by Greg King
While Manson considered what to do, Mary Brunner and Sandy Good drove to a nearby Sears store to purchase a few things with a stolen credit card. The card, however, showed up on a list while they were making their purchases, and both were apprehended after an extended car chase through the streets of the San Fernando Valley. They were booked into custody around 6 PM.
When Brunner and Good did not return as usual, Manson began to worry. After dinner, the Family gathered around a camp-fire. At ten that evening, Manson got a telephone call: it was Sandy Good, informing him of the arrest earlier in the day.
According to his own account, when he hung up the telephone, Manson was “in a rage. I walked away from the buildings, stood beside a tree and pounded my fists against it.… All I could focus on was, ‘What the fuck is happening here? One by one this fucked-up society is stripping my loves from me. I’ll show them! They made animals out of us—I’ll unleash those animals—I’ll give them so much fucking fear the people will be afraid to come out of their houses.…’ Every abuse, every rejection in my entire life flashed before my eyes.”1
Although things had not been going Manson’s way for several months, by Friday, 8 August, it must have seemed as if his world were falling apart. On that day he found out that Bobby Beausoleil had been arrested for Hinman’s murder—an arrest which he believed would eventually lead the police back to Spahn Ranch. This was followed by the news of Brunner’s and Good’s arrest that evening. Dennis Wilson had rejected him; Terry Melcher had rejected him; Rudi Altobelli had rejected him; the Establishment had rejected him; his Family was on the verge of being destroyed.
Much ink has been spilled on the events of that August weekend, in an attempt to make sense of what surely must rate as one of the most senseless of the twentieth century’s mass murders. The tendency to seek the fantastic, the most bizarre explanation for the Tate-LaBianca murders, flows naturally enough from the very nature of the crimes. It is difficult to assign to such a savage rampage the most logical conclusions, and this difficulty in accepting the obvious has plagued historians of the case for thirty years.
It is apparent that the murders were not planned; these were random acts of violence, undertaken on a criminal whim. And that whim can only have been brought about by the momentous events of Friday, 8 August. Manson’s plans for the future were disrupted; his very freedom was threatened should Beausoleil be traced back to Spahn Ranch. Two of his most ardent disciples were in jail. Manson had been unable to exert any control over the Establishment, and had been rejected by them. Now, he was fast losing control of his own Family. It does not stretch credulity to believe that the resulting murders were as much an attempt by Manson to re-assert his authority over the group at Spahn as they were to instigate a race war.
Manson undoubtedly believed that a race war, Helter Skelter, was indeed on the horizon. He may very well have believed that two nights of murder would help speed the process along. It was also later claimed during the trial by various Family members that a series of crimes, committed in a manner similar to Gary Hinman’s murder—that is, vicious knife wounds, messages left in blood at the scene, the use of the word “Pig” in the phrases—would at least give the police pause that they might have arrested the wrong suspect.
But Manson’s determination to maintain his hold over his followers cannot be underestimated as one of the motives for the crimes which took place. Certainly the very act of committing the various crimes solidified, at least for a time, not only Manson’s position as head of the Family, but the bonds among the Family members themselves. The two nights of murder once again restored Manson to what he perceived as his rightful place: that of leader, of seer, of manipulator, of master over life and death.
Seething with anger over his own tenuous position, and facing not only the months of rejection at the hands of others but the disintegration of his Family, Manson struck out. His target, the residents of 10050 Cielo Drive, represented the establishment in abstract, and, in particular, a substitute for Melcher, Wilson, Altobeli and all of those who had turned their backs on him and ignored their promises to promote Manson and his music.
When Manson returned to his followers, his mood had changed. He began to complain about the establishment. Everyone in Hollywood, he said, was too busy with their own lives to notice what was going on around them. No one was interested in anyone else. No one was interested in Manson anymore. With this, he turned to his followers and declared flatly, “Now is the time for Helter Skelter.”2
Manson pulled Tex Watson, Susan Atkins and Linda Kasabian aside. He told each to get a knife and a change of clothes, and to meet him at the front of the ranch when they were ready. He asked them to dress in dark clothes.3
According to his own account, earlier in the day, Tex Watson had taken a large dose of acid.4 He and Susan Atkins also allegedly had their own stash of Methedrine, which they had been snorting for several days.5 Prior to Manson’s announcement, Atkins again used the crystal speed. Once he had a moment after receiving his instructions from Manson, Watson, too, went to their stash and snorted Methedrine.6 According to Atkins, “We were both stoned, but our senses were keen. We were alert. We knew what we were doing.”7
Patricia Krenwinkel was asleep in the children’s trailer, when Manson came in and woke her. “Get up,” he said. “I want you to go somewhere.” On his instructions, she grabbed a knife, and joined Watson and Atkins on the boardwalk in front of the Longhorn Saloon.8
On her way to the Saloon, Manson told Kasabian to stop at the bunkhouse to retrieve her California Driver’s License, which he had confiscated when she had joined the Family only a month earlier.
Within fifteen minutes, Watson, Atkins, Krenwinkel and Kasabian stood waiting on the boardwalk. Considering this group, Family member Ruth Ann Morehouse later declared that Manson had “sent out the expendables.”9
Watson wore black cowboy boots, black jeans and a black velour turtleneck over a white cotton tee shirt. Atkins and Krenwinkel were dressed in blue denim jeans and black tee shirts. Linda Kasabian wore a dark skirt and purple shirt. All the women were barefoot.
They had three knives between them, two Buck knives and a larger kitchen knife with a taped handle. Manson had brought out the .22 caliber Buntline Special, with which he had shot the drug dealer Bernard Crowe just over a month before. Watson had a pair of red-handled bolt cutters and around forty feet of the white nylon three strand rope which Manson had purchased earlier that summer, coiled over his shoulder.
Manson took Watson aside. “I want you to go to that house where Terry Melcher used to live … and totally destroy everyone in that house, as gruesome as you can. Make it a real nice murder, just as bad as you’ve ever seen. And get all their money.”10 According to Manson, the house was occupied by “some movie stars.”11
Manson was explicit in his instructions. First, he told Watson to cut the telephone lines, so that no one could call for help. Watson was not to use the electronic gate either, even though both men were familiar with its operation, having previously been to 10050 Cielo Drive. Manson feared that there might be some kind of new security alarm. He wanted the bodies mutilated. “Pull out their eyes and hang them on the mirrors!” he exhorted Watson. He also told him to leave messages written in blood.12 “If you don’t get enough money at the Melcher house,” Manson told Watson, “then go to the house next door, and then to the house after that.…”13
“There is no reason to suppose,” writes journalist David Cooper, “that the wily Manson was unaware of what he was doing or of the illegality and commonly accepted immorality of his actions.… Even if Manson’s disciples had become unthinking zombies, brainwashed into automatic obedience to their master’s commands, Manson himself was no zombie incapable of not giving those commands. And Manson, moreover, displayed in all his behavior a scheming canniness and sharp instinct for self-preservation, which are incompatible with the picture of a man who is victim to unshiftable, unalterable intentions.”14
Wa
tson, Atkins, Krenwinkel and Kasabian all climbed into ranch hand Johnny Schwartz’s 1959 white and yellow Ford. Watson drove, although Kasabian had been brought along specifically because she was the only one at the ranch who possessed a valid driver’s license. Instead, she sat in the front passenger seat, with Atkins and Krenwinkel crouched on the rear floor; the back seat had been removed earlier that year to make room for more food on the Family’s garbage runs. Watson had enough self-possession to tell Kasabian that there was a gun in the glove compartment, and that, if they were stopped by the police along the way, she should throw the gun, and all of the knives—which she carried in her lap—out the window.15 As the car began to drive away, Manson ran up to the open passenger window and leaned in. “Leave a sign,” he told them. “You girls know what to write. Something witchy.” With that, the four drove off into the night.16
Chapter 29
Cease to Exist
Watson drove down the Santa Monica Freeway. It was just past eleven when he finally told the women what they were going to do. He explained that they were going to the house where Terry Melcher used to live, and once there, they were to get all of the money that they could and then kill whoever was in the house.1 “It would make no sense at all to argue that the Family could not have had any idea of what acts they might perpetrate,” writes Peter French, “especially after months of indoctrination in ritual slaughters and Manson’s ‘Helter Skelter’ vision.”2
They got lost on the way to Hollywood. Watson missed a turn, and ended up in downtown Los Angeles. He drove until he came to Santa Monica Boulevard, then followed it through West Hollywood and up into Beverly Hills. At the edge of Beverly Hills, he turned onto Sunset Boulevard and followed it until it met Benedict Canyon Road. A few miles later, he turned and began the ascent up the steeply winding length of Cielo Drive.3
He drove straight to the end of the cul-de-sac at 10050 Cielo Drive and got out of the car. Kasabian saw him take the red bolt cutters from the rear of the car, walk to the right side of the gate, and climb up the high telephone pole.4 At the top were three different sets of wires. Watson had to guess which ones to cut. He used the bolt cutters to sever two of the three sets, and, with a splat, they fell across the metal and chain-link gate. From the top of the telephone pole, he could see that the lights at the side of the garage and the Christmas lights along the front lawn remained on.5
Watson returned to the car, backed it up against the hillside and, with the headlights off, drove back down the cul-de-sac and out onto Cielo Drive, parking the Ford just off the side of the road in a wide space nearly hidden by trees. Taking the gun from the glove compartment, he hoisted the coil of white rope over his shoulder, and, motioning to the women to follow, set off back up the cul-de-sac on foot.
When they arrived at the gate to 10050 Cielo Drive, Watson stopped. The gate itself, twelve feet long and six feet high, sat in the middle of a six-foot high chain-link and board fence stretching from the edge of the cliff on the left to the sharp upslope of the hill on the right. To the left of the gate and a few feet before it, on a metal pole, was an electronic gate control button, which allowed a driver to open the gate without having to leave their car. A similar device was located on the inner side of the gate. Although Watson had been to the property before, and knew how to use the gate mechanism, he finally decided to scale the embankment at the right of the fence and follow the hill down the other side and on to the driveway.6
Atkins stood silent, waiting and watching for Watson to make a move. “Suddenly,” she later wrote, “that whole section, number 10050, was cut out of the rest of the world and lifted into another existence. We were separated from the whole world. Perhaps for the first time in my life I was deeply aware of evil. I was evil.” As they climbed over the hill, she noticed the Christmas tree lights twinkling across the front lawn.7
On the other side of the gate, at the end of the paved parking area, Steve Parent approached his car, carrying the clock radio in his hand. The night was quiet, warm, the lights of Los Angeles spread out and sparkling below. As he climbed into his car, it is likely that he spotted the foursome, clad in their dark clothes, climbing over the hillside at the top of the driveway. He started the car and turned on the headlights. He obviously feared for his life: he backed the Ambassador out of the drive so quickly that he crashed into the split-rail fence bordering the parking area; police would later discover paint scrapings from his car on the fence, and crushed pieces of wood still attached to the Ambassador’s bumper.8
Watson had seen the headlights of the approaching car as he and the women were stashing their bundles of clothing in the bushes next to the gate. “Lay down! Stay here!” he whispered to the women, as he bolted toward the gate and the approaching car.9
Parent had his driver’s side window rolled down, to allow him to reach the gate control button. Watson ran up to the car, a knife in one hand and a gun in the other. Atkins, hiding in the bushes, heard him yell, “Halt!”10
Watson thrust his hand into the open window, trying to reach the keys. Parent must have been terrified. He looked at glassy-eyed Watson and pleaded, “Please, please, don’t hurt me! I’m your friend! I won’t tell!”11 In answer, Watson raised the knife and sliced at the open window. In an attempt to shield his face, Parent raised his left hand. The knife went down, slicing between Parent’s little and ring fingers and running down the length of his palm. His Lucerne wrist-watch flew from his arm, its band slashed in half, and landed in the rear seat.12
In reaction, Parent pulled down his arm. Watson aimed the .22 caliber Buntline through the open window and fired four shots in quick succession. One shot went cleanly through Parent’s descending left arm, another through his left cheek, exiting out of his mouth and crashing into the dashboard. Stunned, Parent was unable to move. The other two shots hit him in the chest. He slumped toward the space between the front bucket seats, covered in spreading blood. Parent became the first of what Watson would later refer to as “impersonal blobs.”13
On the other side of the gate, some 100 feet north of 10050, was 10070 Cielo Drive. Mr. and Mrs. Seymour Kott, the residents, had just finished hosting a dinner party. At midnight, they said goodnight to their guests; as they stood on their doorstep, the Kotts could see the gate of 10050 and the yellow bug light burning on the side of the garage, as well as the string of Christmas lights along the split-rail fence. They were just getting ready for bed when Mrs. Kott heard four shots, all in rapid succession. She thought that they came from the direction of 10050 Cielo Drive, but was not certain. She listened for a few more minutes. Hearing nothing further, she went to bed. She later estimated the time as about 12:30 AM.14
The four shots apparently had not been heard in the main house at 10050 Cielo Drive. The curious echo pattern in the canyon was apparently enough to buffer the shots from the drive.
Watson reached inside the Ambassador, turned off the ignition and the headlights and motioned for the women in the bushes to join him. He flipped the car into neutral and, together, the four of them pushed the car down the driveway. Watson felt that the car would be less conspicuous if it was parked away from the gate.15 They left it parked at an odd angle, to the left of the drive, about twenty-five feet beyond the gate.
According to Linda Kasabian, on watching Watson shoot Parent, she immediately went into a state of shock. “My mind went blank,” she recalled later. “I was aware of my body, walking toward the house.”16 The four walked past Jay Sebring’s black Porsche and Abigail’s red Firebird parked next to the split-rail fence at the end of the drive. They followed the curve of the flagstone walk across the front lawn, Watson noting “the shimmering lights of the whole west side” of the city below.17
They stopped at the front porch. The white Dutch door was closed, the carriage lights on either side shining brightly. Watson told Kasabian to go round to the rear of the house and check to see if any of the windows or doors were open.18 She went off, but, still horrified at the shooting she had just witne
ssed, walked past the two open windows of the freshly painted nursery-to-be, past the rear entrance door, and as far as the French door to the living room, before returning to the front lawn. On telling Watson that everything was locked and closed, he walked to the multi-paned dining room windows, stood in the flower bed behind the neatly trimmed hedge, and, with his knife, made a long, horizontal slash through the screen, allowing him to reach up inside and remove it. He set the screen at the side of the window and slipped his fingers into the crack, raising it up enough to allow him to hoist himself over the ledge and into the dark room. Once inside, he walked through the room to the entrance hall and opened the Dutch door leading to the front porch. As the women walked toward him, he pulled Kasabian aside, telling her to go back to the gate and wait there, to watch in case anyone approached the estate.19 Atkins and Krenwinkel disappeared inside the house; before Kasabian turned to leave, Watson ominously whispered that she should “listen for sounds.”20
Watson, Atkins and Krenwinkel entered the living room. A table lamp on the desk filled the room with dim light. In front of them stretched a long, beige couch whose back was draped with an American flag. Although there would be speculation as to its meaning later, Mrs. Chapman told police investigators that it had simply been placed on the back of the couch as a decorative touch a few weeks earlier.21
When they walked round the couch, they saw for the first time that there was a man asleep there. It was Voyteck Frykowski. Watson stood over Frykowski and said, “Wake up!”22 Voyteck stirred, looked up at the curious trio gathered in the darkened living room, and asked “What time is it?”23
“Be quiet!” Watson answered. “Don’t move or you’re dead.”24
“Who are you?” Frykowski demanded, rising from the couch. “What do you want?”25 In response, Watson kicked him in the head, and Frykowski fell back against the couch, stunned.26