Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders Page 45

  Only this time it was without Ira Reiner. On July 17, Leslie Van Houten formally requested that Reiner be relieved as her attorney and Ronald Hughes appointed instead.

  After questioning Hughes, Manson, and Van Houten on the possibility of a conflict of interest, Judge Older granted the substitution. Reiner was out, receiving not even so much as a thank-you for the eight months he had devoted to the case. Manson’s former attorney, the “hippie lawyer” Ronald Hughes, with his Santa Claus beard and Walter Slezak suits, became Leslie Van Houten’s attorney of record.

  Ira Reiner had been fired for one reason, and one reason only. He had tried to represent his client to the best of his ability. And he had properly decided that his client was not Charles Manson but Leslie Van Houten.

  There was a slight but perceptible smile on Manson’s face. With good reason. He had succeeded in forming a united defense team. Although Fitzgerald remained its nominal head, it was obvious who was calling the shots.

  On July 21 the six alternates were sworn, and they too were sequestered.* Jury selection had taken five weeks, during which 205 people had been examined and nearly 4,500 pages of transcript accumulated.

  It had been a rough five weeks. Older and I had clashed on several occasions, Reiner and Older even oftener. And Older had threatened four of the attorneys with contempt, carrying through on one.

  Three were for violations of the gag order: Aaron Stovitz was cited for an interview he had given the magazine Rolling Stone; Paul Fitzgerald and Ira Reiner for their quoted remarks in the Los Angeles Times story “TATE SUSPECTS TRY TO SILENCE LAWYERS.” Though Older eventually dropped the contempt citations against all three, Irving Kanarek was less lucky. On July 8 he was seven minutes late to court. He had a valid reason—it was very difficult to find a parking space at the time court convened—but Older, who had previously threatened Kanarek with contempt when he was just three minutes late, was not sympathetic. He ruled Kanarek in contempt and fined him twenty-five dollars.

  While we were busy selecting a jury, two of Manson’s killers were set free.

  Mary Brunner was reindicted and rearrested for the Hinman murder. Her attorneys filed a writ of habeas corpus. Ruling that she had fulfilled the conditions of the immunity agreement, Judge Kathleen Parker granted the writ and Brunner was released.

  Meanwhile, Clem, t/n Steve Grogan, pleaded guilty to a grand theft auto charge stemming from the Barker raid. Van Nuys Judge Sterry Fagan heard the case. He was aware of Grogan’s lengthy rap sheet. Moreover, the probation department, usually very permissive, in this case recommended that Grogan be sentenced to a year in the County Jail. Aaron also informed the judge that Clem was exceedingly dangerous; and that he had not only been along on the night the LaBiancas were killed, but we also had evidence that he had beheaded Shorty Shea. Yet unbelievably enough, Judge Fagan gave Clem straight probation!

  On learning that Clem had returned to the Family at Spahn Ranch, I contacted his probation officer, asking him to revoke Clem’s probation. There was more than ample cause. Among the terms of his probation were that he maintain residence at the home of his parents; seek and maintain employment; not use or possess any narcotics; not associate with known narcotics users. Moreover, he had been seen on several occasions, even photographed, with a knife and a gun.

  His probation officer refused to act. He later admitted to LAPD that he was afraid of Clem.

  Though Bruce Davis had gone underground, most of the other hard-core Family members were very much in evidence. Some dozen of them, including Clem and Mary, haunted the entrances and corridors of the Hall of Justice each day, where they would cast cold, accusing stares at the prosecution witnesses as they arrived to testify.

  The problem of their presence in the courtroom—a concern since Sandy had been found carrying a knife—was solved by Aaron. Prospective witnesses are excluded when other witnesses are testifying. Aaron simply subpoenaed all the known Family members as prosecution witnesses, an act which raised a tremendous furor from the defense but made everyone else breathe a little easier.

  JULY 24–26, 1970

  TATE MURDER TRIAL STARTS TODAY

  HINT PROSECUTION WILL REVEAL

  “SURPRISE MOTIVE”

  SHARON’ S FATHER EXPECTED

  TO BE FIRST WITNESS

  Many of the spectators had been waiting since 6 A.M., hoping to get a seat and a glimpse of Manson. When he was escorted into the courtroom, several gasped. On his forehead was a bloody X. Sometime the previous night he had taken a sharp object and carved the mark in his flesh.

  An explanation was not long forthcoming. Outside court his followers passed out a typewritten statement bearing his name:

  “I have X’d myself from your world…You have created the monster. I am not of you, from you, nor do I condone your unjust attitude toward things, animals, and people that you do not try to understand…I stand opposed to what you do and have done in the past…You make fun of God and have murdered the world in the name of Jesus Christ…My faith in me is stronger than all of your armies, governments, gas chambers, or anything you may want to do to me. I know what I have done. Your courtroom is man’s game. Love is my judge…”

  THE COURT “People vs. Charles Manson, Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Leslie Van Houten.

  “All parties and counsel and jurors are present…

  “Do the People care to make an opening statement?”

  BUGLIOSI “Yes, Your Honor.”

  I began the People’s opening statement—which was a preview of the evidence the prosecution intended to introduce in the trial—by summarizing the charges, naming the defendants, and, after relating what had occurred at 10050 Cielo Drive in the early-morning hours of August 9, 1969, and at 3301 Waverly Drive the following night, identifying the victims.

  “A question you ladies and gentlemen will probably ask yourselves at some point during this trial, and we expect the evidence to answer that question for you, is this:

  “What kind of a diabolical mind would contemplate or conceive of these seven murders? What kind of mind would want to have seven human beings brutally murdered?

  “We expect the evidence at this trial to answer that question and show that defendant Charles Manson owned that diabolical mind. Charles Manson, who the evidence will show at times had the infinite humility, as it were, to refer to himself as Jesus Christ.

  “Evidence at this trial will show defendant Manson to be a vagrant wanderer, a frustrated singer-guitarist, a pseudo-philosopher, but, most of all, the evidence will conclusively prove that Charles Manson is a killer who cleverly masqueraded behind the common image of a hippie, that of being peace loving…

  “The evidence will show Charles Manson to be a megalomaniac who coupled his insatiable thirst for power with an intense obsession for violent death.”

  The evidence would show, I continued, that Manson was the unquestioned leader and overlord of a nomadic band of vagabonds who called themselves the “Family.” After briefly tracing the history and composition of the group, I observed: “We anticipate that Mr. Manson, in his defense, will claim that neither he nor anyone else was the leader of the Family and that he never ordered anyone in the Family to do anything, much less commit these murders for him.”

  KANAREK “Your Honor, he is now making an opening statement for us!”

  THE COURT “Overruled. You may continue, Mr. Bugliosi.”

  BUGLIOSI “We therefore intend to offer evidence at this trial showing that Charles Manson was in fact the dictatorial leader of the Family; that everyone in the Family was slavishly obedient to him; that he always had the other members of the Family do his bidding for him; and that eventually they committed the seven Tate-LaBianca murders at his command.

  “This evidence of Mr. Manson’s total domination over the Family will be offered as circumstantial evidence that on the two nights in question it was he who ordered these seven murders.”

  The principal witness for the prosecution, I told the jury,
would be Linda Kasabian. I then briefly stated what Linda would testify to, interrelating her story with the physical evidence we intended to introduce: the gun, the rope, the clothing the killers wore the night of the Tate murders, and so forth.

  We came now to the question that everyone had been asking since these murders occurred: Why?

  The prosecution does not have the burden of proving motive, I told the jury. We needn’t introduce one single, solitary speck of evidence as to motive. However, when we have evidence of motive we introduce it, because if one has a motive for committing a murder, this is circumstantial evidence that it was he who committed the murder. “In this trial, we will offer evidence of Charles Manson’s motives for ordering these seven murders.”

  If Manson and the defense were waiting to hear the word “robbery,” they’d wait in vain. Instead, Manson’s own beliefs came back at them.

  “We believe there to be more than one motive,” I told the jury. “Besides the motives of Manson’s passion for violent death and his extreme anti-establishment state of mind, the evidence in this trial will show that there was a further motive for these murders, which is perhaps as bizarre, or perhaps even more bizarre, than the murders themselves.

  “Briefly, the evidence will show Manson’s fanatical obsession with Helter Skelter, a term he got from the English musical group the Beatles.

  “Manson was an avid follower of the Beatles and believed that they were speaking to him across the ocean through the lyrics of their songs. In fact, Manson told his followers that he found complete support for his philosophy in the words of those songs…

  “To Charles Manson, Helter Skelter, the title of one of their songs, meant the black man rising up and destroying the entire white race; that is, with the exception of Charles Manson and his chosen followers, who intended to escape from Helter Skelter by going to the desert and living in a bottomless pit, a place that Manson derived from Revelation 9, a chapter in the last book of the New Testament…

  “Evidence from several witnesses will show that Charles Manson hated black people, but that he also hated the white establishment, whom he called ‘pigs.’

  “The word ‘pig’ was found printed in blood on the outside of the front door to the Tate residence.

  “The words ‘death to pigs,’ ‘helter skelter,’ and ‘rise’ were found printed in blood inside the LaBianca residence.

  “The evidence will show that one of Manson’s principal motives for these seven savage murders was to ignite Helter Skelter; in other words, start the black-white revolution by making it look as though the black man had murdered these seven Caucasian victims. In his twisted mind, he thought this would cause the white community to turn against the black community, ultimately leading to a civil war between blacks and whites, a war which Manson told his followers would see bloodbaths in the streets of every American city, a war which Manson predicted and foresaw the black man as winning.

  “Manson envisioned that black people, once they destroyed the entire white race, would be unable to handle the reins of power because of inexperience, and would therefore have to turn over the reins to those white people who had escaped from Helter Skelter; i.e., Charles Manson and his Family.

  “In Manson’s mind, his Family, and particularly he, would be the ultimate beneficiaries of a black-white civil war.

  “We intend to offer the testimony of not just one witness but many witnesses on Manson’s philosophy, because the evidence will show that it is so strange and so bizarre that if you heard it only from the lips of one person you probably would not believe it.”

  Thus far all the emphasis had been on Manson. Convicting Manson was the first priority. If we convicted the others and not Manson, it would be like a war crimes trial in which the flunkies were found guilty and Hitler went free. Therefore I stressed that it was Manson who had ordered these murders, though his co-defendants, obedient to his every command, actually committed them.

  There was a danger in this, however. I was giving the attorneys for the three girls a ready-made defense. In the penalty phase of the trial, they could argue that since Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten were totally under Manson’s domination, they were not nearly as culpable as he, and therefore should receive life imprisonment rather than the death penalty.

  Anticipating long in advance that I’d have to prove the very opposite, I laid the groundwork in my opening statement:

  “What about Charles Manson’s followers, the other defendants in this case, Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Leslie Van Houten?

  “The evidence will show that they, along with Tex Watson, were the actual killers of the seven Tate-LaBianca victims.

  “The evidence will also show that they were very willing participants in these mass murders, that by their overkill tactics—for instance, Rosemary LaBianca was stabbed forty-one times, Voytek Frykowski was stabbed fifty-one times, shot twice, and struck violently over the head thirteen times with the butt of a revolver—these defendants displayed that even apart from Charles Manson, murder ran through their own blood.”

  After mentioning Susan Atkins’ confessions to Virginia Graham and Ronnie Howard; the fingerprint which placed Patricia Krenwinkel at the Tate murder scene; and the evidence which implicated Leslie Van Houten in the LaBianca murders, I observed: “The evidence will show that Charles Manson started his Family in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco in March of 1967. The Family’s demise, as it were, took place in October of 1969 at Barker Ranch, a desolate, secluded, rock-strewn hideout from civilization on the shadowy perimeters of Death Valley. Between these two dates, seven human beings and an eight-and-a-half-month baby boy fetus in the womb of Sharon Tate met their death at the hands of these members of the Family.

  “The evidence at this trial will show that these seven incredible murders were perhaps the most bizarre, savage, nightmarish murders in the recorded annals of crime.

  “Mr. Stovitz and I intend to prove not just beyond a reasonable doubt, which is our only burden, but beyond all doubt that these defendants committed these murders, and are guilty of these murders; and in our final arguments to you at the conclusion of the evidence, we intend to ask you to return verdicts of first degree murder against each of these defendants.”

  Noting that it would be a long trial, with many witnesses, I recalled the old Chinese proverb, “The palest ink is better than the best memory,” urging the jury to take detailed notes to aid them in their deliberations.

  I closed by telling the jury that we felt confident that they would give both the defendants and the People of the State of California the fair and impartial trial to which each was entitled.

  Kanarek had interrupted my opening statement nine times with objections, all of which the Court had overruled. When I finished, he moved that the whole statement be stricken or, failing in that, a mistrial declared. Older denied both motions. Fitzgerald told the press my remarks were “scurrilous and slanderous,” and called the Helter Skelter motive “a truly preposterous theory.”

  I had a strong feeling that by the time of his closing argument to the jury, Paul wouldn’t even bother to argue this.

  The defense reserving its opening statements until after the prosecution had completed its case, the People called their first witness, Colonel Paul Tate.

  With military erectness, Sharon’s father took the stand and was sworn. Though forty-six, he looked younger, and sported a well-trimmed beard. Before entering the courtroom, he had been thoroughly searched, it being rumored that he had vowed to kill Manson. Even though he glanced only briefly at the defendants, and exhibited no discernible reaction, the bailiffs watched him every minute he was in the courtroom.

  Our direct examination was brief. Colonel Tate described his last meeting with Sharon, and identified photos of his daughter, Miss Folger, Frykowski, Sebring, and the house at 10050 Cielo Drive.

  Wilfred Parent, who followed Colonel Tate to the stand, broke down and cried when shown a photograph of his son, Steven.


  Winifred Chapman, the Tate maid, was next. I questioned her in detail about the washing of the two doors; then, wanting to establish a chronology for the jurors, I took her up to her departure from the residence on the afternoon of August 8, 1969, intending to recall her to the stand later so she could testify to her discoveries the next morning.

  On cross-examination Fitzgerald brought out that she hadn’t mentioned washing the door in Sharon’s bedroom until months after the murders, and then she had told this not to LAPD but to me.

  This was to be the start of a pattern. Having questioned each of the witnesses not once but a number of times, I had uncovered a great deal of information not previously related to the police. In many instances I had been the only one who had interviewed the witness. Though Fitzgerald initially planted the idea, Kanarek would nurture it until, in his mind at least, it budded into a full-bloomed conspiracy, with Bugliosi framing the whole case.

  Kanarek had only one question for Mrs. Chapman, but it was a good one. Had she ever seen the defendant Charles Manson before her appearance in court? She replied that she had not.

  Although he had recently married and was not anxious to leave his bride, William Garretson had flown back from his home in Lancaster, Ohio, where he had returned after being released by LAPD. The former caretaker came across as sincere, though rather shy. Although I intended to call both officers Whisenhunt and Wolfer, the former to testify to finding the setting on Garretson’s stereo at between 4 and 5, the latter to describe the sound tests he had conducted, I did question Garretson in detail as to the events of that night, and I felt the jury believed him when he claimed he hadn’t heard any gunshots or screams.

  I asked Garretson: “How loud were you playing your stereo?”

  A. “It was about medium…It wasn’t very loud.”

  This, I felt, was the best evidence Garretson was telling the truth. Had he been lying about hearing nothing, then surely he would have lied and said the stereo was loud.