Real Life Horror - Manson

Charles Manson has finally died.  May his soul be blotted out forever.

Charles Milles Manson (born Charles Milles Maddox, November 12, 1934 – November 19, 2017) was an American criminal and cult leader who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. Manson's followers committed a series of nine murders at four locations in July and August 1969. In 1971 he was found guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for the deaths of seven people – including the actress Sharon Tate – all of which were carried out by members of the group at his instruction. Manson also received first-degree murder convictions for two other deaths. Manson was originally sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment when California invalidated the state's death penalty statute in 1972. He served out life sentences at California State Prison in Corcoran.

Manson believed in what he called "Helter Skelter", a term he took from the Beatles' song of the same name. Manson believed Helter Skelter to be an impending apocalyptic race war, which he described in his own version of the lyrics to the Beatles' song. He believed the murders would help precipitate that war. From the beginning of his notoriety, a pop culture arose around him in which he ultimately became an emblem of insanity, violence and the macabre.

At the time the Family began to form, Manson was an unemployed former convict, who had spent half of his life in correctional institutions for a variety of offenses. Before the murders, he was a singer-songwriter on the fringe of the Los Angeles music industry, chiefly through a chance association with Dennis Wilson, drummer and founding member of the Beach Boys. After Manson was charged with the crimes of which he was later convicted, recordings of songs written and performed by him were released commercially. Various musicians have coveredsome of his songs.

The Tate murders were a series of notorious and brutal killings conducted by members of the Manson Family on August 8–9, 1969, which claimed the lives of five people, one of them pregnant. Four members of the Family invaded the home of married celebrity couple, actress Sharon Tate and director Roman Polanski at 10050 Cielo Drive in Los Angeles. They murdered Tate (who was eight and a half months pregnant), along with three friends who were visiting at the time, and an 18-year-old visitor, who was slain as he was departing the home. Polanski was not present on the night of the murders as he was working on a film in Europe.

The murders were carried out by Tex Watson under the direction of Charles Manson. Watson drove, with Susan Atkins, Linda Kasabian, and Patricia Krenwinkel, from Spahn Ranch to the residence on Cielo Drive. Manson, an aspiring musician, had previously attempted to enter into a recording contract with record producer Terry Melcher, who was a previous renter of the house along with musician Mark Lindsay and Melcher's then-girlfriend, actress Candice Bergen. Melcher had snubbed Manson, leaving him disgruntled.

Murder of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca[edit]

LaBianca murders
Date	August 10, 1969

The next night of August 10, 1969, six Family members — Leslie Van Houten, Steve "Clem" Grogan, and the four from the previous night — drove out on Manson's orders. Displeased by the panic of the victims at Cielo Drive, Manson accompanied the six, "to show them how to do it."^{[1]:176–184, 258–269[42]} After a few hours' ride, in which he considered a number of murders and even attempted one of them,^{[1]:258–269[42]} Manson gave Kasabian directions that brought the group to 3301 Waverly Drive. This was the home of supermarket executive Leno LaBianca and his wife, Rosemary, a dress shop co-owner.^{[1]:22–25, 42–48} Located in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles, it was next door to a house at which Manson and Family members had attended a party the previous year.^{[1]:176–184, 204–210}

According to Atkins and Kasabian, Manson disappeared up the driveway and returned to say he had tied up the house's occupants. He then sent Watson up with Krenwinkel and Van Houten.^{[1]:176–184, 258–269} In his autobiography, Watson stated that having gone up alone, Manson returned to take him up to the house with him. After Manson pointed out a sleeping man through a window, the two of them entered through the unlocked back door.^[42] Watson added at trial, he "went along with" the women's account, which he figured made him "look that much less responsible."^[43]

As Watson related it, Manson roused the sleeping Leno LaBianca from the couch at gunpoint and had Watson bind his hands with a leather thong. After Rosemary was brought briefly into the living room from the bedroom, Watson followed Manson's instructions to cover the couple's heads with pillowcases. He bound these in place with lamp cords. Manson left, sending Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten into the house with instructions that the couple be killed.^{[1]:176–184, 258–269[42]}

While Watson cleaned off the bayonet and showered, Krenwinkel wrote "Rise" and "Death to pigs" on the walls and "Healter [sic] Skelter" on the refrigerator door, all in LaBianca's blood. She gave Leno LaBianca 14 puncture wounds with an ivory-handled, two-tined carving fork, which she left jutting out of his stomach. She also planted a steak knife in his throat.^{[1]:176–184, 258–269[42]}

Meanwhile, hoping for a double crime, Manson had gone on to direct Kasabian to drive to the Venice home of an actor acquaintance of hers, another "piggy". Depositing the other three Family members who had departed Spahn with him that evening at the man's apartment building, Manson drove back to Spahn Ranch, leaving them and the LaBianca killers to hitchhike home.^{[1]:176–184, 258–269} Kasabian thwarted this murder by deliberately knocking on the wrong apartment door and waking a stranger. As the group abandoned the murder plan and left, Atkins defecated in the stairwell.^{[1]:270–273}