iranian photographer who was Tate's friend. Hatami was there to photograph Tate in advance for her departure for Rome the next day. Having seen Manson through the window, Hatami had gone onto the front porch to ask Manson what he wanted.

When Manson told Hatami he was looking for someone whose name Hatami didn't recognize, Hatami informed him that the place was the Polanski residence. Hatami advised Manson to try the back alley, by which he meant the path to the guest house, beyond the main house. Concerned about the stranger on the property, Hatami went to confront Manson. Appearing behind Hatami, in the house's front door, Sharon Tate asked him who the man was, Hatami informed her that the 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.

That evening, Manson returned to the property and again went to the guest house. When Altobelli informed Manson that he had plans to go out of the country and would be gone more than a year, Manson explained he had been directed to the guest house by the people in the main house. Altobelli told Manson not to disturb his tenants and Manson left. As Altobelli flew with Sharon Tate to Rome the next day, Tate asked if "that creepy looking guy" had shown up again the previous day.

Crowe Shooting -

On May 18, 1969, Terry Melcher visited Spahn Ranch to hear Manson and the women sing. Melcher arranged a subsequent visit, not long thereafter, during which be brought a friend who possessed a mobile recording unit, but Melcher did not record the group.

By June, Manson was telling the family they might have to start "Helter Skelter". When Manson tasked Tex Watson with obtaining money, supposedly intended to help the family prepare for the conflict, Watson defrauded a black drug dealer named Bernard Crowe. Crowe responded with a threat to wipe out everyone at Spahn Ranch. Manson countered on July 1, 1969, by shooting Crowe at his Hollywood apartment.

Manson's belief that he had killed Crowe was seemingly confirmed by a news report of the discovery of the dumped body of a black panther in Los Angeles. Although Crowe was not a member of the black panthers, Manson concluded he had been and expected retaliation from the panthers. He turned Spahn Ranch into a defensive camp, with night patrols and armed guards.

Hinman Murder -

Gary Allen Hinman was a music teacher and PhD student at UCLA. He had been described as a "Kind, gentle soul" who would often open his house up to those needing a place to stay. At some point in the late 1960's, he befriended members of the Manson family, with some staying at his home on occasion.

Manson was under the impression that Hinman had considerable stocks and bonds and owned his property. Believing that he was wealthy, Manson sent family member Bobby Beausoleil along with Mary Brunner and Susan Atkins to Hinman's home on July 25, 1969, to convince Gary to join the family, which included turning over the assets Manson thought Hinman had inherited. The three held the uncooperative Hinman hostage for two days, during which Manson showed up with a sword to slash his ear. After that, Beausoleil stabbed Hinman to death, ostensibly on Manson's instruction. Before leaving the Topanga Canyon residence, Beausoleil, or one of the women, used Hinman's blood to write "political piggy" on the wall and to draw a panther paw, the black panther symbol.

In magazine interviews of 1981 and 1998, Beausoleil would say he went to Hinman's to recover money paid to Hinman for drugs that had supposedly been bad, he added that Brunner and Atkins, unaware of his intent, went along idly, merely to visit Hinman. On the other hand, Atkins, in her 1977 autobiography, wrote that Manson directly told Beausoleil, Brunner and herself to go to Hinman's and get the supposed inheritance of $21,000. She said Manson had told her privately, two days earlier, that, if she wanted to "do something important", she could kill Hinman and get his money. Beausoleil was arrested on August 6, 1969, after he'd been caught driving Hinman's car. Police found the murder weapon in the tire well. Two days later, Manson told the family members at Spahn Ranch, "Now is the time for Helter Skelter."

Murder of Sharon Tate -

On the night of August 8, 1969, Manson directed Watson to take Susan Atkins, Linda Kasabin, and Patricia Krenwinkle to Melcher's former home, 10050 Cielo Drive in Los Angeles and kill everyone there. The home had only recently been rented to celebrity couple Sharon Tate and her husband, director Roman Polanski. Polanski was away in Europe working on "A Day at the Beach", which he would later end up producing. Manson told the three women to do as Watson told them.

The family members proceeded to kill the five people they found; Sharon Tate, who was eight months pregnant at the time, her unborn child was also killed, Jay Sebring, Abigail Folger, and Wojcieck Frykowski, who were visiting Sharon and Steven Parent, who had been the caretaker of the home. Atkins wrote "pig" in blood on the front door as they left. The murders created a nationwide sensation.

The LaBianca Murders -

The next night, August 9, 1969, six family members, Leslie Van Houten, Steve Grogan, and the four from the Tate Murder, drove out on Manson's orders. Displeased by the panic of the victims of 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. This was the home of supermarket executive Leno LaBianca and his wife, Rosemary. Located in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles, it was next door to a house at which Manson and family members had attended a party at the previous year.

According to Atkins and Kasabian, Manson disappeared up the driveway and returned to say he had tied up the house's occupants, he then sent Watson up with Krenwinkle and Van Houten. In his autobiography, Watson stated that having gone up alone, Manson returned to take him up to the house with him. After Manson pointed out a sleeping man through a window, the two of them entered through the unlocked back door. Watson added at trial, he "went along with" the women's account, which he figured made him "look that much less responsible."

As Watson related it, Manson roused the sleeping Leno LaBianca from the couch at gunpoint and 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. He bound these in place with lamp cords. Manson left, sending Leslie Van Houten and Krenwinkel into the house with instructions that the couple be killed.

Before leaving Spahn Ranch, Watson had complained to Manson of the inadequacy of the previous night's weapons. Now, sending the women for the kitchen, he went to the living room and began stabbing Leno LaBianca with a chrome-plated bayonet. The first thrust went into the man's throat. Sounds of a scuffle in the bedroom drew Watson there to discover Mrs.LaBianca keeping the women at bay by the swinging the lamp around her neck. After subduing her with several stabs of the bayonet, he returned to attacking Leno, whom he stabbed a total of 12 times. When he had finished, Watson carved "War" on the man's exposed abdomen. In an unclear portion of her eventual grand jury testimony, Atkins, who did not enter the LaBianca house, said she believed Krenwinkel had carved the word.

Returning to the bedroom, Watson found Krenwinkel stabbing Rosemary LaBianca with a knife from the kitchen. Heeding Manson's instruction to make sure each of the women played a part, Watson told Van Houten to stab Mrs.LaBianca too. She did, stabbing her approximately 16 times in the back and exposed buttocks. At trial, Van Houten would claim, uncertainly, that Rosemary LaBianca was dead at the time she stabbed her. Evidence showed that many of Mrs.LaBianca's 41 stab wounds had been inflicted post mortem.

While Watson cleaned the bayonet and showered, Krenwinkel wrote "Rise" and "Death to pigs" on the wall and "Helter Skelter" on the refrigerator door, all in LaBianca's blood. She gave Leno LaBianca 14 puncture wounds with an ivory-handled, two-tined carving fork, which she left jutting out of his stomach. She also planted a steak knife in his throat.

Meanwhile, 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 other three family members at the man's apartment building, Manson drove back to Spahn Ranch, leaving them and the LaBianca killers to hitch-hike home. Kasabian thwarted this murder by deliberatingly knocking on the wrong apartment door and waking a stranger. As the group abandoned the murder plan and left, Atkins defecated in the stairwell.

Investigation -

The Tate murders became national news on August 9, 1969. The Polanski's housekeeper, Winifred Chapman, had arrived for work that morning and discovered the murder scene. On August 10, detectives of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, which had jurisdiction in the Hinman case, informed Los Angeles Police Department detectives assigned to the Tate case of the bloody writing at the Hinman house. Thinking the Tate murders were a consequence of a drug transaction, the Tate team ignored this and the crimes' other similarities. The Tate autopsies were under way and the LaBianca bodies were yet to be discovered.

The LaBianca crime scene was discovered at about 10:30pm on August 10, approximately 19 hours after the murders were committed. Fifteen-year-old Frank Struthers, Rosemary's son from a prior marriage and Leno's stepson, returned from a camping trip and was disturbed by seeing all of the window shades of his home drawn and by the fact that his stepfather's speedboat was still attached to the family car, which was parked in the driveway. He called his older sister and her boyfriend. The boyfriend, Joe Dorgan, accompanied the siblings into the home and discovered Leno's body. Rosemary's body was found by investigating police officers.

On August 12, 1969, the LAPD told the press it had ruled out any connection between the Tate and LaBianca homicides. On August 16, the sheriff's office raided Spahn Ranch and arrested Manson and 35 others, as "suspects in a major auto theft ring" that had been stealing Volkswagen Beetles and converting them into dune buggies. Weapons were seized, but, because the warrant had been misdated, the group was released a few days later.

In a report at the end of August when virtually all leads had gone nowhere, the LaBianca detective noted a possible connection between the bloody writings at the LaBianca house and "the singing group the Beatles' most recent album.

Breakthrough -

Still working separately from the Tate team, the LaBianca team checked with the sheriff's office in mid-October about possible similar crimes. They learned of the Hinman case. They also learned that the Hinman detectives had spoken with Beausoleil's girlfriend, Kitty Lutesinger. She had been arrested a few days earlier with members of the Manson family.

The arrests, for car thefts, had taken place at the desert ranches, to which the family had moved and whence, unknown to authorities, its members had been searching Death Valley for a hole in the ground. A joint force of National Park Service Rangers and Officers from the California Highway Patrol and the Inyo County Sheriff's Office, federal, state, and county personnel had raided both Myers and Barker Ranch after following clues unwittingly left when family members burned the earthmover owned by Death Valley National Monument. The raiders had found stolen dune buggies and other vehicles and had arrested two dozen people, including Manson. A highway patrol officer found Manson hiding in a cabinet beneath Barker's bathroom sink. The officers had no idea that the people they were arresting were involved with the murders.

Following up leads a month after they had spoken with Lutesinger, LaBianca detectives contacted members of a motorcycle gang Manson tried to enlist as his bodyguards while the family was at Spahn Ranch. While the gang members were providing information that suggested a link between Manson and the murders, a dormitory mate of Susan Atkins informed LAPD of the family's involvement in the crimes. Atkins was booked for the Hinman murder after she told Sheriff's detectives that she had been involved in it. Transferred to Sybil Brand Institute, a detention center in Los Angeles, she had begun talking to bunkmates Ronnie Howard and Virginia Graham, to whom she gave accounts of the events in which she had been involved.

Apprehension -

On December 1, 1969, acting on the information from these sources, LAPD announced warrants for the arrest of Watson, Krenwinkel and Kasabian in the Tate case. 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.

Watson and Krenwinkel were already under arrest, with authorities in McKinney, Texas, and Mobile, Alabama, having picked them up on notice from LAPD. Informed that a warrant was out for her arrest, Kasabian voluntarily surrendered to authorities in Concord, New Hampshire, on December 2.

Before long, physical evidence such as Krenwinkel's and Watson's fingerprints, which had been collected by LAPD a Cielo Drive, was augmented by evidence recovered by the public. On September 1, 1969, the distinctive .22-caliber Hi Standard "Buntline Special" revolver Watson used on Parent, Sebring, and Frykowski had been found and given to the police by Steven Weiss, a 10-year old who lived near the Tate residence. In mid-December, when the Los Angeles Times published a crime account based on information Susan Atkins had given her attorney, Weiss' father made several phone calls which finally prompted LAPD to locate the gun in it's evidence file and connect it with the murders via ballistics tests.

Acting on that same newspaper account, a local ABC television crew quickly located and recovered the bloody clothing discarded by the Tate Killers. The Knives discarded en route from the Tate residence were never recovered, despite a search by some of the same crewman and months later by LAPD. A knife found behind the cushion of a chair in the Tate living room was apparently that of Susan Atkins, who lost her knife in the course of the attack.

Trial -

The trial began June 15, 1970. 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. Since Kasabian, by all accounts, had not participated in the killings, she was granted immunity in exchange for testimony that detailed the nights of the crimes. Originally, a deal had been made with Atkins in which the prosecution agreed not to seek the death penalty against her in exchange for her grand jury testimony on which the indictments were secured, once Atkins repudiated that testimony and the deal was withdrawn, because Van Houten had participated only in the LaBianca killings, she was changed with two counts of murder and one conspiracy.

Originally, Judge William Keene had reluctantly granted Manson permission to act as his own "outlandish" and "nonsensical" pretrial motions, the permission was withdrawn before the trial's start. Manson filed an affidavit of prejudice against Keene, who was replaced by Judge Charles H. Older. On Friday, July 24, the first day of testimony, Manson appeared in court with an "x" carved into his forehead. He issued a statement that he was "considered inadequate and incompetent to speak of defend himself". Over the following weekend, the female defendants duplicated the mark on their own foreheads, as did most family members within another day or so. Years later, Manson changed the "x" into a swastika.

The prosecution argued the triggering of "Helter Skelter" was Manson's main motive. The crime scene's bloody White Album references were correlated with testimony about Manson's predictions that the murders blacks would commit at the outset of Helter Skelter would have involved the writings of "pigs" on the walls in victim's blood.

Ongoing Disruptions -

During the trial, family members loitered near the entrances and corridors of the courthouse. To keep them out of the courtroom proper, the prosecution subpoenaed them as prospective witnesses, who would not be able to enter while others were testifying. When the group established itself in vigil in the sidewalk, some members wore sheathed hunting knives that, although in plain view, were carried legally. Each of them was also identifiable by the x on his or her forehead.

Some family members attempted to dissuade witnesses from testifying. Prosecution witnesses Paul Watkins and Juan Flynn were both threatened, Watkins was badly burned in a suspicious fire in his van. Former family member Barbara Hoyt, who had overheard Susan Atkins describing the Tate murders for family member Ruth Ann Moorehouse, agreed to accompany the latter to Hawaii. There, Moorehouse allegedly gave her a hamburger spiked with several doses of LSD. Found sprawled on a Honolulu curb in a drugged semi-stupor, Hoyt was taken to the hospital, where she did her best to identify herself as a witness in the Tate-LaBianca murder trial. Before the incident, Hoyt had been a reluctant witness, after the attempt to silence her, her reticence disappeared.

On August 4, despite precautions taken by the court, Manson flashed the jury a Los Angeles Times front page whose headline was "Manson guilty, Nixon declares". This was a reference to a statement made the previous day when U.S. President Richard Nixon had described what he saw as the media's glamorized of Manson.

On October 5, Manson was denied the court's permission to question a prosecution witness who's defense attorneys had declined to cross-examine. Leaping over the defense table, Manson attempted to attack the judge. Wrestled to the ground by bailiffs, he was removed from the courtroom with the female defendants, who had subsequently risen.

Defense Rests -

On November 16, the prosecution rested its case. Three days later, after arguing standard dismissal motions, the defense stunned the court by resting as well, without calling a single witness. Shouting their disapproval, Atkins, Krenwinkel and Van Houten demanded their right to testify.

In chambers, the women's lawyers told the judge their clients wanted to testify that they had planned and committed the crimes and the Manson had not been involved. By resting their case, the defense lawyers had tried to stop this, Van Houten's attorney, Ronald Hughes, Vehemently stated that he would not "push a client out the window". In the prosecutor's view, it was Manson, who was advising the women to testify in an attempt to save himself.

As the body of the trial concluded and with the closing arguments impending, defense attorney Hughes disappeared during a weekend trip. When Maxwell Keith was appointed to represent Van Houten in Hughes' absence, a delay of more then two weeks was required to permit Keith to familiarize himself with the trial, resumed, just before Christmas, then disruptions of the prosecution's closing argument by the defendants led Older to ban the four defendants from the courtroom for the remainder of the guilt phase. This may have occurred because the defendants were acting in collusion with each other and were simply putting on a performance, while Older said was becoming obvious.

Conviction and Penalty Phase -

On January 25, 1971, the jury returned with guilty verdicts against the four defendants on each of the 27 separate counts against them. Not far into the trial's penalty phase, the jurors saw, at last, the defense the Manson had planned to present. Atkins, Krenwinkel and Van Houten testified the murders had been conceived as "copycat" versions of the Hinman murder, for which Atkins now took credit. The killings, they said, were intended to draw suspicion away from Bobby Beausoleil by resembling the crime for which he had been jailed.

Midway through the penalty phase, Manson shaved his head and trimmed his beard to a fork, he told the press, "I am the devil, and the devil always has a bald head". In what the prosecution regarded as belated recognition on their part that imitation of Manson only proved his domination, the female defendants refrained from shaving their heads until the jurors retired to weigh the state's request for the death penalty.

On March 29, 1971, the jury returned verdicts of death against all four defendants on all counts.

On April 19, 1971, Judge Older sentenced the four to death.

Remaining In View -

On September 5, 1975, the family rocketed back to national attention when Squeaky Fromme attempted to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford. The attempt took place in 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 US mail and transmitting death threats by way of interstate commerce. The threats involved corporate executives and US government officials supposed environmental dereliction on their part. Fromme was sentenced to 15 years to life, becoming the first person sentenced under the United States Code Title 18, chapter 84, which made it a federal crime to attempt to assassinate the president of the United States.

In December 1987, Fromme, serving a life sentence for the assassination attempt, escaped briefly from Federal Prison Camp, Anderson, in West Virginia. She was trying to reach Manson, who she had heard had testicular cancer, she was apprehended within days. She was released on parole from Federal Medical Center, Carswell on August 14, 2009.

It was announced in early 2008 that Susan Atkins was suffering from brain cancer. Atkins died of natural causes on September 24, 2009, at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla.

Charles Manson died of a heart attack and complications from colon cancer on November 19, 2017. He was 83 years old.

Three people state their intention to claim Manson's estate and body. Manson's grandson, Jason Freedman, stated his intent to take possession on Manson's remains and personal effects. Micheal Channels, a pen pal of Manson, has a will dated February 14, 2002, that leaves Manson's entire estate and body to him. A friend of Manson's, Ben Gurecki, has a will dated January 2017. It gives the estate and body to his alleged son, Matthew Roberts.

In 2012, CNN news ran a DNA match to see if Freeman and Roberts were related to each other and found they were not. On March 12, 2018, the Kern County Superior Court in California decided in favor of Freeman in regard to Manson's body. Freeman had previously said he would have Manson cremated, which he did, on March 20, 2018.

*Author's Note: If you guys would like a in-depth look in Charle Manson's life specifically, let me know*

Photos -

Charles Manson

Leslie Van Houten

Susan Atkins

Tex Watson

Husband and Wife, Sharon Tate and Roman Polanski

Sharon Tate, eight months pregnant, believed to have been taken by Shahrokh Hatami shortly before Tate's trip to Rome.