Page 6 - ARUBA TODAY

A6 U.S. NEWS
Tuesday 21 November 2017
Charles Manson, whose brutality made him face of evil, dead

By JOHN ROGERS mourned on the occasion within 10 days, then it’s up
Associated Press of his death,” Hanisee said. to the department to de-
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A petty criminal who had termine whether the body
Charles Manson, the hippie been in and out of jail is cremated or buried.
cult leader who became since childhood, the char- The Manson Family, as
the hypnotic-eyed face of ismatic, guru-like Manson his followers were called,
evil across America after surrounded himself in the slaughtered five of its vic-
masterminding the grue- 1960s with runaways and tims on Aug. 9, 1969, at
some murders of pregnant other lost souls and then Tate’s home: the actress,
actress Sharon Tate and six sent his disciples to butcher who was 8½ months preg-
others in Los Angeles during some of L.A.’s rich and fa- nant, coffee heiress Abigail
the summer of 1969, died mous in what prosecutors Folger, celebrity hairdresser
Sunday night after nearly said was a bid to trigger Jay Sebring, Polish movie
a half-century in prison. He a race war — an idea he director Voityck Frykowski
was 83. got from a twisted reading and Steven Parent, a friend
Manson died of natural of the Beatles song “Helter of the estate’s caretaker.
causes at a California hos- Skelter.” Tate’s husband, “Rose-
pital while serving a life The slayings horrified the mary’s Baby” director Ro-
sentence, his name syn- world and, together with man Polanski, was out of
onymous to this day with In this 1969 file photo, Charles Manson is escorted to his the deadly violence that the country at the time.
arraignment on conspiracy-murder charges in connection
unspeakable violence and with the Sharon Tate murder case. Authorities say Manson, cult erupted later in 1969 during The next night, a wealthy
depravity. leader and mastermind behind 1969 deaths of actress Sharon a Rolling Stones concert grocer and his wife, Leno
Michele Hanisee, president Tate and several others, died on Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017. He was at California’s Altamont and Rosemary LaBianca,
of the Association of Dep- 83. Speedway, exposed the were stabbed to death in
uty District Attorneys for Los (AP Photo) dangerous, drugged-out their home across town.
Angeles County, reacted Manson behind bars. Bu- moral values.” underside of the counter- The killers scrawled such
to the death by quoting gliosi said: “Manson was an “Today, Manson’s victims culture movement and phrases as “Pigs” and a
the late Vincent Bugliosi, evil, sophisticated con man are the ones who should seemed to mark the death misspelled “Healter Skel-
the prosecutor who put with twisted and warped be remembered and of the era of peace and ter” in blood at the crime
love. scenes.
Despite the overwhelm- Manson was arrested three
ing evidence against him, months later. In the annals
Manson maintained during of American crime, he be-
his tumultuous trial in 1970 came the personification
that he was innocent and of evil, a short, shaggy-
that society itself was guilty. haired, bearded figure with
“These children that come a demonic stare and an
at you with knives, they are “X’’ — later turned into a
your children. swastika — carved into his
You taught them; I didn’t forehead.
teach them. I just tried to “Many people I know in
help them stand up,” he Los Angeles believe that
said in a courtroom solilo- the Sixties ended abruptly
quy. on August 9, 1969,” author
Linda Deutsch, the long- Joan Didion wrote in her
time courts reporter for 1979 book “The White Al-
The Associated Press who bum.”
covered the Manson case, After a trial that lasted
said he “left a legacy of nearly a year, Manson and
evil and hate and murder.” three followers — Susan
“He was able to take young Atkins, Patricia Krenwin-
people who were impres- kel and Leslie Van Houten
sionable and convince — were found guilty of
them he had the answer to murder and sentenced to
everything and he turned death. Another defendant,
them into killers,” she said. Charles “Tex” Watson, was
“It was beyond anything convicted later. All were
we had ever seen before spared execution and giv-
in this country.” en life sentences after the
California Corrections De- California Supreme Court
partment spokeswoman struck down the death
Vicky Waters said it has yet penalty in 1972.
to be determined what Atkins died behind bars
happens to Manson’s in 2009. Krenwinkel, Van
body. Houten and Watson re-
It was also unclear if Man- main in prison.
son requested funeral ser- Another Manson devotee,
vices of any sort. Lynette “Squeaky” From-
Prison officials previously me, tried to assassinate
said Manson had no known President Gerald Ford in
next of kin, and state law 1975, but her gun jammed.
says that if no relative or le- She served 34 years in
gal representative surfaces prison.q