Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders

by Vincent Bugliosi

  I then addressed myself to the issue of whether the four defendants should receive the death penalty.

  The strongest argument that can be made in support of capital punishment is, I feel, deterrence—that it may save additional lives. Unfortunately, under California law the prosecution could not argue deterrence, only retribution.

  “These weren’t typical murders, ladies and gentlemen. This was a one-sided war where unspeakable atrocities were committed. If all of these defendants don’t receive the death penalty, the typical first-degree murderer only deserves ten days in the County Jail.”

  As for Fitzgerald’s contention that killing these defendants would not bring the seven victims back to life, “If we were to accept that line of reasoning, no one would ever be punished for any crime, since punishing a person does not remove the fact that the crime was committed.” For example, “Don’t punish a man for arson because the punishment is not going to rebuild the building.”

  In California, if a defendant is seventeen years of age or younger, he or she cannot be sentenced to death. Though Fitzgerald repeatedly called the three female defendants “children,” I reminded the jury that Leslie was twenty-one, Susan twenty-two, Katie twenty-three. “They are adults by any standard, and completely responsible for their acts.”

  In regard to the defense contention that the three female defendants were insane, I reminded the jury that Dr. Hochman, the only psychiatrist to examine all three, said they are not and have never been insane.

  Dr. Hochman testified that we are all capable of killing, I noted. “He did not say that we are all capable of murder. There is a vast difference between killing—as in justifiable homicide, self-defense, or defense of others—and murder. And no one can convince me, ladies and gentlemen, that all of us are capable of murdering strangers for no reason whatsoever like these three female defendants did.

  “It takes a special type of person to do what they did. It takes a person who places no value on the life of a fellow human being.

  “True, Watson, Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten committed these murders because Charles Manson told them to, but they would never have committed these murders in a million years if they did not already have murder in their guts, in their system. Manson merely told them to do what they were already capable of doing.”

  Moreover, there was no evidence that Manson forced Watson and the girls to murder for him. “In fact, the inference is that they wanted to go along. That seemed to be the general feeling in the Family. Witness the statement of Cathy Gillies. Witness Susan Atkins’ telling Juan Flynn, ‘We’re going to get some fucking pigs.’ Does that sound like someone who is being forced to go out?”

  Manson ordered the murders, but Watson and the three girls personally committed them “because they wanted to. Make no mistake about that. If they did not want to murder these victims, all they had to do was not do it.”

  I examined now the backgrounds of the three girls. Like the other female members of the Family, they had “one common denominator among them. It was obvious that each of them had a revulsion, an antipathy, a seething feeling of disgust for society, for their own parents.” Each of the three girls had dropped out of society before even meeting Charles Manson; each had taken LSD and other drugs before meeting Manson; and each had rejected her real family before meeting Manson.

  Looking right at juror Jean Roseland, who had two teenage daughters, I said, “Don’t confuse them with the girl-next-door type. These three female defendants had repudiated and renounced their very families and society before they ever met Charles Manson.

  “In fact, it was precisely because they had contemptuously disavowed and rejected their families and society that they ended up with Charles Manson. That is the very reason.

  “Manson was simply the catalyst, the moving force that translated their pre-existing disgust and hatred for society and human beings into violence.”

  I anticipated an argument that I felt Maxwell Keith might give. “The thought certainly may enter your mind that as wicked and as vicious as these three female defendants are, by comparison to Charles Manson they are nowhere as wicked and vicious as he is; therefore, let’s give Manson the death penalty and these three female defendants life imprisonment.

  “The only problem with that type of approach is that these female defendants are given credit, as it were, because of Manson’s extreme wickedness and viciousness. Under that type of reasoning, if Adolf Hitler were Charles Manson’s co-defendant, Manson should receive life imprisonment because of the indescribably evil Adolf Hitler.” Rather than compare the three female defendants with Manson, I told the jury, they should evaluate the conduct of each of the defendants and determine whether it warranted the imposition of the death penalty. I then went into the acts of each, starting with Manson, enumerating one by one the reasons they deserved death rather than life.

  One question the jury would surely ask, I noted, was: Why no remorse? The answer was simple: “Manson and his co-defendants like to kill human beings. That is why they have no remorse. As Paul Watkins testified, ‘Death is Charlie’s trip.’”

  I came to the end of my argument.

  “Now the defense attorneys want you to give these defendants a break. Did these defendants give the seven victims in this case a break?

  “Now the defense attorneys want you to give their clients another chance. Did these defendants give the seven victims in this case any chance at all?

  “Now the defense attorneys want you to have mercy on their clients. Did these defendants have any mercy at all on the seven victims in this case when they begged and pleaded for their lives?”

  I then reminded the jurors that nine months earlier, during voir dire, each had told me he would be willing to vote death if he felt this was a proper case. I reiterated: “If the death penalty is to mean anything in the State of California, other than two empty words, this is a proper case.”

  I concluded: “On behalf of the People of the State of California, I can’t thank you enough for the enormous public service you have rendered as jurors in this very long, historic trial.”

  That night after dinner I said to Gail, “There must be something I have to do tonight.” But there wasn’t. For a year and a half, seven days a week, I had been totally immersed in the case. Now all I could do was listen to the closing arguments of the defense attorneys and wait until the jury reached its verdict.

  Kanarek began by implying that perhaps I had poisoned the glass of water on the lectern and ended, more than a day later, by reading chapter after chapter from the New Testament.

  “Now, this being the Easter season, there is an analogy here between Mr. Manson—this may sound at first blush to be ridiculous, and we are not suggesting that Mr. Manson is the deity or Christlike or anything like that—but how can we know?”

  Judge Older, who had several times warned Kanarek that he had exhausted all relevant rebuttal, finally brought his sermon to an end at the point of resurrection.

  Shinn spent his time attacking the DA’s Office and in particular me: “Miss Atkins was drowning without friends…and she saw Mr. Bugliosi with an oar. She said: Oh, here comes help now. Miss Atkins reached out for that oar. And what do you think Mr. Bugliosi did? He hit her over the head with the oar.”

  Keith delivered a strong argument against the death penalty itself. Before this, however, he said: “Now strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, I accepted wholeheartedly certain areas of Mr. Bugliosi’s argument.

  “I accept his exposition to you that Mr. Manson dominated these girls and ordered the homicides.

  “I accept that the ‘free Bobby Beausoleil’ motive is nonsense.

  “I accept his telling you that you shouldn’t hold the Hinman murder against Leslie.

  “I accept his argument that Leslie’s testimony and the testimony of the other girls in this case shows Mr. Manson’s domination and influence still persists and is all-pervasive.”

  To deny these things, Keith said, w
ould be to deny the evidence. Thus Keith became the first, and only, defense attorney to accuse Manson of these murders.

  Keith, however, said that he did not agree that any of the defendants should receive the death penalty, not even Charles Manson. For in his opinion, Keith said, “Mr. Manson is insane,” and in instilling his thoughts into the minds of the three female defendants he had also infected them with his madness.

  Keith concluded: “Give Leslie the chance for redemption, to which she is entitled. Remember, Linda Kasabian cut the umbilical cord, in Mr. Bugliosi’s words, that tied her to Manson and his Family. Give Leslie the chance to do the same. Give her life. I thank you.”

  Fitzgerald read a short argument, at the end of which he began describing in detail how the three female defendants would be executed in the gas chamber at San Quentin Prison if the jury returned verdicts of death. This was improper argument, and I objected. When we approached the bench, Paul literally begged Judge Older to let him proceed. “This is extremely important! I can’t impress on the Court how important it is!” Because he was so desperate, I decided to back off, agreeing not to object if he would describe this as a hypothetical situation—“Imagine that this is happening”—and not as fact. He did so, after which Judge Older instructed the jury. They left the courtroom at 5:25 P.M. on Friday, March 26, 1971.

  While I felt confident that the jury would return a death penalty verdict against Charles Manson, I was less sure when it came to the girls. Only four females had been executed in California history, none of them as young as the defendants.

  I had anticipated that the jury would be out at least four days. When I received the call Monday afternoon, after only two days, I knew there could be only one verdict. It was too fast for anything else. Their actual deliberations, I later learned, had taken only ten hours.

  Again under extraordinary security precautions, the jury was brought back into the courtroom, at 4:24 P.M. on Monday, March 29, with their verdicts.

  Manson and the girls had been brought into the courtroom earlier—the three female defendants now, when it was too late to influence the jury, having shaved their heads also—but before the clerk could read the first verdict, Manson yelled, “I don’t see how you can get by with this without letting me put on some kind of defense…You people have no authority over me…Half of you in here ain’t as good as I am…” and Older ordered him removed.

  Manson’s no-defense claim was nonsense. It was obvious that the defense he intended to put on during the guilt phase had been delivered in toto during the penalty phase. The jury’s reaction to it was now being delivered, in a courtroom jammed with spectators and press.

  The clerk read the first verdict: “We, the jury in the above-entitled action, having found the defendant Charles Manson guilty of murder in the first degree as charged in Count I of the Indictment, do now fix the penalty as death.”

  KRENWINKEL “You have just judged yourselves.”

  ATKINS “Better lock your doors and watch your own kids.”

  VAN HOUTEN “Your whole system is a game. You blind, stupid people. Your children will turn against you.”

  Judge Older had the three girls removed. They too listened over the loudspeaker as the clerk fixed the penalty for all four defendants as death on all counts.

  Judge Older left the bench to shake hands with each juror. “If it were within the power of a trial judge to award a medal of honor to jurors,” he told them, “believe me, I would bestow an award on each of you.”

  For the first time the jurors could speak to the press about their ordeal.

  Jury foreman Herman Tubick told reporters that the jury was convinced “the motive was Helter Skelter.” Mrs. Thelma McKenzie said the jury had “certainly tried” to find points upon which they could sentence the female defendants to a verdict less severe, “but we couldn’t.” William McBride remarked: “I felt sympathy for the women but sympathy can’t interfere with justice. What they did deserves the death penalty.” Marie Mesmer said she felt more pity for Susan Atkins than for the other two girls, because of her background, but that she was shocked when all three showed no signs of remorse. As for Manson, she said: “I wanted to protect society. I think Manson is a very dangerous influence.” Jean Roseland, mother of three teen-agers, two of them girls, said the most terrible part of the whole trial was Leslie Van Houten “looking at me with those big brown eyes.” Mrs. Roseland was convinced Manson’s power to manipulate others came not from within himself but “from the voids within the minds and souls of his followers.”

  Later Life ran an article entitled “The Manson Jury: End of a Long Ordeal.”

  Ironically, there appeared in the same issue an article entitled “Paul McCartney on the Beatles Breakup.”

  That there had been irreconcilable troubles within the group became apparent, McCartney said, while they were making the White Album.

  Colonel Paul Tate was reported to have said, regarding the death sentence verdicts: “That’s what we wanted. That’s what we expected. But there’s no jubilation in something like this, no sense of satisfaction. It’s more a feeling that justice has been done. Naturally I wanted the death penalty. They took my daughter and my grandchild.”

  Mrs. Tate told reporters that she didn’t believe any human being should have the power to take a life, that that was up to God.

  Roman Polanski declined comment, as did the other relatives of the victims whom the media contacted.

  Sandy, Cathy, and the other girls on the corner had threatened to burn themselves to death with gasoline if any of the four were given death sentences. They didn’t carry out their threat, though all did later shave their heads.

  On learning of the decision, Sandy looked into the TV cameras and screamed: “Death? That’s what you’re all going to get!”

  With the exception of the sentencing, the trial was over. It had been the longest murder trial in American history, lasting nine and a half months; the most expensive, costing approximately $1 million; and the most highly publicized; while the jury had been sequestered 225 days, longer than any jury before it. The trial transcript alone ran to 209 volumes, 31,716 pages, approximately eight million words, a mini-library.

  For almost everyone, the ordeal was not only long but expensive. A number of the jurors, anticipating that they would be paid by their employers, now found themselves either unpaid or without jobs. Mrs. Roseland, for example, claimed that TWA did not honor a verbal agreement to keep her on salary until the end of the trial, and estimated she lost about $2,700 in back pay. TWA denied there was any such agreement. There were several such denials.

  The financial sacrifice on the part of the defense attorneys was enormous. Fitzgerald said: “It’s just really wiped me out.” He told a reporter that he had lost about $30,000 in income and incurred $10,000 in trial expenses. He had been forced to sell his stereo and other possessions, and had spent $5,000 which he didn’t have. Six-times-married Daye Shinn said: “I’m behind in my house payments and child support and my alimonies.” Shinn had received $19,000 in royalties from the Atkins book, he said, but he claimed that about $16,000 of it went back to the Manson Family. Kanarek refused to discuss his financial situation. Another of the defense attorneys did tell me, however, that at one point during the trial Manson had ordered Shinn to give Kanarek $5,000 from the Atkins account, to help defray his expenses, but how much more he received, if any, is unknown. Keith, who received a fee from the county, since he was court-appointed, admitted his private practice had gone downhill and that he didn’t expect to gain any new clients as a result of the publicity.

  The trial cost another attorney his life.

  In the avalanche of stories on the Manson verdict, one small item which appeared that same day went almost unnoticed.

  The Ventura County Sheriff’s Office reported that they had found a body believed to be that of the missing defense attorney, Ronald Hughes. The badly decomposed corpse had been found face down, wedged between two boulders, in Sespe C
reek, miles from where Hughes had last been seen alive.

  Two fishermen had discovered the body early Saturday but didn’t report it until Sunday night, because “we didn’t want to spoil our fishing trip.”

  The cause of death was at this time unknown. Through our office, I ordered an immediate autopsy.

  APRIL 19, 1971

  Judge Older had set Monday, April 19, 1971, as the date of sentencing.

  There was speculation that Older might decide on his own to reduce at least some of the verdicts from death to life. In a previous case Older had done this for a defendant who had poured gasoline on two beds where four children were sleeping, killing one of them. However, I personally felt that since Older had complimented the jurors, he wouldn’t turn right around and set aside their verdict.

  On the nineteenth the Court heard, and rejected, a number of defense motions, including those for a new trial. Judge Older then asked the defendants if they had anything to say. Only Manson did.

  Charlie’s left hand was trembling and he seemed near tears. Very meekly, with a quivering voice, he said: “I accept this court as my father. I have always done my best in my life to uphold the laws of my father, and I accept my father’s judgment.”

  THE COURT “After nine and a half months of trial, all of the superlatives had been used, all of the hyperbole has been indulged in, and all that remains are the bare, stark facts of seven senseless murders, seven people whose lives were snuffed out by total strangers…

  “I have carefully looked, in considering this action, for mitigating circumstances, and I have been unable to find any…

  “It is my considered judgment that not only is the death penalty appropriate, but it is almost compelled by the circumstances. I must agree with the prosecutor that if this is not a proper case for the death penalty, what would be?”