“To get all of their money and to kill whoever was there.”
“What happened when you arrived at the residence?”
For more than an hour Atkins testified, though less graphically, to the same account that she’d given Ronnie Howard, save one detail. “I remember seeing Sharon Tate struggling with the rope, and Tex told me to take care of her because Katie was asking for help with Abigail, and I saw Tex stab Abigail. When he came back in he told me to kill Sharon and I couldn’t. In order to make a diversion, I grabbed her hand and held her arms and then I saw Tex stab her in the heart area. Then Sharon fell off the couch, to the floor, and all three of us went out the front door.”
“Susan, how did you feel about what you had just done?” Bugliosi asked.
“I almost passed out. I felt as though I had just killed myself. I felt dead. I feel dead now.”
“Susan, in what context would you and the other members of your family use the word pig . . . and helter-skelter?”
“Helter-skelter was to be the last war on the face of the earth. It would be all the wars that have ever been fought, built one on top of the other. Something that no man could conceive of in his imagination. You can’t conceive of what it would be like to see every man judge himself and then take it out on every other man all over the face of the earth. And pig was a word used to describe the establishment.”
An hour after the noon recess, Atkins’s testimony was completed. Following two days of collaborating witnesses, the grand jury indicted Manson, Watson, Krenwinkel, Atkins, and Kasabian for seven counts of murder and one count of conspiracy to commit murder. Leslie Van Houten was indicted for two counts of murder and one count of conspiracy.
P.J.
TWO-NIGHT ORGY OF MURDER TOLD TO THE JURY BY TATE SUSPECT. I gazed at the newspaper headline and the accompanying pictures of the killers while my wife vented over the phone from Texas.
“You know, I’ve been hanging on for months, just thinking when they caught these assholes that I’d feel better,” she cried. “But it hasn’t made a damned bit of difference. All everyone keeps saying is, ‘closure, closure, catching the killers should give you closure’—if I hear one more person say ‘closure,’ I’m going to strangle them. There is no goddamned closure!”
Even though I agreed, I tried to subdue her. “I know, honey, but at least there’ll be some justice done here.”
“How can you say that? Nothing a jury decides is going to bring our daughter home,” she cried bitterly.
“All right, let’s just calm down.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down. I’m madder than hell,” she lashed out. “On top of everything else, the press is starting up again, writing about Sharon being part of a black and white racial war. What are they talking about? Sharon didn’t have anything against Negros.”
“They’re not saying that,” I patiently explained. “It has something to do with Manson ordering his people to kill Sharon. Then they tried to make it look like Negros did it to start a racial war. It’s all nonsense, and you know better than to read the newspapers.”
“Where are they getting this crap from?”
“I don’t know. The DA is digging it all up from Manson’s group. By the time you come home they’ll have some answers.”
“Have you made our reservations?”
“Yes, for the eleventh, after Manson’s arraignment. By then things should calm down with all the media.”
Throughout our conversation, my eyes had never left the newspaper photos of Sharon’s killers. I may have been pacifying her on the phone, but my wife’s anger paled in comparison to mine. I toyed with the pistol lying next to the paper. It was four o’clock. In forty-eight hours, Manson would arrive at the downtown Los Angeles jail.
MY PREDICTION THAT the media’s interest would subside was premature. The funnel cloud of their storm caught the public’s interest, driving them into a frenzy. Everyone wanted to see this monster who had glossed the headlines.
Jake circled the car around for the fourth time. “Jesus, what is this, the fucking witch hunts of Salem? There’s not a parking spot within five miles of the place,” he complained.
I was edgy. “Manson’s supposed to be here in fifteen minutes. You mind waiting in the car?”
“I guess not—on one condition: You leave the heat behind.”
I tried to fool him with a stoic look.
“Come on, I know you’re packing, and it ain’t the way to settle this score. You got a wife and kids coming home today. You do this, and they’ll be fighting this shit alone. Now let’s have it.” He held his hand out for my gun.
I grudgingly laid the pistol on the seat. Before I shut the door he said, “And remember what Helder said: no closer than six feet to him.”
I’d been forced to watch Atkins, Krenwinkel, Van Houten, and Kasabian being brought into Los Angeles via the television news, but I wasn’t about to do the same with the man who’d supposedly masterminded Sharon’s murder. With minutes to spare, I pushed through the crush of curiosity seekers. The double doors at the end of the corridor opened. A sudden surge by the crowd pushed me the last three feet to the barrier rope. Camera lights turned on from every direction as the entourage stepped through.
Ten deputies surrounded Manson; three were in the lead, two on either side of him, and three behind. In the center, Manson’s head barely reached the shoulder height of the men escorting him. In spite of his cuffed hands, he walked with casual confidence, nodding and smiling at the reporters.
Camera flashes bounced off the walls and ceiling; their strobes caused a slow-motion effect. Over the past few months, my picture had appeared in the news. Given the chance, I was sure Manson would recognize me. When he was at arm’s reach, I pulled down my sunglasses, making eye contact with the man who plotted and then ordered Sharon’s murder. Manson’s smile faltered as we locked eyes. It was a slow study of the enemy on both our parts.
Three feet beyond me, Manson twisted around, walking backward in order to continue the staring match. Pointing my finger first at Manson, then at my chest, I mouthed the words, “You’re mine.”
8
EVIL HAS ITS ALLURE
If the death penalty is to mean anything in the state of California other than two empty words, this unquestionably was a case for the imposition of the death penalty.
—VINCENT BUGLIOSI, MANSON TRIAL LEAD PROSECUTOR
Patti
The media swarmed the downtown courthouse like journalistic sharks drawn into the feeding frenzy by the Manson Family. Months before the trial started, reporters played a high-stakes, cutthroat game for exclusive interviews with the suspects. Publication angles varied from Life’s sinister portrayal of Manson with deranged eyes on their cover to Tuesday’s Child naming him “Man of the Year.” The media’s focus on the Manson Family was an obscure blessing, as they’d all but forgotten that we existed.
Information about the killers or their destiny meant little to me. I was too young to understand justice or its system, so if “it” couldn’t magically bring my sister back to life, the outcome was inconsequential. On the other hand, my parents sought retribution and scanned the headlines for the progress of the upcoming trial. SUSAN ATKINS RECANTS HER GRAND JURY TESTIMONY. CHARLES WATSON FIGHTING EXTRADITION; WILL HAVE A SEPARATE TRIAL. NEW PROSECUTION STAR WITNESS, LINDA KASABIAN: IMMUNITY FOR HER TESTIMONY. UNITED DEFENSE: MANSON AND FEMALE FOLLOWERS, ONE TRIAL, ONE DEFENSE— NOT GUILTY PLEA EXPECTED. TRIAL OF THE CENTURY BEGINS TOMORROW.
P.J.
Manson followers camped out around the clock in front the Criminal Courts building, preaching their leader’s daily gospel. Their base, the corner of Broadway and Temple, became an entanglement of supply and demand for the curious. Hollywood tour buses added the spectacle to their route; it was the number-two attraction, second only to the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Nine floors above the faithful group’s exhibition, Manson, Krenwinkel, Atkins, and Van Houten entered the stuffy, outdated Department 10
4, where fifty-two-year-old Judge Charles Older, an ex–fighter pilot, brought his courtroom to order.
June 15, 1970, was a hot day. The portable air conditioners rattled in protest against the windows. Considering the blizzard of pre-trial motions from the defense, it should have been cooler for the first day of the trial proceedings.
To accommodate the defendants and their attorneys, the bailiffs cramped eight chairs around an L-shaped table. Clients and lawyers alike formed a motley-looking crew.
Numerous defense attorneys came and went before the trial. Manson handpicked the team that made the final cut for an obvious reason. Irving Kanarek, Paul Fitzgerald, Daye Shinn, and Ronald Hughes were the epitome of trial obstruction.
Alongside Vincent Bugliosi at the prosecutor’s table sat co-counsel Aaron Stovitz. Though lackadaisical in comparison to Bugliosi, Stovitz was an effective prosecutor and the stabilizing force when Vince’s agitation rose to the level of the overhead fans.
In a month’s time, the defense and prosecution scrutinized 204 perspective jurors before agreeing on a twelve-member panel. On July 24, 1970, those jurors plus six alternates filed into the seats they would occupy for close to a year.
Spectators had lined up before dawn to secure a place at “the trial of the century.” I was there early as well, waiting in a private corridor with the other witness scheduled to testify that morning. Two of us, who had never met, yet had much in common, sat quietly side by side on the bench, watching a bailiff walk down the hall. The bailiff stopped in front of us. “Mr. Tate?”
I nodded.
He then looked at the other man. “Mr. Parent?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Gentlemen, opening statements have begun. Once completed, Mr. Tate, you will be the first witness called to the stand, followed by you, Mr. Parent. It shouldn’t be long. I’m going back in. If anyone gives you trouble, press the button on the door. That will alert me, and I’ll come right out,” he explained.
I would have preferred to continue in silence, but Steve Parent’s father extended his hand. “I’m Will.”
“P.J.,” I said, shaking his hand. Steve had been the fifth victim on August 9. It was his body that had been beneath the bloody sheet in the unknown car at Sharon’s house. It was a clear case of being at the wrong place at the wrong time for the eighteen-year-old. He’d paid a late-night visit to the caretaker, Garretson, and encountered the killers on his way to the gate.
Will rested his head against the wall. “Rumor has it in the papers that you want to kill Manson. Wish I had the guts to do it myself.”
“Don’t believe everything you read.”
“How’s your family holding up?”
“How the hell do you think we’re holding up?” I said bitterly.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry. I just thought . . . well . . . we’re not doing so hot.” Parent’s voice cracked.
I softened. “Knee-jerk reaction. It’s been a long time since anyone asked me that question with sincerity.” I offered him a cigar. “For the record, we’re doing shitty.”
Will accepted a light, then said, “It’s been almost a year, but my wife still won’t talk about it. Every time she hears a car pull in the driveway, she perks up, like it’s Steve coming home from work or something. She won’t let me touch anything in his room. His pajamas are still lying on the bed.”
“Yep, same with mine. She spends most of the time in denial. You won’t catch her within five miles of this courthouse because she can’t bear to hear the slightest detail of what happened.”
“I guess in time they’ll open up,” Will said.
“Probably,” I commented, though I didn’t believe it. Time was disintegrating my marriage. Nightly, the gentle shaking of the bed awakened me to find my wife crying. If I tried to comfort her, she silently turned away.
We’d been married twenty-seven years. I’d known her a few years longer than that, since high school actually, except I didn’t have the courage to ask her out then. But when I saw her again in 1942, I had a few more years’ experience and a few more drinks under my belt, which encouraged me to ask her for a dance. Artie Shaw and Glenn Miller played beneath the Sylvan Beach Pavilion that overlooked Galveston Bay. Texans like to two-step, but they also like to dance hand in hand while the big bands play. And from that first dance with Doris, I was a man smitten.
Three wars and my daughter’s murder couldn’t change my feelings; I was still smitten. But with each sunset, a couple of bricks were added to the wall building between us, and I didn’t know how to stop the construction. Will Parent interrupted my thoughts. “What do you think is happening in there?”
“With any luck, Bugliosi’s inspiring the folks on the jury to set up the gas chamber.”
VINCE BUGLIOSI TUGGED at the vest of his three-piece suit, smoothing it to perfection. “In this trial,” he said to the jury, “we will offer evidence of Manson’s motives for ordering these seven murders. Besides the motive of Manson’s passion for violent death and his extreme anti-establishment state of mind, the evidence at this trial will show that there was a further motive which was almost as bizarre as the murders themselves.
“Very briefly, the evidence will show Manson’s fanatical obsession with ‘Helter Skelter,’ a term he got from the English musical recording group the Beatles. Manson was an avid follower of the Beatles and believed that they were speaking to him through the lyrics of their songs.
“To Manson, Helter Skelter meant the black man rising up against the white establishment and murdering the entire white race, that is, with the exception of 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, the last book of the New Testament.
“The evidence will show that although Manson hated black people, he also hated the white establishment, whom he called ‘pigs.’
“The evidence will show that one of Manson’s principal motives for the Tate/LaBianca murders was to ignite Helter Skelter. In other words, to start the black-white revolution by making it look like the black people had murdered the five Tate victims and Mr. and Mrs. LaBianca. Thereby causing the white community to turn against the black man, and ultimately lead to a civil war between blacks and whites, a war Manson foresaw the black man winning.
“Manson envisioned that the black people, once they destroyed the white race and assumed the reins of power, would be unable to handle the reins because of inexperience and would have to turn over the reins to those white people who had escaped from Helter Skelter. That is, turn over the reins to Manson and his followers.”
Four hours later, the bailiff emerged from the courtroom to find Will and me as he’d left us. “Mr. Tate, they’re ready for you. Step up to the table here and empty your pockets.”
Expecting the search, I carried only three items: my wallet, a lighter, and a cigar pouch. “Place your hands on the table,” the deputy said, as he began to pat me down.
“Careful down there,” I nervously joked.
He remained stone-faced. “Sorry, we’re searching everyone, and they told me to give you a real thorough check. Okay, let’s go.” He paused at the door. “Let’s not make any headlines today. Don’t do anything crazy in there. Just try to concentrate on the questions the lawyers ask you. Are you ready?”
I pulled back my shoulders, took a deep breath, and gave a nod. All the way to the witness chair, I concentrated on the deputy’s back like a side-blinded horse.
Right arm raised, I faced the clerk and was sworn in. “Please be seated, Mr. Tate,” Judge Older said.
I kept my look downcast, avoiding Sharon’s killers sitting less than twenty feet from my grasp. The frantic scratching of the reporters’ pencils cavernously echoed amid hushed anticipation. Equally loud, seconds clicked away on the wall clock. Simple testimony, I thought. Identify Sharon, Woytek, Gibbie, and Jay, then get the hell out of Dodge.
My hands white-knuckled
the armrests of the chair. What in the hell was taking the prosecutor so long?
Temptation won out. I looked up. My eyes locked onto Manson with his perpetual dumb-ass grin. I had read about his so-called hypnotic stare that he tried to use to intimidate people. But that crap wasn’t going to wash with me. I gave him my own little grin and stared back with a look that said I’d as gladly snap your neck as I would testify. It didn’t take long before his smile disappeared and he looked away.
My inspection drifted down the defense table to the women. They were so young, giggling with the innocence of teenagers at a slumber party. On closer examination, their facial expressions emitted complete dispassion. Noticing my scrutiny, Atkins seductively licked her lips while her finger tapped on a picture of Sharon that lay atop the files.
Her action was all the goading I needed. The deputy who searched me for hidden weapons didn’t understand that the most lethal weapons I had were in plain sight: my mind and body. I counted the armed personnel and their positions; figuring the odds of whether I could jump the witness stand to the defense table before they stopped me. Inside five seconds, I could have one of their necks, but I’d have to make a choice: Atkins, the knife wielder, or Manson, the instigator. Aaron Stovitz moved to the front area, blocking my view. “Would you please state and spell your name, sir?”
Before I could respond, Irving Kanarek sluggishly lifted his heavily framed body from the chair. “I make a motion to exclude the witness, Your Honor.”
“Denied. Sit down, Mr. Kanarek,” Older admonished Manson’s lawyer, and then turned to me. “You may answer the question.”
“Paul James Tate, T-A-T-E.” . . .
“What is your business or occupation, sir?” . . .
“I was an intelligence officer . . . as lieutenant colonel.” . . .
Stovitz handed me a photo. “I show you Exhibit 1 for identification, Sir. Do you recognize the person depicted in that photo?”
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