Helter Skelter

“I’m not going to be accused of a serious offense by this guy day in and day out.”

THE COURT “That’s absurd. You interrupted Mr. Kanarek. You made outrageous statements in front of the jury…I find you in direct contempt of Court, and I fine you fifty dollars.”

To the amusement of the clerk, I had to call my wife to come down and pay the fine. Later the deputy DAs in the office put up a buck each for a “Bugliosi Defense Fund” and reimbursed her.

As with the earlier citation of Hughes, I felt if I was in contempt of anyone, it was Kanarek, not the Court. The following day, for the record, I responded to the contempt, noting among other things that “in the future I would ask the Court to please consider two obvious points: this is a hotly contested trial and tempers become a little frayed; and also take into consideration what Mr. Kanarek is doing which incites a response on my part.”

With my citation, we now had a perfect score: every attorney involved in the trial had been either cited for contempt or threatened with it.

The defense tried their best to ridicule Juan’s fear of Manson.

Hughes brought out that since Manson was locked up, it was hardly likely he could hurt anyone; did Mr. Flynn actually expect the jury to believe that he was afraid of Mr. Manson?

Juan might have been speaking for all the prosecution witnesses when he answered: “Well, not of Mr. Manson himself, but the reach that he has, you know.”

By now I could see the pattern. The more damaging the testimony, the more chance Manson would create a disturbance, thereby assuring that he—and not the evidence itself—would get the day’s headlines. Juan Flynn’s testimony was hurting him badly. Several times while Flynn was on the stand, Older had to order Manson and the girls removed because of their outbursts. When it happened again, on October 2, Manson turned to the spectators and said: “Look at yourselves. Where are you going? You’re going to destruction, that’s where you’re going.” He then smiled a very odd little smile, and added, “It’s your Judgment Day, not mine.”

Again the girls parroted Manson, and Older ordered all four removed.

Kanarek was livid. I’d just showed the judge the transcript pages where Kanarek accused Flynn of lying. Older ruled: “There is no question: there was an implied, if not express, charge of recent fabrication.” Highway patrolman Dave Steuber would be permitted to play that portion of the taped interview dealing with Manson’s incriminating admission.[75]

After establishing the circumstances of the interview, Steuber set up the tape recorder and began playing the tape at the point where the statement had begun. There is something about such physical evidence that deeply impresses a jury. Again, in words very similar to those they had heard him use when he was on the stand, the jurors heard Juan say: “Then he was looking at me real funny…And then he grabbed me by the hair like that, and he put a knife by my throat…And then he says, ‘Don’t you know I’m the one who is doing all the killings?’”

Monday, October 5, 1970. Bailiff Bill Murray later said he had a very strong feeling that something was going to happen. You get a kind of sixth sense dealing with prisoners day after day, he said, noting that when he brought Manson into the lockup he was acting very tense and edgy.

Although they had made no assurances that they would conduct themselves properly, Older gave the defendants still another chance, permitting them to return to the courtroom.

The testimony was dull, undramatic. There was, at this point, no clue as to its importance, though I had a feeling Charlie just might suspect what I was up to. Through a series of witnesses, I was laying the groundwork for destroying Manson’s anticipated alibi.

LASO detective Paul Whiteley had just finished testifying, and the defense attorneys had declined to cross- examine him, when Manson asked: “May I examine him, Your Honor?”

THE COURT “No, you may not.”

MANSON “You are going to use this courtroom to kill me?”

Older told the witness he could step down. Manson asked the question a second time, adding, “I am going to fight for my life one way or another. You should let me do it with words.”

THE COURT “If you don’t stop, I will have to have you removed.”

MANSON “I will have you removed if you don’t stop. I have a little system of my own.”

Not until Manson made that very startling admission did I realize that this time he wasn’t playacting but deadly serious.

THE COURT “Call your next witness.”

BUGLIOSI “Sergeant Gutierrez.”

MANSON “Do you think I’m kidding?”

It happened in less time than it takes to describe it. With a pencil clutched in his right hand, Manson suddenly leaped over the counsel table in the direction of Judge Older. He landed just a few feet from the bench, falling on one knee. As he was struggling to his feet, bailiff Bill Murray leaped too, landing on Manson’s back. Two other deputies quickly joined in and, after a brief struggle, Manson’s arms were pinned. As he was being propelled to the lockup, Manson screamed at Older: “In the name of Christian justice, someone should cut your head off!”

Adding to the bedlam, Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten stood and began chanting something in Latin. Older, much less disturbed than I would have expected, gave them not one but several chances to stop, then ordered them removed also.

According to the bailiffs, Manson continued to fight even after he had been taken into the lockup, and it took four men to put cuffs on him.

Fitzgerald asked if counsel might approach the bench. For the record, Judge Older described exactly how he had viewed the incident. Fitzgerald asked if he might inquire as to the judge’s state of mind.

THE COURT “He looked like he was coming for me.”

FITZGERALD “I was afraid of that, and although—”

THE COURT “If he had taken one more step, I would have done something to defend myself.”

Because of the judge’s state of mind, Fitzgerald said, he felt it incumbent upon him to move for a mistrial. Hughes, Shinn, and Kanarek joined. Older replied: “It isn’t going to be that easy, Mr. Fitzgerald…They are not going to profit from their own wrong…Denied.”

Out of curiosity, after court Murray measured the distance of Manson’s leap: ten feet.

Murray wasn’t too surprised. Manson had very powerful leg and arm muscles. He was constantly exercising in the lockup. Asked why, he’d once told a bailiff: “I’m toughening myself up for the desert.”

Murray tried to re-create his own leap. Without that sudden shot of adrenaline, he couldn’t even jump up on the counsel table.

Though Judge Older instructed the jury to “disregard what you saw and what you have heard here this morning,” I knew that as long as they lived they’d never forget it.

All the masks had been dropped. They’d seen the real face of Charles Manson.

From a reliable source, I learned that after the incident Judge Older began wearing a .38 caliber revolver under his robes, both in court and in chambers.

Judgment Day. Echoing Manson, the girls waiting outside on the corner spoke of it in conspiratorial whispers. “Wait till Judgment Day. That’s when Helter Skelter will really come down.”

Judgment Day. What was it? A plan to break out Manson? An orgy of retribution?

As important was the question of when. The day the jury returned their verdict of “Not guilty” or “Guilty”? Or, if the latter, the day the same jury decided “Life” or “Death”? Or perhaps the day of sentencing itself? Or might it even be tomorrow?

Judgment Day. We began to hear those words more and more often. Without explanation. As yet unaware that the first phase of Judgment Day had already begun, with the theft, from Camp Pendleton Marine Base, of a case of hand grenades.