The Manson Family Part 4: the trial and the aftermath

Buckle up as we take you on a spine-chilling journey into the notorious Manson Family trial and their bizarre musical exploits. Imagine Manson, adopting the alias 'Jesus Christ's Prisoner', audaciously attempting to manipulate the courtroom. We're pulling back the curtain on this audacious spectacle, revealing the Manson Family's strange musical endeavors outside the courtroom. Preposterous, you say? Well, we've got the tunes to prove it. 

Ever wondered about the effects of the Manson Family's influence on Susan Atkins, Bobby Bouseliel, and Linda Kasabian? What if we told you that Manson's manipulation led these individuals to make some shocking decisions in court, and forever altered their lives? We're unearthing the truth behind the Manson Family's twisted hold over these individuals.

Brace yourselves as we unravel the astounding theories and aftermath of the Manson Family murders. We're going to sift through everything - from the drug burn theory to the Terry Melcher theory, the supposed Manson-Polanski connection, and the rumors of the Family's heinous deeds. Hear the chilling tales of Patricia Krenwinkel's unwavering loyalty to Manson, Tex Watson's role in the murders, and Squeaky Fromme's audacious assassination attempt on President Ford. Prepare for an episode so gripping, every story will leave you on the edge of your seat!

Transcript

Tiffany: 0:13

Welcome to Rogue and Wicked.

wendy: 0:17

I am so excited to say that, even though the remnants of my cold has made my voice scratchy, it's the first time that we've recorded in two weeks where I wasn't on dayquil or nightquil spinning.

Tiffany: 0:30

Yeah, you can have some fun on nightquil, but I don't recommend it.

wendy: 0:36

It's so bad, I take it to clear up one part of me, but then it upsets the rest. My stomach doesn't like nightquil whatsoever, so I have to be really sick to take it. My head has to be super congested, and so with that gone, there's a little bit more clarity. Thank goddess, because we've got a lot of stuff to cover today.

Tiffany: 0:56

We've got what the court case, yeah we've got the trial of the Manson family. I cannot wait for this one. Yeah, so we talked about everything that led up to the capture of the family and Manson and how he was apprehended at the ranch, and we are now at July 15, 1971.

wendy: 1:20

I am so glad I'm fully cognitive this time. I'm excited about this one, and you guys? I just want to preface this by saying I'm not excited about the idea of hearing about people that have been murdered, but I am super intrigued about the characters that Tiffany has very vividly implanted in my mind during the last two podcasts.

Tiffany: 1:44

So let's go yeah. So in July 15, 1971, the trial began. Linda Kassabian was granted immunity, since she didn't participate in the murders and testified against the family. Linda testified for 18 days, during which time Manson and his family would disrupt the testimony. Manson ran his finger across his throat, staring at Linda as she testified.

wendy: 2:10

He did this in front of a judge. Yeah, wow, that doesn't make him look inspicuous or guilty.

Tiffany: 2:16

No, but this whole trial is a circus. You're getting here all kinds of crazy shit.

Tiffany: 2:19

Wow that blows my mind. So Susan Atkins also repeatedly whispered to Linda across the courtroom you're killing us. Linda responded with I'm not killing you, you have killed yourselves. January 14, diane Lake was visited while she was on a 90-day observation at Patton State Hospital. Two detectives from the LAPD interviewed her because she had information against Tex Watson and Leslie Van Hooten. During her recording she claimed that three people in black hitchhiked away and one was gone already during the lobbyonka murders. She told police that Gypsy told her that they killed a black panther. But again there's no evidence of other people at the lobbyonka murders or of a black panther being killed by the family.

Tiffany: 3:06

Outside of the prison walls the family put together a bunch of Manson songs to make an album. Squeaky Fromm paid Dennis Wilson a visit to see if he would give up the tapes that he recorded at his home and threaten to kill him if he didn't release them to her. He told her that he turned them over to the DA, but he didn't. He kept them in a safe and no one knows what happened to those tapes. Another source claimed that Phil Kaufman obtained some of the tapes that the group already had and remastered them in the studio for resale. He fronted the money to get the album into production. Unfortunately, this flopped and Kaufman was out the money that he spent. On January 17th, manson went before the judge to represent himself under Charles Manson, also known as Jesus Christ's Prisoner. Yeah, yeah, that was his name Charles Manson, also known as Jesus Christ's Prisoner.

wendy: 4:00

I just wow.

Tiffany: 4:02

Yeah, the ego was strong with that one.

wendy: 4:04

It always is with these guys.

Tiffany: 4:07

Yeah, I know.

wendy: 4:08

They always have. There's so many, you know. One thinks they're the Joker, the other one thinks he's the son of God.

Tiffany: 4:15

Yeah, so he was backed up by the other prisoners operating under the name the family of Infinite Soul Incorporated. Okay, they filed a habeas corpus, basically saying that he was being mistreated at the prison because he didn't have a spiritual, mental and physical liberty and demanded to be freed. Yeah, so, of course, the judge denied the request.

wendy: 4:41

He can manipulate those prisoners, but he's not going to step into a courtroom and try to swing that.

Tiffany: 4:46

Yeah well, he does. He does try, oh no, oh no, he tries, oh yeah, and he keeps trying, you'll see. So Susan Atkins was given a deal to testify against the family in exchange for taking the death penalty off the table. The prosecution was afraid that the family would get to Susan Atkins, who was going to testify against the family in court. The family bombarded Susan Atkins, bobby Boussileal and Linda Cassabian with letters, telegrams to dump their attorneys, refute any incriminating statements that they made prior and become a united defense.

Tiffany: 5:22

Linda was shown crime scene photos of the tape murders in court. She had a reaction that most you know empathetical people would have to seeing such gruesome photos when she composed herself long enough to look up from the photos of Sharon Tate. She then shot a look across the courtroom to the defendants and said how could you do that? The women laughed and the attack asked Linda how she could be so certain, considering her LSD use, that she had not participated in the murders and she said because I don't have that kind of thing in me to do something so animalistic. Susan Atkins demanded to see Charles Manson and on March 5th 1970, she had gotten her wish. Manson asked her are you afraid of the guest chamber and she replied no, I'm not afraid of it now. And that's all it took for her to be under his control again. Being in the room with him, talking to him, looking into his face, that's all she needed and she was hooked again.

wendy: 6:19

That seems like a really severe case of Stockholm syndrome.

Tiffany: 6:23

Well, yeah, I think they all had it because they were completely isolated.

wendy: 6:26

Mm-hmm. You know, I mean the dynamics from what I recall, lined up in such a way that they were essentially prisoners. You know, they were baited there with one lifestyle that kind of metamorphosized into another while they were acclimating, they were becoming, I mean, he was sociopathic, so he used all those methods that do precisely that, and then they were inebriated, they were bullied and they were brainwashed, and that's a lot. That's a lot to do to somebody, and I can see where the Stockholm syndrome become really profoundly fucked up in a scenario like that.

Tiffany: 7:01

Oh, yeah, yeah, definitely took a toll on them and each one of the members really did believe that their captor was their friend and, to be honest with you, they did it of their own free will, but at some point like the brainwashing is what kind of kept them there and they did believe that if they left that they would be injured or hurt.

wendy: 7:21

Oh, yeah, I mean it's like they're responsible for how they handled it, but they were pumped full of all kinds of things and especially cortisol, like stress and fear, constantly and getting bullied to that degree, being under that type of fear, a perpetual circle of it. The way that he kind of lined everything up, their adrenaline must have been going when they weren't on hallucinogenics. I'm assuming their adrenaline must have been going till they were batshit crazy.

Tiffany: 7:49

Now during the visit Manson also spoke to Susan in a type of gibberish and the police had no idea what they were saying to one another, but Susan did. Later she said that it was some kind of double talk made up words with some real ones like splayed in there. The conversation had to do with Susan dropping her insanity play, dropping her attorney and refusing any further discussion with anyone on the prosecution. Manson fired his attorney after he tried to sever the case between Manson and his disciples so that he could receive a psychiatric evaluation. So this sounds a little confusing. But basically the attorney wanted Manson to go to a psychiatrist, I guess for the insanity play or something, or at least to get Psych-E-Vout to see if he was competent to stand trial. And he did not want Manson to be tried with his disciples because then he couldn't win the case on his own merit, which it would have been easier to win them case by case, or at least not win them because you know whatever, but at least try to get it thrown out. Because he didn't actually like physically commit the murders at the lobbyonkas and the tates. Manson tried to get the trial moved because it was sensationalized all over the media and too many people had prejudice, but the judge denied the request and decided to try all four defendants together. Once Manson saw that they would all be tried as a unit, he rebelled as hard as he could, in any way that he could.

Tiffany: 9:17

In March Sandy and Squeaky Fromm both went to Wisconsin to convince Mary Bruner not to testify at the Bobby Boussileal second trial, but she had worked out a deal to get her charges dropped in exchange for her testimony, so that didn't work out too well. Susan Atkins had her footprint taken by force to compare to the scene of the Cielo Drive murders. Charlie asked to have a new judge and he was granted a new judge to try his case. Leslie Van Hooten was charged with the murders of the lobbyonkas and conspiracy for her part in the crime. She was also the one who took Rosemary into her bedroom, put the pillowcase over her head and held her down with the electrical cord while Susan Atkins and Tex stabbed her to death. Afterwards she was ordered to stab Rosemary and did so in her buttock area around 17 times. Leslie said that she believed that Rosemary was already dead when she stabbed her. When asked if it was Atmansons lead, she said that she was driven to commit the crimes because of the Vietnam War and the movies.

wendy: 10:28

That is intense and quite the diversion.

Tiffany: 10:33

Yeah, that's like a straight up lie.

wendy: 10:36

I mean, I wonder if there was any truth to her thinking that the woman was dead before she stabbed her 17 times, or she tried to convince herself that, so she didn't think she was like bestowing any pain onto this woman.

Tiffany: 10:49

Well, that is true. She was stabbed post-mortem Right and she was dead.

wendy: 10:55

She was completely dead, not just stabbed, but she was certain she was yeah when Leslie stabbed her, she was completely dead.

Tiffany: 11:06

She finished the job. Huh yeah, no, like she didn't finish the job. Leslie stabbed her when she was already dead. Well, that's what I'm saying.

wendy: 11:15

Yeah, yeah, the woman be oh taxes, not a woman.

Tiffany: 11:18

Tax and Susan Atkins were the ones.

wendy: 11:21

Right, that's what I meant by those are the ones.

Tiffany: 11:24

They finished the job before she got to them, so but according to Tax, he did all the stabbing and that Susan Atkins didn't do any of the stabbing, which is not true either.

wendy: 11:36

Well.

Tiffany: 11:36

So I mean there's no like beyond a reasonable doubt proof that Susan Atkins stabbed anybody, except for word of mouth, because you know, back then with the forensics it wasn't all that great. They changed their story a bunch of times. But I do know that when Leslie Van Hooten was stabbing Rosemary post-mortem, so she was telling the truth.

wendy: 11:59

Oh wow, it's a bunch of, he said. She said bullshit going on there.

Tiffany: 12:02

Yeah, the trial was a complete circus. Like I was saying earlier, the girls sang on their way to court. They were all smiles and giggling with excitement. They curled their hair, they put them up in pigtails. They dressed up like little schoolgirls. The other family members showed up day after day singing songs outside of the courthouse because they weren't allowed in. And the reason they weren't allowed in is because they were bringing knives and shit into the courthouse Like full blown buck knives and shit.

wendy: 12:34

Oh my god, yeah, fuckin', before there were metal detectors. That's so damn wild, because I spent nine years in court and I used to collect knives and I now don't carry them on my person anymore because I had to keep taking them out of my pockets all the time. Yeah, and they. Yeah, they didn't have metal detectors.

Tiffany: 12:52

It's just so wild to me. All right, they ended up eventually being banned from the courthouse because they were causing too many disruptions and the cops actually did fear for their lives because they did carry knives and shit in there. So they also held daily vigils and maintained their loyalty to Manson. They even threatened the prosecution's witnesses to try to get them not to testify, which earlier I told you about how they were bombarding them with letters. But they also like physically went and threatened them Like this wasn't just some letters and telegrams and shit. They also went and like physically threatened the witnesses.

wendy: 13:29

This man did a number on these people.

Tiffany: 13:33

Oh yeah, I mean they had undying loyalty for him.

wendy: 13:36

The level of brainwashing this dude did is unbelievable.

Tiffany: 13:41

Yeah, and Squeaky Fromm was probably the most loyal one of all the group members, and she was the one that was on the outside still running the Manson family while everyone else was in. Well, the other four key players were in prison. Manson was granted permission to act as his own attorney, but of course he went off on a ridiculous tangent which in turn made the judge reverse his privilege, and the next day Manson came in a court with an X carved into his forehead for being held down by the establishment man, and all three of the family members also carved X's into their heads to show their loyalty. Eventually, manson turns the X into a swastika.

wendy: 14:26

I'm sorry, it's not funny, it's just. You're watching metamorphosis take place in an evil way, like right on their faces.

Tiffany: 14:35

Oh yeah, and I think the girls he cut his into his head. The girls I believe I read that it was a bobby pin that they took and they like heated it up and they burned it into their heads. During the spring the rest of the family were living in a red and white trailer parked in front of the spawn ranch. Squeaky worked out a deal to let Mr spawn allow them to stay there using her hand and or mouth. April 14th 1970, bruce Davis was indicted for the Hinman murder. Officers thought that he was the weak link and thought that they could break him. They visited spawn ranch regularly to shake up the family but were respectful of their civil liberties. And at the Hinman trial the prosecution brought out a full sized mannequin with a knife sticking out of its chest to show how Gary Hinman was murdered. It was odd and not normal protocol, but I did see pictures of this thing and it was super fucking creepy. And on April 21st, bobby Bousaliel was found guilty and sentenced to death at the conclusion of the Gary Hinman trial.

wendy: 15:42

What was their method to euthanize at that time?

Tiffany: 15:47

Oh, I have no idea, because eventually the death penalty was banned in the state of California, so everybody's convictions got overturned.

wendy: 15:56

Oh shit.

Tiffany: 15:57

Yeah, so any of the death sentences that they were found guilty of they ended up being life sentences Communicated to life sentences yeah.

wendy: 16:06

Wow, I wonder what it was before that. Was it electric, was it gas?

Tiffany: 16:10

I don't know. I mean we're in the 60s so they might have done gas at that time. I know that they still had the electric chair, but only in mainly the southern states. I don't really know because this is California so I'm not real sure about I. Would think it would be more humane than that.

wendy: 16:30

Yeah, you're right, they were pretty progressive all along, just like the northeast has been.

Tiffany: 16:34

Yeah. So I don't know what their method was. It might have been lethal injection, but I don't know when that was introduced. So Barbara Hoyt was supposed to testify as a witness but was taken to the hospital after Ruth Morehouse drugged her with LSD so she couldn't testify. Paul Watkins was burned badly in a suspicious fire that happened inside of his van and they I guess they were hoping that like dead men, would tell no tales, because but there's no actual proof. You see, here's the thing it's like he was burned badly in his van but like he didn't finger anyone. So but while the girls were incarcerated, they confessed to drinking dog blood as a fertility right, so that the women could produce children. Also, the girls stated that they also had sex with some of the dogs as a kind of liberation at Charlie's command.

wendy: 17:23

That is some unbelievably sick shit, and I wonder if this dude was thinking to himself. I wonder how far I can get these clowns to go, unless he's doing something. What he perceived to be like spiritual in his head and he's like well, a newbous is the light bringer in the after world.

Tiffany: 17:40

It's weird man. I think you're trying to prove that the women were less than dogs yes and that they were just something that he could do to get them to do whatever he wanted to. To number one, to knock down their dignity and number two, to maintain that control.

wendy: 17:58

Right, exactly, and by in seeing how far he could push them.

Tiffany: 18:03

Yeah.

wendy: 18:04

And that I mean that to me seems like the most suspicious psychological culprit in this, but the other one could be, if it was deeper than that, that he was. You know what the dog is indicative of in mythology, but I don't think so. I mean he is professing it's some cook. Right, exactly, for real.

Tiffany: 18:24

The prison guards were warned against having sex with the girls because they gave an incurable type of chlamydia that's only found in dogs to Juan Flynn. And it wasn't. No, yeah, but it wasn't, it wasn't proven, without a doubt, but they could only speculate because that type of chlamydia was just from dogs. Wow, I mean I can't say like, like I said, without 100%, I'm not 100%, you know, like I can't say that's like an absolute fact, but you know, I mean you put two and two together it makes three. Yeah, actually wait, I love you too.

wendy: 19:10

Wow, dude, this is not you. Where's my friend? I know it makes four okay.

Tiffany: 19:21

Oh man. So the first day of the trial Bansa tried to escape. The plan was to slip into a manhole after he was taken to the courthouse. Then he could like, navigate through the sewer systems and find himself to freedom. The family had plans to blow up the oil towers nearby as a distraction. But because the supposedly this is what the author of the family he said he went to authorities. When he heard the news, which at the time was a rumor, and the escape attempt was thwarted, leslie Van Hooten fired her attorney but then hired Manson's old attorney. He was afraid to represent her because you know he was getting death threats and shit. But when he found out that Manson okayed he was working for Leslie, he agreed to represent her.

Tiffany: 20:09

Now it was rumored that empty tape sleeves had contained a porno that Roman Polanski taped with a black man in charan tape. Normally I wouldn't mention this kind of stuff, but it kind of plays into something that I'll talk about later. The strange thing was that Manson and his family had ties to the group that was hanging with the Polanskis and Manson knew about the film that Polanski had made called Rosemary's Baby. Manson and Fitzgerald had a conversation about how sick Polanski was, which came out many years later that he was a known pedophile and swinger. Manson asked Fitzgerald what was Lobbianca's wife's first name. Fitzgerald responded Rosemary. And Manson smiled eerily at Fitzgerald but said nothing else. Manson jumped over the table and tried to attack the judge when he was denied permission across examining a witness.

wendy: 21:06

What.

Tiffany: 21:07

Yeah, he was wrestled to the grounds and removed from the courtroom.

wendy: 21:11

That is the king of the courtroom, the judge yeah, he didn't care.

Tiffany: 21:16

He was upset that he couldn't cross examine that witness, so he was like he didn't like anybody else being the king in the room.

wendy: 21:21

That was the problem with the judge. He's the messiah's son and he's like oh really, you think you have all the power in here.

Tiffany: 21:28

Oh yeah, well, of course. Yeah, he's a little ego, it's a little Napoleon ego.

wendy: 21:32

A little tiny sidebar. I just want to say that I've never met a single judge that I did not like. I've met so many lawyers I didn't like and I know they started that way. But the ones that make it to the hierarchy of the courtroom, so far as I can tell, I've all been brilliant and bullshit detectors, All of them. I'm so lucky.

Tiffany: 21:51

The girls were also removed when they started chanting in Latin in unison. The prosecution wouldn't allow the girls to testify because it would show that Manson wasn't culpable for the killings. They believed that Manson had instructed the girls to testify in such a way that he would be able to save himself in the end. Manson claimed that he never told Linda Kassabian that she had to go to the Tate-Labyanka houses, that she could have stayed behind but chose to go. He took no accountability for his followers and acted as if they all did this out of their own free will. Manson had gotten a hold of a copy of a current newspaper which flashed the headline Manson Guilty, nixon Declars, and he held it up for the judge and jury to prove that he was being persecuted in the headlines. Before the conclusion of the trial, unbeknownst to Manson, the jurors bus had the windows soaked so that they couldn't see any of the headlines on the passing newsstands. But it was a good try.

Tiffany: 22:51

Patricia Crenwinkel was the most active participant in the murders and said that she felt nothing when she stabbed Abigail Folger. She stayed very loyal to Charles throughout the years and even likened Charles to Pan, like the Pan in his pan pipes kind of Pan saying that the rest of them were his nymphs running around with flowers in their hair. And she was quoted as saying I wake up every day knowing I'm a destroyer of the most precious thing which is life, and I do that because that's what I deserve. To wake up every morning and know that, and I don't know if I should hate her for saying that or to be like okay, well, at least you're taking accountability, because I feel like it's, or.

wendy: 23:34

I understand. I get a mixed set of emotions with that too. It's like on one hand, I feel like, wow, she's really being accountable for what she's done, but I hate what she's saying, yeah, like I'm the destroyer of the most precious thing.

Tiffany: 23:49

It's almost like she's likening herself to like God.

wendy: 23:52

Right? Well, not only that, but the fact that I think it connotates defiling innocence to at least for me it does because it has that same set of mentality. So I look at it like that's a really gross and horrible fucking thing to think or feel or say. But the fact that you're able to own it is at least one sliver of commendable At least. Yeah, I am a piece of shit. That's what she's like. Yes, she's not being like oh, I'm not a piece of shit at all, I didn't do it at all. She's like I'm a piece of shit.

Tiffany: 24:24

Yeah, a little bit. I feel like there's still a little bit of that God complex in there though too. Oh, definitely so. Tex Watson he was the main participant in the Tate Lobbianca murders. Patricia Crenwinkle was the most active which she was but Tex Watson was the main participant. He kind of facilitated everything and he told the girls like what to do, when to do it. He was like their little drill sergeant, and he also was very active in murder too. During these attacks he sounds like his right hand man. He was, yeah. When he entered the Tate's resident he was quoted as saying I am the devil and I'm here to do the devil's business, which we talked about earlier in the last episode. He made statements that killing them was funny because they were running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

Tiffany: 25:11

Tex was never charged in the Shea murder, even though he participated in it. He was given seven life sentences and he had since renounced Manson and has become an ordained minister in prison Wow, holy shit. And he married and fathered four children before conjugal visits were abolished. Holy shit, yeah. So even like got married and had kids while he was in prison. He also co-wrote a book called Will you Die For Me, and it was about his experience in the family. Terry Melcher had to seek therapy for the murders because he thought he was the target, being that the police told him that early in the investigation, but later he found out that he wasn't the target and that Manson had no ill will against him after all.

Tiffany: 25:56

A shocking revelation was a speculation after the family claimed that Manson was Sharon Tate's baby dad, although that didn't hold up. There was evidence that the two visited the same doctor, who was described as a doctor feel good, but ultimately there was no concrete evidence that those claims were even remotely true. In total, charles Manson and his followers were convicted of some, if not all, of the nine murders, which included the Tate Lobbianca murders and those of Gary Hinman and Donald Shorty Shea. All four were sentenced to death.

Tiffany: 26:28

However, there were several other strange and brutal deaths that had been linked to both Manson and the members of his family. In fact, the LAPD believes that the family could have claimed up to at least 12 more victims. Cliff Shepard, a former LAPD robbery homicide division detective, said that Manson repeatedly claimed to have killed many others. For instance, the prosecutor Stephen K once stated I know that Manson one time told one of his cellmates that he was responsible for 35 murders. So here are some of the other murders that were linked to the Manson family. There were a couple others, but I cut them out because if I didn't think that they were strong enough, I dropped them from this list, because some of them just seemed like they were grasping at straws, while other ones seemed a bit more likely.

wendy: 27:20

Something that I've noticed when you and I do these podcasts that incorporate like 10 or more murders, there are always those shit slingers that try to throw their murders in the same pile.

Tiffany: 27:31

Yeah, and I mean it's possible that you know other people were killed during these, during these things, but I don't, I don't know if all these are attributed to them. Nancy Warren, 64, and Clyda Dullaney, 24, were both found near Ukaya, california, at the antique store owned by Warren on October 13, 1968. They had both been beaten and strangled to death with 36 leather thongs. After the family members were arrested, they became suspects in the crime, which I understand, that murder being tied to them because in like a couple of the other murders that they committed, they use leather thongs to tie them up. Plus, they had, you know, ties to that biker gang who used to hang out at the leather shop that they had the leather pieces made for them. So if that makes sense to me, that ends up, I agree, and they were in the area when the murders occurred and the leather thongs were also used, like I said in the lobby on the murders. So no one was ever charged in those murders and it still remains an open investigation.

Tiffany: 28:33

Marina Elizabeth Habes, 17, was murdered on December 30, 1968. And, according to the autopsy report, habes body was found fully clothed, with the exception of one shoe lying nearby. Her throat had been slashed and she had received numerous knife wounds to the chest. She suffered multiple contusions to the face and throat and she had been garaded. No alcohol or barbiturates were found in her blood. A former Manson family associate claimed members of the family had known Habes and it was eluded that she had been one of their victims.

Tiffany: 29:08

But again, it can't be proven. Darwin Morrill Scott, 64, was the uncle of Manson and the brother of Manson's father, colonel Scott. On May 27, 1969, scott was found brutally stabbed to death in his Ashland Kentucky apartment. His body was pinned to the kitchen floor with a butcher knife and he had been stabbed 19 times. After Manson's arrest it was reported that the local residents claimed to have seen a man resembling Manson using the alias Preacher in the area at the time. Darwin was murdered. Manson was on parole in California at the time of the murder, but the murder occurred when Manson was out of touch with his parole officers and he knew them. So I mean that's another one that was tied to him again never proven because you know they don't have evidence that one seems pretty close to home though.

wendy: 29:59

Yeah, that, especially that third one, at least for me.

Tiffany: 30:03

Mark Waltz, 16, was an acquaintance of the family members and was even known to associate with them at Spawn Ranch. On July 17, 1969, waltz hitchhiked to Santa Monica pier so that he could go fishing. His fishing pole was found abandoned at the pier and his body was found the next day near Mahalan Drive. His face had been brutally bludgeoned and he had been shot three times in the chest. Though the family was reportedly shocked by Waltz's murder, waltz's brother was convinced that Manson was responsible for his death and even called him in order to directly accuse him of the murder. The Los Angeles Sheriff's Department investigated Spawn Ranch in regard to Waltz's murder, but no links were found and the murder again was never solved. I mean, I wouldn't say it's like 100%, but I mean he did hang out with them and he did hang out on Spawn Ranch. So I'm on the fence with that one. Yeah, I know I'm not 100% with that one, but it's. It is coincidental that he did hang out with the family prior to his death.

wendy: 31:04

Yes, coincidental and possible, but probable, probably not. Probably not.

Tiffany: 31:09

Yeah, exactly yeah. John Philip Zero Haught, 22, was an Ohio native who had moved to California and met Manson in the summer of 1969. He joined the Manson family and was amongst the group who was arrested in the October raid of the Klan for the Tate-Labyanca murders. Manson suspected him of being an informant. On November 5th 1969, haught was associating with some of the members of the family, including Bruce Davis, who had been involved in the killing of Donald Shea on Manson's orders.

Tiffany: 31:45

Just two months prior, and according to all other family members present, haught suddenly found a gun in the room, picked it up and promptly shot himself while attempting a game of Russian roulette. However, according to Jeff Ginn's book Manson, when the police investigated the death, they found that the gun contained seven bullets and one spent shell. Moreover, the gun had been wiped free of prints. Despite this, the police concluded that Haught had actually killed himself, and a witness said that they saw one of the female family members in the room holding the gun in her hand, but nothing came of it. Fucking LAP day. I'll tell you what.

wendy: 32:23

That's because his people went into the police department and scared them, oh my god.

Tiffany: 32:28

Well, let me tell you something right now. If you are playing Russian roulette and free youngins that don't know what that game is you put one bullet in the chamber and you stick into a revolver, of course, and you spin it and then you take a shot and it's not a fun game because you're probably somebody's gonna die. But if you're gonna play Russian roulette, you're not gonna fill the whole chamber up with all six bullets. Now in this gun it said seven. So I don't know if this is like an odd number chamber or something, but it had seven bullets in it, which I thought was very odd. I didn't even know they made revolvers with seven bullets.

wendy: 33:00

You know there's some fun dangerous things to do, like climb up obnoxious things, and I'm totally into that. But people playing Russian roulette unless they definitely have a suicide wish, or that game where you put your palm against a table and have somebody stab between your fingers Stabbed yeah, had you done, stab between your fingers.

Tiffany: 33:21

I've done it. I've done that game.

wendy: 33:23

I mean, I have done it with my own hand. I've never done it with anyone else's, nor would I trust anybody else with a knife in front of other people.

Tiffany: 33:31

I've never had anybody do it to me.

wendy: 33:33

No, I would never let somebody do that to me and I would never let myself do it to somebody else, and I have stabbed myself when. I was doing it. It's just one of those games like the two of them, I'm like why?

Tiffany: 33:46

Well, you really do it when you're drunk and that's like the worst time to play with knives. You're not wrong so. So James Sharp and Doreen Gull were found stabbed to death in an alley on November 7th 1969. The police noted the similarities of the LaBianca murders and that of the two victims. The stabbings were overkill and the pair were found very close to where the LaBiancas lived. Plus, gull was rumored to have been an ex-girlfriend of Bruce Davis, a Manson family member. Bruce denied knowing her and without any evidence the case went on sale.

Tiffany: 34:21

On November 8th 1972, the body of 26-year-old Vietnam Marine combat veteran James LT Willett was found by a hiker in uh Gurnaville, cali. He had been forced to dig his own grave and then he was shot. He was missing his hand and his head, most likely from scavenging animals. They don't think he was actually decapitated. His station wagon was found outside of the Stockton House where the family was living. Police forced their way into the home and arrested the people inside, including three family members, squeaky Fromm, priscilla Cooper and Nancy Pittman, and in the house they found the deceased body of James' wife, lauren. What, yeah, her cause of death was a gunshot wound to the head and she was buried in the basement. The family claimed that she was killed by accident, but later it was revealed that they feared that she would have told who had killed her husband. Michael Monfort pleaded guilty to murdering uh Renny Willett and relatedly Priscilla Cooper, james Craig and Nancy Pittman pleaded guilty as accessories after the fact, monfort and William Groucher or, I'm sorry, william Goucher later pleaded guilty to the murder of James Willett and James Craig pleaded guilty as an accessory after the fact the group had been living in the house with the Willetts while committing various robberies. James Willett was not part of the robberies and it was theorized that he was killed so that he didn't talk about the robberies.

Tiffany: 35:49

According to the Manson family, the arrest of Bobby Boussileal for the murder of Gary Himan is what started the murder spray. Drew and Capote's interviews with Bobby confirmed this account. Ed Sanders and Paul Krasner uncovered information that Joel Rostow was the boyfriend of Seabring's receptionist and had delivered mescaline and cocaine to Seabring and Frigowski at the Tate's house a few hours before the murders. During the Manson trial, rostow and other associates of Seabring were murdered, which insinuates that there was more to it than just the location of the murders. So the murder before with James Willett, I believe the Manson family killed him. Charlie Manson didn't, but the Manson family members, I believe, did. It's pretty much proven because some of them got arrested.

Tiffany: 36:36

And here, when we were talking about earlier the stuff with Roman Polanski and Charlie Manson saying stuff about him, because he was later found out to be a pedophile and a swinger, they also did a bunch of drugs. They hang out, they party, they did drugs. It's Hollywood, old Hollywood. So we got mescaline, which we talked about in the other episode. Quite a few of the Manson family members were selling mescaline. So here's the theories of motive, because that's what I was alluding to. Now that we're moving away from the murders that were linked to the family and we're now talking about how the mescaline and the mescaline that was being sold at the ranch kind of ties these two things together, that maybe there was more to the CLO Drive murders than just the location of it, which we talked about. Quite a few of these theories throughout the four part podcast.

Tiffany: 37:34

People have been trying to understand the Manson murders for years. Scholars, armchair detectives and celebrities have vocalized their theories through many platforms. Even Charles Manson himself said the police had gotten it all wrong. So which one's right? So I compiled six theories to date. Some sound plausible and have evidence to corroborate some of the information and others seem a bit far-fetched. So here we go. The first theory is the drug burn theory. In the beginning of the investigation police definitely thought that drugs were involved in the Tate killings, mainly because they found MDA in Abigail Folger's bloodstream and also in uh, I can't ever say his name, so we're gonna say his last name Frikowski's urine.

Tiffany: 38:16

August 5th 1969, four days before the murders, 22 people plus Folger and Frikowski joined up for some satanic gathering where it was said that a man was seized, stripped and tied nude to a post. Folger and Frikowski explained that he was being punished for 2k, aka a dope burn, allegedly giving poor quality drugs to JC Brang. The man was whipped and humiliated in a drug-fueled orgy. These allegations were first aired by Dennis Hopper in an interview with some no-name, non-sourced LA paper. Then again all these allegations of sex and torture were brought up again by both. Bobby Boosaliel when speaking with Truman Capote. He said they burned people on dope deals, sharon Tate and that whole gang.

Tiffany: 39:06

They picked up kids on the strip and took them home and whipped them, made movies of it, asked the cops. They found the movies, not that they'd tell you the truth. That kind of scares me, though. I mean, I don't want to like talk about victims, like that, you know, but where we idolize people and people aren't always good people, and some people have some dark ass secrets, and if she was dating a fucking pedophile which she was, because he skipped out of the country to get away from charges of pedophilia, then it wouldn't be far-fetched for them to have been picking kids that were underage up off the strip, bringing them home, tying them up in some fucking room and filming it, because he was a fucking sick piece of shit, right, yeah, we don't know that for a fact, but we're just saying what people have interviewed about, and it is appausable.

wendy: 39:56

Yeah, it is. Honestly, I think once you get to a certain level of black, there's no way that you can convince me that you don't have the fundamental, the lack of fundamentals, I should say, to do some of those types of things, and dating a known pedophile who had to skip the fucking country that that's right there in that blackness. It's like hey demon, come here.

Tiffany: 40:18

Exactly and like ever since the ebbsene shit, nothing ebbsene that Gisling Maxwell or whatever, nothing phases me anymore, especially if you know some girl who's like new in the business is dating this well-known screenplay writer you know what I mean and she's gonna do whatever she can.

wendy: 40:36

Yeah, she's young vulnerable with these big dreams that he undoubtedly you know yeah, I totally do, and that's such as the fucking life in Hollywood and it epstein, that whole situation that burns a hole in my stomach when I think about it. It blows my mind. I don't even know if I could even do that on any of our podcasts. I find it so damn upsetting.

Tiffany: 41:00

Yeah, I don't talk about that. I can't do that. I don't want to have to.

wendy: 41:02

You know why? Because it's unsolved. It is so it is so unsolved and it's right there in our face, it's unsolved and we can't do shit about it. Exactly, at least, this was, you know, trialed back in the day and it's in hindsight the epstein thing is like right in our faces right now.

Tiffany: 41:20

The police denied these claims, but it was supposedly confirmed that there was a pseudo-masochistic torture devices in the room when Sharon Tate's loft. According to an interview article with Ed Sanders in People Magazine titled Inside Sharon Tate's Wild Sex Life with Roman Polanski, new book claims director forced wife to have threesomes make sex tapes for his friends. It was revealed and corroborated that Tate's husband and movie director, roman Polanski, was a dominating force in her life, urging her to fulfill his sexual fantasies by taking drugs and participating in affairs, orgies and home sex videos that he would later play for his friends of parties. At first I thought, like I said earlier, it was some kind of smear campaign on the victim, but then, when I learned all this stuff, I learned that Roman Polanski had been accused of sexual assault by five women. He admitted to having an appetite for teenage girls and since has been convicted of a sexual assault of a 13-year-old girl. So this theory to me isn't that far-fetched. And it's no secret that when he was with Sharon Tate he was known to have a thing for teenage girls then too.

Tiffany: 42:31

Theory number two was Helter Skelter, which we talked about during the podcast. The race war was to be incited. The black man would rise up, the Beatles were telling man's and they get ready for the apocalypse. This theory was the main theory that was used in court, and this is one of the theories that Charles Manson said that they got wrong. I do think that he used this theory, though, in order to keep control of his group when he felt like he was losing control of them by putting this fantastical thing out there, because after a while, you know you've got to come up with something new and give them a reason to stick around. Especially when they're falling off here and there. You can't just let them go.

Tiffany: 43:10

Theory number three Terry Melcher. This theory was also used a lot in the murder. Manson felt slighted because of the business deal that he and Terry Melcher had and decided to do the Tate-Lobby-Uncle murders. These two places symbolized all that was going wrong with Manson's music career, his life and motivation, and that motivation was to scare Melcher into keeping his word about this record deal, a plausible one, being that Terry Melcher lived in the house at one time, also that the Lobby-Uncles lived next door to Kaufman's friend, and Kaufman was the one who told Charlie about his connections in the music business while Charlie was in prison before the murders. So the location may have been something to do with this or where he could have just told the group theory two, which was Heltrathelter, and in his mind was run in theory three, which was revenge.

wendy: 44:03

I think that one. I'm a little bit on the fence with two. I do believe that he might have some, you know, spiteful, vengeful tendencies in him, but I think it. I don't know. I'm on the fence with that one. There's just not. There's not enough substantiating it for me, but still, I think that this person's crazy enough to do anything.

Tiffany: 44:23

See, the cops went with theory two, which was Heltrathelter right, and that's what he told his group that they were doing was inciting a race war, and that's what they actually testified to in court.

wendy: 44:33

Oh yeah, I believe definitely they were doing that part.

Tiffany: 44:35

Yeah, but like in his mind was he running theory three, which was he was pissed off at Terry Melcher for not signing him. He told his group members about the supposed race war so that they would just do what he wanted them to do, which is get revenge on these people. That's what. That's what I thought about, and I was like that seems pretty plausible, because if you're that like fucking egotistical and you want to control over everyone, you might tell them one thing and then have them run in some fucking covert operation that they don't even know about, that they're not even privy to.

wendy: 45:09

Heck, you know, I can see him doing that, I can see him having the capacity to do that, but with everything else he was doing too, I mean, it's like I said, it is possible, but I just think he had so many things elsewise going on at that time.

Tiffany: 45:23

Yeah well, I mean, that's what the cops went with. I feel like those two things are probably the most logical ones, but he says that they got it wrong, so there must be something that we're missing.

wendy: 45:35

Yeah, that's what it feels like with me too. Like, yeah, Now, not just that you know he says that they got it wrong, but also they've already like admitted to so many things and been caught for so many things. Yeah, that would be added to that pile. There'd be no reason to deny it.

Tiffany: 45:51

Theory number five, revelation nine. This theory states that Manson's drug-addled ideology, mixed with the Beatles and drizzled with Christian ideology, ultimately led to the demise of the Tatelom Yonka murders. I'm not going to recite like how they did this, but they literally took line for line, revelation nine and ripped it apart and then came up with some insane connection between the Beatles helter-skelter song and the passages. I'm not going to read Revelation nine because it's really long and that would take an entire episode in itself. But if you want to go over it and see what I'm talking about, go to CharlesMansoncom and it breaks it down for you line by line and you can reference it later for your own amusement.

wendy: 46:37

I think nine was when they were talking about the fifth angel sounding off his trumpet. I love the re-. I don't know why I have an affinity for the revelations. My favorite is Revelation 17, but I loosely know the ones before and after it as well.

Tiffany: 46:54

Well, it's a long one so I'm going to leave it up to listeners to go research it themselves. But that one I found a little too fantastical for me and I didn't feel like that revelation. And the Beatles song, I didn't see how that was like a real strong theory. Now this one here, I think, is the most fantastical of all but worth talking about. This is theory number six, the false flag patsy theory. The theory is that the Republican Party wanted to show hippies as dirty and evil and in order to do that the feds kept releasing Charles Manson into society, even though they shouldn't have intentionally sent out to bring the end of the hippie revolution.

wendy: 47:39

I absolutely believe that one.

Tiffany: 47:42

I don't know. See that one sounds too fucking creepy.

wendy: 47:44

You know what it is is. I don't trust our government whatsoever. And you know, when you think of the hypothesis about John Lennon getting shot because he was promoting love and peace and anti-war no, mother Teresa was at that around about that time. She was like go to a peace rally, not an anti-war, because she was learning a little bit from the manifesters next door with the Hindus while she was doing her thing. Mother Teresa had a lot of that going on and I feel like John Lennon was promoting some of that in his music and he was allegedly shot for that.

wendy: 48:21

And so when I think of how the government's favorite thing to do in this entire fucking world is to pit people against each other using the politics of fear. So if there's this dude and he looks like a hippie and he's out there doing evil shit, it's like they're going to jump on that. They're going to jump on all these anti-government liberals as hard as they can. They're doing it still to this day regarding things of liberal nature. They'll take the worst example of a liberal person and they'll be like they're all just like this.

Tiffany: 48:59

Yeah, but I feel like they, like I don't think they would have facilitated that to happen. I feel like yes, yes, okay, yes, I agree. I don't think they're saying yeah and this, they're saying that they facilitated. The CIA fucking facilitated this.

wendy: 49:13

Oh, they made it all happen so that they could do that yeah.

Tiffany: 49:17

Oh no, that's why I said it sounds nuts Like I yeah?

wendy: 49:20

no, I don't believe that at all. I think that they jumped on it after it was done.

Tiffany: 49:24

The theory goes that the summer of love brought about drugs and anti-war protesters that were taking it to the White House. That movement was a sociological threat to the government and it was wildly claimed that Charles Manson was released onto the street to put an end to the hippie movement by the CIA. Is that after the murders occurred in 1969, the movement ended? I did find this one fantastical. I'm not a ten-hout wearing conspiracy theorist, but I do know that the government does a lot of shady shit.

wendy: 49:56

Yeah, but when the government does shit like that, they usually have better government funding than him having to be a drifter and living on other people's properties and shit the way he did.

Tiffany: 50:06

That's what I'm saying Like it's like, if you're going to facilitate it, you're not just going to let him walk around aimlessly, no, you're going to finance it.

wendy: 50:14

Yeah Right, I mean, the government loves financing whore more than the academic system.

Tiffany: 50:21

Exactly, and the Manson family always claims the copycat theory.

Tiffany: 50:26

The police mixed the theory of Helter Skelter and the Terry Melcher theory and I think it was all three. The Manson family talked about Helter Skelter, manson was angry with Melcher, wanted revenge and they also wanted to get Bobby out of prison. So it's very possible that those three theories combined are the true motives for the Manson family. And that's what I mean is like the third one would be the copycat theory. They wanted Bobby Bucilio out of prison so they made these copycat murders, ie the Tate-Labyanka murders, while Bobby was in prison, so that they could say, look, bobby didn't kill those people and then he would get set free and their Manson family member would be out of jail. So that seems plausible to me. So that, mixed with those other two theories, makes a lot of sense to me, even if you mix it a little bit with the Sharon Tate, roman Polanski being a dirty philanderer. One or two, just like a little tad of each one of those, because I feel like they all are kind of connected and it's not one theory. I feel like it's a mishmash.

wendy: 51:32

Yeah, you're not wrong. It feels like there's parts to each theory that are true. If you take out like a few of the elements of each, you could probably integrate them and then transition properly into one theory.

Tiffany: 51:45

The aftermath, in 1972, the death sentences were commuted to life in prison. Big surprise, manson joined the Aryan Brotherhood, imprisoned by means of injection, so for a little bit he was protected by them, as long as he played bottom to a daddy in the Brotherhood. On September 5, 1979, squeaky Fromm attempted to assassinate President Gerald Ford. She was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. She was the first person sentenced under Title 18, chapter 84, which made it a federal crime to attempt to assassinate the President of the United States. In December of 1987, fromm escaped from prison in West Virginia and she heard that Manson was dying from testicular cancer and was trying to get to him. She was apprehended by authorities within days and then was released on parole in 2009.

Tiffany: 52:40

In 2007, afton Burton corresponded and started visiting Charles in prison. She claimed that she believes he is innocent and they needed to marry so that she could get a hold of his information easier. Afton runs a few pro-Manson websites and in one photo had an ex caught into her forehead. She eerily resembles Susan Atkins and when it was brought to her attention she called Susan Atkins a crazy fucking bitch and then started mocking her by saying I did this for you, charlie, and then states that she didn't know what she was doing. Afton's parents do not like Charlie, but they won't disown their daughter. It seems as though she is a Mansonite and kind of, like you know, wanted to be a family member. I don't know, I just think she has like hyperstaphilia.

wendy: 53:31

Have we learned about that one a few episodes ago?

Tiffany: 53:33

Yeah, the two were engaged, but Manson said that he wasn't going to get married to her and that it was all garbage for public consumption and true Manson style.

wendy: 53:45

He gave her the shut the fuck up ring, as Tiffany calls it.

Tiffany: 53:48

Yeah, that's what he did. Yeah, susan Atkins died in prison in 2009 after losing her battle with brain cancer. While she was dying, she challenged the terms of her incarceration so that she could be released to die outside of prison walls. She was denied and passed away without ever seeing the light of day. On November 19, 2017, charles Manson died from a heart attack and colon cancer at 83 years old. He never married Afton Burton, nor would he give her permission to have his dead body. Weirdly enough, she asked him if she could have his body.

Tiffany: 54:25

No, so that she could display it in a museum, because that's what we need To immortalize a filthy, fucking little cult leader who facilitated one of the most notorious mass murders in history.

wendy: 54:40

Wow, these sick fucks. I was talking about our podcast to one of my clients today this little old lady who I absolutely love, by the way and I said one of the main things we do on our podcast is the opposite of what idolized serial killers would want to hear.

Tiffany: 55:01

Yeah, I don't like people like that either. I think it's fucking weird. Ever since this whole, I did this case because of Leslie Van Hooten and everybody's been blowing the internet up about Charles Manson because of the Leslie Van Hooten being released from prison. And these fucking kids know nothing about Charles Manson, just his pictures and stuff that they like quick little articles that they read and maybe a documentary if they even researched it. And they're saying all kinds of stuff on the internet about how fucking hot he was and how great he was and blah, blah, blah and the Manson women and how they want to be like him. And I'm like are you stupid?

wendy: 55:44

There's a couple screws missing. There has to be. It's either information missing or screws missing. It can't be. It could be both.

Tiffany: 55:53

Yeah, a few French fries, short of a happy man, oh my God.

wendy: 55:59

Not the sharpest knife in the box.

Tiffany: 56:02

On January 3rd 2019, Robert Boussileal was paroled and considered a low risk to reoffend. Patricia Crenwinkel did an interview with the New York Times about how she was able to mentally break free from Charles Manson. It actually had me in tears because it was the most heartfelt and heartbreaking thing I'd ever heard an inmate say, and let me preface this by saying that this girl was brainwashed, mentally beaten, drugged, isolated. Every belief she had came from Charles Manson, just like many of the cult followers, and once behind bars, she was then taken away from her source. At that moment, she had to face herself. She was used to giving her energy, every ounce of it and of who she was, over to Charles Manson. When she was on death row, she was left to face what she did, which was senseless, unforgivable and unnecessary. The takeaway was that she had to think for herself, make her own choices, and that was the cost. And the cost was at the lives of others, and while normally I'm a cold, savage bitch when it comes to criminals, and especially when it comes to murders and stuff when it comes to cult members, I'm a bit more forgiving In that interview. She wasn't asking to get out or for people to pity her. She took full responsibility for her actions and really spoke about what she was feeling inside, which choked me up because of how young these girls were and how old Charles Manson was. Some of the girls that he was sexually assaulting were as little as 14 years old. He was in his 30s and these were children he was molding, Using mind-altering drugs, isolation, psychological tactics, and these girls didn't stand a fucking chance. And in no way am I excusing the actions of Patricia Crenwinkle because she deserves to be in prison for what she did and deserves to feel remorse. What made me feel for her is that so many women are manipulated by older men through fear and isolation, and she's still currently in prison and is 75 years old.

Tiffany: 58:12

Leslie Van Hooten was released on parole at 73 years old on July 11, 2023. A family member of JC Brink said that they think that the governor should have challenged the release. The state didn't overturn it and they let it pass through. Leslie's attorney said that her client has gone through courses to confront what she did, to take responsibility for what she did, along with 40 years of psyche vow to gain parole. While I think she should still be in prison, I also think at her age. She doesn't really pose a threat to society either. I mean, she's like 73, you know Most people don't live past 80, and she served over 50 years in prison. Those are laws too, so she did her time, you know. So what can you do?

wendy: 59:06

While I feel horrible and do not empathize with her in regards to the actions that she chose to commit and I already explained that, like there are parts of me that think that that level of brainwashing is prevalent I think she has not had one day out of prison since she met Charles Manson until now.

Tiffany: 59:30

When she was in there, she learned a lot of stuff and she became a tutor. She helped other inmates. She was very empathetical. She showed empathy. I mean, for years they talked about the amount of empathy that she had shown. And not only that, but Leslie Van Hooten was the one that stabbed Rosemary LaBianca post-mortem she was dead already in the back. She did help hold her down, while Tex, I think, stabbed her, or Susan Atkins I'm not sure which one, but she didn't kill anyone.

Tiffany: 1:00:11

Well, wendy's internet went out, so I'm going to end it here and I want to say thank you guys for listening. If you'd like to check us out on Facebook, instagram, twitter, youtube or TikTok, then you can find us under Rogue and Wicked Podcast. If you'd like to join our Patreon and become a subscriber, then you can find us at wwwpatreoncom. Our Tier 1 listeners get pictures, polls and exclusive content. Our Tier 2 listeners get all that plus a bonus episode monthly. Our Tier 3 listeners get two bonus episodes monthly and all tiers get a shout out on the pod. Grab a copy of Wendy's book Sage. It's available at roguepoetnet. Any cool stories, questions or case suggestions should be sent to our email at rogueandwickedyahoocom. And don't forget to give us a five-star review on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts. The more reviews that we get, the more pod episodes that we can bring to you you dig. Thanks for listening and until next time.