i'm craig melvin. >> and i'm natalie morales. >> and this is "dateline." >> manson has come to represent the malignant side of humanity. these people enjoyed killing. >> things that the police had never seen before. >> sharon tate begged her, please don't kill me. please don't kill me. >> k average kids from average american homes turn out to be the killers. >> he would dose them with lsd. >> are you sane? >> sane? that's relative. >> charles manson stole lives. >> grief like you could not imagine. >> stole innocence. >> he looks beautiful. he looks happy. and he draws a lot of people. >> and left a city living in

fear. >> gun stores sell out. guard dogs are selling for $5,000.or >> you may think you know the manson story. but not like this. m >> he's a very evil sophisticated con man and knows exactly what he's doing. >> it's all a play, isn't it? hello and welcome to "dateline." he was aane charismatic ex-con dreamed of becoming a rock star. then he found a ragtag group of hippies in search g of directio and purpose to follow him. in the end their toxic union with result in a frenzy of unfathomable brutality. how was charles manson able to exert his influence to engineer a murderous rampage that would make him one of the most notorious figures in criminal history? here's keith morrison with "manson."

>> reporter: april 14th, 2016. a clear blustery day in the high desert outside los angeles. inside the walls of the california institution for women a gray-haired 66-year-old inmate appears before a parole board, as p she has done many times before. but this time something remarkable. >> a parole board panel is recommending the release of former charles manson follower leslie van houten. >> leslie van houten a name on the list forever linked with the most notorious crimes of the 20keth center any wp charles manson. >> you don't understand me. that's youron trouble. not my fault you don't understand me. i don't understand you either! >> the story of charles manson, his family, and all the horror they wrought is buried in

archives. i memorialized in media. long obsolete. and yet somehow it feels present. that hot summer night that caught the world utterly unprepared. when los angeles became suddenly a very scary place. it was august 9th, 1969, around 8:00 a.m. a officer jerry derosa was a young cop with the lapd working the day l shift. >> first call ie got was a cal to go to cielo drive. it came outie as a drunk in a c. >> reporter: officer d derosa cruised up benedict canyon and found the dead end street called cielo drive. a neighbor flagged him down. and suddenly the drunk in a car call became something else. >> he had told me that the maid came running back out yelling

"blood and bodies." >> reporter: derosa, all alone, nosed his squad car up the gated driveway. he could see right away, things weren't right. >> the telephone wires that had been cutir are hanging over the gate. you go through the gate and there's ae car parked in the driveway. >> reporter: in the car he found not ahe drunk but a body. >> he had been shot. and i walked around the front of the location, and there were two morean bodies on the lawn. >> then backup arrived and they went into the house and found the scene, horrible in a way that would go down in history. there was a young woman. >> there were multiple stab

wounds on her. and then there was a thick rope that was wrapped around her neck. >> and something else. the young s woman was pregnant. eight months pregnant. she'd been stabbed repeatedly. next to her a man with a bloody towel over his head. he'd been shot at close range, also stabbed. it was aal bloodbath. had you ever seen such a thing before? >> no. no. it was horrendous. >> derosa could see out the hall out the back door. a guest house and a swimming pool. he and a second officer went to check it out. and inside they found a young man, alive. >> i thought this guy knows something. >> 19-year-old william garretson said he was the caretaker. he told derosa he knew nothing, had seen nothing, and heard nothing. >> with all the n screaming and

thean gunshots and the fighting- >> how could he not hear it? >> you would think so. i handcuffed him and walked him through the property. >> they walked past the bodies on the front lawn. hent didn't seem shocked? >> no. not at all. >> garretson was the first and most likely suspect. derosa took him to the station house to book him. then theus detectives arrived a cielo drive and the coroner and of course the press. >> are you all rolling? >> rolling. >> at 8:30 this morning an employee came to work at 10050 cielo and found several bodies in the house. >> the lapd didn't share right away the awful details or that the phone wires had been cut so no one could call for help or that anl american flag had bee drapedg over the couch or that someone hade written in blood the front door one word, "pig."

>> do you have any kind of apbs out, any suspects at all? >> no. the only person we have at this time is mr. garretson, whom we are questioning. >> the lapd wasn't saying much. didn't know much. >> did you find a body mutilated? >> this i'd rather not discuss. >> who would know? the fear would spread so fast, choke what was left of innocence, infect us still. but that night the one thing no one knew washe what was startedn cielo drive wasn't over. >> coming up -- there was still another big shock toe come. the identities of the r victims. >> myti boyfriend called my mother, and he had heard five people were dead and it was rumored to be the house of sharon tate. >> when "dateline" continues. >> when "dateline" continues .. which menu am i looking at here? start with "ta-paz." -oh, it's tapas. -tapas. get out of town. it's like eating dinner with your parents. sandra, are you in school? yes, i'm in art school. oh, wow.

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it was media frenzy, 1969 style, recorded on 16-millimeter film. >> we have a weird homicide with the two bodies inside, two bodies outside. >> but word of mouth had skewed the awful truth. by the time 16-year-old debra tate heard it. >> my boyfriend called my mother, and he had heard that there was a fire in benedict canyon and five people were dead, and it was rumored to be the house of sharon tate. ♪ >> sharon tate, debra's big sister. sharon tate's biggest film, "valley of the dolls," was two

years behind her already. now 26, she was known less for her acting than for her beauty, her style, and her husband. director roman polanski had recently shot to fame with "rosemary's baby," in which a woman discovers she may be carrying the child of the devil. in real life sharon tate and roman polanski were expecting too. >> she was so terribly excited. like a new mom-to-be. creating the nice little home nest for the family to welcome the new life. >> and now debra frantic to learn what happened to her sister pressed her panic-stricken mother. >> mother, what? what? tell me what. >> she must have been -- >> oh, she was out of her mind crazy. grief like you could not imagine. >> but it was no mistake. and the murders, already

gruesome, now took on the trappings of celebrity. >> this was at the home of movie director roman polanski. and it was his wife, sharon tate, who was one of the victims. >> with sharon tate 25-year-old coffee heiress abigail folger. she's been working with poor kids in watts. it was her body officer derosa saw on the front yard. beside her was her boyfriend wojciech fry kousi,kowski, 32, sometime actor and friend of roman's. in the house next to sharon the man with the towel over his head was 35-year-old jay sebring. >> famous hairdresser to the stars who had been sharon tate's boyfriend. >> jeff gwynn wrote the 2013 book "moons." >> they'd remained frerngsds and sharon tate had invited sebring over that evening. >> anthony demaria is jay sebring's nephew. >> one of the sad ironies is jay was not supposed to be there that night. he was supposed to be in las

vegas and for whatever reason he decided to stay. >> the body in the car took longer to identify. he turned out to be 19-year-old steve parent, who'd been visiting the property's caretaker. parent went out to his car at just the wrong moment, never got out of the driveway. l.a. struggled to understand, why would anyone kill all these people and why in such a sadistic manner? the lapd searched for clues in the surrounding brush, among the neighbors, as of course did the ever-growing army of reporters. >> the lights weren't on. and usually the gate light is on at least. >> why would you take note of that? >> it's always been on. >> strange. despite all the carnage, no real clues. though there was this one thing. >> it was revealed that a small amount of narcotics was found in the sports car of sebring. >> some pot and hash were found in the house, too.

and so now police and the press began to wonder, could the murders have had something to do with the lifestyle sharon and her fabulous friends led? in mourning, in shock director roman polanski found himself in front of a camera defending his dead wife. >> sharon not only didn't use drugs, she didn't touch alcohoa, she didn't smoke cigarettes. >> all sharon was thinking about was her baby, he added. her baby that died with her. >> there was a lot of blood all over the place, baby clothes, and that's all. >> but then another rumor hit the press. that the killings were somehow connected to plansolanski's hor movie, "rosemary's baby." this time a representative spoke for polanski. >> sharon and all her three friends were rational people with no interest in mysticism or

anything occult. >> the news tried to pin on sharon and her friends, you know, the drugs, sex, rock and roll, devil worshiping. >> horrific, yes. all those ugly theories. >> there was this kind of gossip subtext that these people brought this on themselves. these were people engaging in drugs or some sort of, you know, orgies. tragically, for the victims especially, that they were played off as a form of morality tale. >> drugs? orgies? there was no stopping the gossip. but if anyone believed it, then what happened next made no sense at all. >> coming up -- >> everybody in los angeles is petrified. where are they going to strike next? >> and then someone does. >> i felt that there was an immediate connection. >> when "dateline" continues. ele blind spot detection,

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welcome back. the unsolved murders of the pregnant actress sharon tate and her friends sent the rumor mill churning because tate's husband, roman polanski, had directed the horror film "rosemary's baby." the press wondered about a satanic connection. or were the brutal stabbings drug-related? now a second attack was about to send the media into overdrive,

with shock waves traveling through the hollywood hills and beyond. once again, here's keith morrison with "manson." >> nearly 24 hours after this truly horrific crime with l.a. in deep shock, the police were baffled. >> anything i'd tell you at this point would be mere speculation. >> and then it happened again. >> the bodies of a man and his wife, found in their home, both been stabbed to death, repeated stab wounds. >> did you know the people in this home? >> oh, god, i've known these people for 30 years. >> what's their name? >> labianca. >> rosemary and leno labianca. rosemary's children found them. the scene every bit as awful as the one ten miles away on cielo drive. leno's hands were tied with a leather cord, his face covered with a pillowcase. rosemary had a lamp cord around her neck. leno had been stabbed 26 times, rosemary 41.

overkill would be an understatement. and again, just as it was at sharon tate's house, the murder scene seemed almost art directed, to elicit fear. >> a fork was jammed into leno la bianca's abdomen and left sticking there. >> painted in blood on one wall was the word "rise." on another "death to pigs." and on the refrigerator "helter-skelter," like the song from the beatles' white album. >> on his body the word "war" had been carved in the chest. >> these were brutal killings. >> elaine aradillas has written about the case for "people" magazine. >> in the middle of the night, showing up with knives, stabbing people multiple times, even when they were dead, things the

police had never seen before. >> the killers seemed to have no conscience. >> they killed a husband and wife, took a shower in their home, calmly ate some food and left. >> over two successive nights seven people and an unborn baby had been ruthlessly slaughtered. l.a. braced itself for the next wave especially after the initial suspect, william garretson, was cleared and released. >> there's some crazed killers roaming los angeles and there's an immediate city-wide panic. >> even though it was a hot august, angelenos closed their windows, locked their doors. >> gun stores sell out. guard dogs who were going for $200 apiece are now selling for $5,000. everybody in los angeles is petrified, where are they going to strike next. >> hollywood was even scared. it's my understanding roman polanski started getting paranoid, thinking it was someone among his peers.

>> warren beatty had said it was like a small nuclear device had gone off in hollywood. people were really scared and they needed to make sense and try to make sure they were somehow insulated and not involved in this. >> people all over town knew it in their guts, the murders had to be related. >> i felt there was an immediate connection. so did everybody in my family. >> why did you think there was a connection? >> because of the writing on the wall. that was the main thing. >> officer jerry derosa, who was working the taped crime scene, thought so, too. >> i had heard about some conditions at the location at the labianca house. i thought to myself, i wonder if this is connected in some way, writing, the blood on the wall, and the stabbing. >> your mind went there pretty well right away? >> yeah. >> but it did not seem that way to the brass at the lapd.

the department assigned a team of detectives to investigate the tate murders. they assigned another team of detectives to la bianca. the two teams worked out of the same squad room. the problem was they didn't work together. >> they didn't like each other, they didn't get along very well and they didn't exchange information for months. so each of those murders was pursued separately. >> detectives acknowledged the crime scenes looked similar but the labiancas were middle-class folks who owned grocery stores, they didn't hang out with movie stars and coffee heiresses. unlikely the same people committed both crimes, they said. >> homicide detectives theorized the la bianca killers may have used the same technique as the tate killers to throw police off the track. >> the media said, hey, these two crimes look similar. and the police were quick to say, no, it's copycat. because what would one have to

do with the other? it didn't make sense on the surface. >> so the labianca cops looked into the usual. was it a workplace dispute, a love triangle, a robbery turned violent? even as the tate cops looked for murderous drug dealers. both teams struck out. both cases stayed open. and the terror lingered that late summer of '69 for weeks. like the smog over downtown l.a. >> was there a time you thought this would never be solved early on? >> yes. it seemed to have gone on forever. >> you'll never find out who did this. >> never find out. and that's its own kind of hell. >> all the while, the cops failed to realize the killers were hiding in plain sight. all it would take was a chance encounter between two unlikely characters in an l.a. jail to crack the case wide open. coming up, a jailhouse chat with a killer.

>> she proceeded on to tell me how sharon tate begged her, please don't kill me, please don't kill me. >> and a dark obsession with the beatles. >> they really did listen to the white album over and over. >> when "dateline" continues. nu. the only one to combine a safe sleep aid. and the 12-hour pain relieving strength of aleve. so...magic mornings happen. there's a better choice. aleve pm.

i'm dara brown with the hour's top stories. newly released documents show donald trump's personal lawyer rudy giuliani was in contact with secretary of state mike pompeo in the months before the u.s. ambassador to ukraine was abruptly recalled. vice president mike pence made a surprise visit to iraq to visit u.s. troops and also to reassure america's kurdish allies in the region. those allies have condemned president trump's decision to pull back american forces in syria, allowing a turkish assault on kurds in the country. now back to "dateline."

welcome back to "dateline." i'm natalie morales. two years after hippies rocked the summer of love in san francisco, los angeles was a city paralyzed with fear. seven victims plus actress sharon tate's unborn baby had been massacred during a merciless two-day killing spree. it had been over a month since the rampage, and detectives were stymied. were the murders even connected? whoever was responsible for the bloody carnage remained a mystery. but soon a most unlikely source would deliver a game-changing jailhouse confession. here again is keith morrison with "manson." >> autumn of '69, it was still hot in l.a. but the police investigation of the grisly tate-labianca murders was ice cold. not a lead, a clue or a suspect in sight. then in october, a woman widely known on the hollywood party

circuit found herself in the l.a. county women's jail. her name was virginia graham. and she knew people. once even dated frank is that the rah. this wasn't her first fling with the law. >> i was there for a violation of probation. >> so that's where virginia was when she met a young woman who was not like the other inmates. >> she was very pretty, very friendly, always happy, singing, doing cartwheels in fact, up and down the aisle. >> the woman's name was susan atkins. virginia was intrigued. >> i casually asked her one day what she was there for. and this is when she said murder. >> susan told virginia she had been accused of killing a guy out in the suburbs months earlier. but then she went on bragging that the cops didn't know a fraction of what she had really done. >> she said, you know those murders up benedict canyon?

>> of course everyone in l.a. knew about that. >> she said, you know who did it, don't you? and i looked at her and i said, no, i don't. and her words to me, "well, you're looking at her." >> just that casually, susan atkins confessed to the crime the whole nation was talking about, enthusiastically described the killings in all their bloodcurdling detail. >> sharon tate begged her, please don't kill me, please don't kill me, and she said she looked at her eye-to-eye and said, "bitch, i don't care if you're going to have a baby or not, i'm going to kill you." >> and then atkins told her she part of a group and they'd kill lots more people, celebrities, like frank sinatra. >> the very fact there were going to be other murders committed of other people, i could never ever be able to live with that.

>> virginia got through to the police and told the whole story. so now lapd detectives zeroed in on susan atkins and learned she belonged to a commune called "the family." which had recently moved to a run-down old ranch way out in death valley. the leader was a short scruffy guy and habitual small-time criminal named manson. charles manson. and the cops, to their surprise, discovered manson and several of his followers were already in custody. not for murder, but for car theft. >> manson was a life-long criminal who never could go more than a day or two of his free life without breaking some law. >> and the people with him young, mostly women, were barely more than half his age. >> they're easily influenced. they came from broken homes or they were bullied at school, they didn't fit in. and he was able to tap into all

of that. ♪ >> police began to interview these women. one was 18-year-old barbara hoyt, who spoke about life inside the family and what attracted her to charles manson. >> he was very loving. he was very much a father figure. >> how did it make you feel when he was nice to you like that? >> made me feel special. felt like we were all fingers on one hand, like we were the digits and charlie was the hand. >> police spoke with other manson women, too. and learned that in the fall of '67, manson moved to los angeles, where he sent his girls out to find someone, anyone who could make him a rock star. they encountered dennis wilson of the beach boys, who took manson to the beach boys studio, where he recorded this. ♪ restless as the wind ♪ this town is killing me

>> it never went anywhere. manson didn't measure up as a singer-songwriter. he and his family, about 20 of them, had settled in the rugged foothills of l.a. a place called spahn ranch, an old movie location for westerns. >> one of the best things about the ranch was they would stay there and do chores. >> when they weren't working they went dumpster diving for food and panhandle for money and sometimes stole cars. there was a lot of drugs and plenty of sex, all directed by manson. >> he told people who to sleep with, what to eat, where to, you know, do their bodily functions. >> barbara hoyt told the detectives that charlie preached to his flock constantly. >> he would quote from the book of revelation. >> which he knew pretty well. >> not pretty well, we're talking word-for-word. >> then detectives found out about charlie's other source of inspiration.

>> they really did listen to the white album over and over. >> the beatles' sprawling double album, released a few months before the murders. one song in particular captivated charlie. "helter-skelter." with lyrics the beatles said were inspired by an amusement park ride. harmless fun. but the people who heard charlie preach told the cops that for him "helter-skelter" meant something apocalyptic. what in the world did a beatles song have to do with the brutal murders of the tate and la bianca homes in los angeles? it all made perfect sense to charlie manson. coming up, manson's unshakable hold on his family. >> he dances, he sings, he looks beautiful, he looks happy, and this draws a lot of people. >> and the possible motive behind the murders. >> charlie would be king of the

world. >> but that's crazy talk. >> it wasn't to us. >> when "dateline" continues. n. introducing... smartdogs. the first dogs trained to train humans. stopping drivers from: liking. selfie-ing. and whatever this is. available to the public... never. smartdogs are not the answer. but geico has a simple tip. turn on "do not disturb while driving" mode. brought to you by geico.

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oh, what a relief it is! so fast! october 1969, after two months of false leads in the tate and labianca murders, suddenly there was news. >> police apparently got their break in the tate case when this girl, susan atkins, a member of

manson's family, was arrested in another los angeles murder and talked to a cellmate about the tate killings. >> that information led investigators and eventually the media to a hippie cult called "the family" and their leader, charles manson. >> he dances, he sings, he looks beautiful. he looks happy. and this draws a lot of people. just like people are drawn to little babies. >> they looked like all the other hippies hanging around l.a. >> hippies up to this point were associated with peace, love, sharing. >> but prosecutor vincent b bugliosi interviewed them extensively and soon found out, as he told us in 2008, these hippies were different. especially their leader, manson, an ex-con and wannabe rock star obsessed with the book of revelation and the beatles. >> he thought they were prophets speaking to him and other tuned in people subliminally beneath

the lyrics of their songs. ♪ >> in particular, that cut called "helter-skelter." manson's followers were well aware of the racial tension that flared up around the country including riots in l.a. now manson told them the song "helter-skelter" was a beatles prophecy of a race war between blacks and whites. the vision of armageddon manson preached to his followers, both bizarre and deeply racist. >> there would be an all-out war. during this war, he would lead his family into death valley, where there is a bottomless pit and a city underneath the surface. they will go down there and be safe. when the war is over, the blacks will have won but they will not have the intellectual capacity to govern themselves. >> then, charlie told him, the family would take over. >> in other words, charlie would be king of the world.

>> but then again, manson was feeding them a steady diet of lsd. >> he was serious about this? >> yeah. >> that's crazy talk. >> it wasn't to us. the world was crazy to us. >> investigators learned from manson's followers that he was not content to wait for helter-skelter, he wanted to start it, by murdering wealthy white people, whom he called in homage to another beatles song, "piggies." but manson didn't plan to kill the piggies himself, he wanted his so-called family to do that. >> by that point, they were willing to do anything for him. >> because they loved him? because they feared him? because they were under his spell? what? >> they say that at that time they were brainwashed. >> it hardly seemed possible,

and yet as prosecutor bugliosi was able to piece it together, manson sent susan atkins, tex watson, linda kasabian and patricia krenwinkel to the home of sharon tate and her friends, a group of people manson did not even know. he did know the former resident, a music producer from whom he tried but failed to get a record contract. he was well aware the producer had moved out. but he also knew this. >> whoever's living there now has to be rich and famous. nobody else could afford a house like that. the house is picked because of its location. >> then manson sent the same group, plus leslie van houten, to the labianca home the following night. seven savage murders, all in the service of one man's twisted fantasy. >> he knew exactly what he was doing. he's not crazy at all. he's very evil. he's a very evil, sophisticated con man but he's not insane at all. >> bugliosi convened a grand

jury. susan atkins was his star witness. revealed all the gruesome details about how she and other family members shot and slashed every one at the tate and labianca homes and then scrawled in blood what charles manson had taught them. >> and when the words "helter-skelter" were found printed in blood at the murder scene that was the equivalent of manson's fingerprints being found at the murder scene. >> and en >> then in december of '69 about four months after the killings. >> in california five members of a so-called religious cult including charles manson, the guru or high priest, had been indicted in the murder of sharon tate and six others. >> they brought charles manson to los angeles, to the police station. and they're expecting, my god, this must be some kind of monster. instead of some big beast barely restrained, there's this little tiny guy with long hair. >> are you sane? >> sane? that's relative.

>> now, as the turbulent '60s came to a close and with the whole world watching, charles manson would go on trial. >> he was the mastermind. these murders would never have taken place had it not been for charles manson. >> but if looking back the case against charlie seems obvious it was not then. not for bugliosi. manson didn't personally commit the murders. there was no physical evidence to prove he manipulated his group, turned them into what bugliosi called bloodthirsty robots. >> i had to bring them in by way of circumstantial evidence. >> the prosecutor decided to use "helter skelter." it played well on the white album. but how would it play with a jury? >> the riveting court case that captivated the country. coming up -- before o.j. this was the trial of the century.

>> charlie always wanted to be famous. and by god, if this was how it was going to happen, he was going to do it right. >> it's all a play, isn't it? >> and does one of the killers have a chance at freedom? when "dateline" continues. line". is about to become your problem. ahh no, come on. i saw you eating poop earlier. hey! my focus is on the road, and that's saving me cash with drivewise. who's the dummy now? whoof! whoof! so get allstate where good drivers save 40% for avoiding mayhem, like me. sorry! he's a baby! have a skincare routine. but what about a lip care routine? pay your lips some attention. the chapstick total hydration collection. exfoliate nourish naturally enhance your lips. chapstick. put your lips first.

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welcome back. it had been nearly a year since the tate-labianca murders had shaken los angeles to its core. susan atkins told investigators in lurid detail how charles manson convinced her and other members of their cult-like group to do the unthinkable, massacre

innocent people. atkins' testimony would be key to the prosecution's case. but there was no physical evidence linking manson to the killings. what would it take to convince a jury that he was the evil puppetmaster behind the bloodsh bloodshed? here is keith morrison with the conclusion of "manson." the '60s gave us the summer of love. in 1970, the summer of manson. >> all the elements are present for one of the most sensational murder trials in american history. >> that summer, charles manson, "life" magazine cover boy, and three of his followers went on trial for the tate-labianca murders. >> i think mr. manson feels he's a product of our society. >> prosecutor bugliosi's task was extremely daunting. a case like no other, a defendant like no prosecutor had ever encountered. >> he had to prove that charles manson, this weird little guy,

could have some control over these other followers to make them commit murder but not to the extent that the followers were mentally incompetent to be tried either. >> that's a tricky business. >> it is very tricky. >> trickiest part would be making a charge of first-degree murder stick against manson himself. >> it's a little more difficult to convict him because he did not physically participate in these murders. >> bugliosi had a two-part strategy -- prove manson's domination over his family and explain his motive to the jury. but what a motive. >> that motive was helter-skelt helter-skelter, to ignite a war between blacks and whites. it was he who introduced "helter-skelter" into the family, talked about it all the time. >> bugliosi had a star witness lined up, susan atkins, the woman who'd confessed the whole lurid story in jail and repeated everything to a grand jury. >> now that you've had a chance to get it off your chest, can

you describe to me how you feel? >> but then atkins recanted, said she'd made up the whole thing. so bugliosi turned to other family members, like barbara hoyt, who left the family when manson's behavior frightened her. >> i decided, well, do i want to live with myself when i get old? and that was the deciding factor. >> barbara became a wary witness for the prosecution. she knew she'd take the stand in full view of her former family of manson followers. >> what was it like to testify, seeing them out there? >> they were really kissing up to me when i was in the back of the courtroom, blowing me kisses and smiling at me and all that. of course that changed when i started opening my mouth on the witness stand. >> day after day, members of the manson family demonstrated at the courthouse, performance art with a sinister gloss. >> your system wants destruction, and that's what it's going to get. ♪ >> inside, charlie's

co-defendants, leslie van houten, patricia krenwinkel and susan atkins played to the cameras. it was a circus of weird. manson in the center ring. >> are you guilty of plotting any murders? >> i killed a chicken once. >> any human beings? >> no. >> you're absolutely innocent of committing murder or telling any to commit murder or planning it? >> i'll plead guilty to the indians. >> one day manson appeared in court with an x scratched into his forehead. the rest of the family quickly followed suit. >> it was theater. charlie always wanted to be famous, and by god, if this was how it was going to happen, he was going to do it right. >> how are you doing, charlie? >> good. how are you this morning? >> sharon's little sister debra seethed as she watched the antics on tv. >> it's all a play, isn't it? >> they were mocking america. they were mocking our very foundation.

>> everyone seemed to be watching. everyone seemed to have an opinion. even the president of the united states. >> here is a man who is guilty directly or indirectly of eight murders without reason. >> next day headline "l.a. times," manson guilty nixon declares, threw the trial into a turmoil. >> all the while, manson basked in the glare of the media, saying anything about anyone. >> the judge made a fool of himself again. then he questions my sanity. i question his. >> at the end of the 22-week trial, bugliosi told the jurors charles manson's family preached love but practiced cold-blooded murder. >> they literally slaughtered the victims in an orgy of murder. >> the verdict came after nine days of deliberations. the jury found all four defendants guilty of first degree murder.

>> in my verdict, i wanted to protect society. after all, this is the united states of america and we have a heritage and this is something we must protect. >> they were all sentenced to death. >> is he prepared to die? has he talked to you about death? >> he's already dead. he's already dead. he has no thoughts. he has no opinions. he's just an empty hole. he's infinite. >> tex watson, who did most of the actual killing, was convicted and sentenced to die in a separate trial. but in 1972 the california supreme court ruled the death penalty unconstitutional. the sentences were reduced to life in prison. there would be no gas chamber for any of the manson family. which meant that all of them, even charles manson himself, would have a chance at freedom after serving their sentences. manson, text watson, patricia

krenwinkel and susan atkins all had parole hearings and each time they were denied. in 2009 atkins died in prison. but leslie van houten, she did have a chance at freedom. >> it doesn't matter whether i wielded the fatal blows or not, i feel responsible for both of their deaths. >> in april 2016 the parole board recommended releasing van houten. but then three months later governor jerry brown vetoed the idea. sharon tate's younger sister debra was relieved. >> i don't think she deserves it. these people were brutally butchered. there has to be some kind of accountability in this world. >> convincing the jury of this very esoteric sophisticated motive of charles manson -- >> prosecutor bugliosi died in 2015. the story he wove for the jury, that "helter-skelter" was the

motive for the killings, inadvertently added to manson's enduring legend. >> what do you want to call me a murderer for? i've never killed anyone! i don't need to kill anyone! >> charlie manson would spend the rest of his life behind bars. in november 2017, shortly after his 83rd birthday, nearly 50 years since he orchestrated those brutal crimes, he died in prison. throughout his long life he never admitted regret or remorse. >> remorse for what? you people have done everything in the world to me. doesn't that give me equal right? i can do anything i want you to people at any time i want to because that's what you've done to me. >> charles manson will remain forever seared into the public consciousness, evil personified. the man some say helped bring down the curtain on the '60s as an age of innocence, who ultimately in his own twisted

way achieved the fame he'd been seeking all along. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm natalie morales. thanks for watching. i'm craig melvin. >> and i'm natalie morales. >> and this is "dateline." >> she's on a conveyor belt. only her feet were ez posed. the workers thought it was a mannequin. her last hours on earth were not pleasant. >> young women murdered or missing. families in anguish. >> i would text her and she would text right back. but this time nothing. >> when they killed her, they killed me. >> a serial killer at work. and maybe he had a friend. >> that's crazy. they don't work together. serial killers are loners. >> very rare. >> two suspected killers