Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders

There were 6.9 grams of marijuana in a plastic bag in a cabinet in the living room of the main residence. In the nightstand in the bedroom used by Frykowski and Folger were 30 grams of hashish, plus ten capsules which, later analyzed, proved to be a relatively new drug known as MDA. There was also marijuana residue in the ashtray on the stand next to Sharon Tate’s bed, a marijuana cigarette on the desk near the front door,[4] and two more in the guest house.

Had a drug party been in progress, one of the participants “freaking out” and slaying everyone there? The police put this at the top of their list of possible reasons for the murders, though well aware this theory had several weaknesses, chief among them the presumption that there was a single killer, wielding a gun in one hand, a bayonet in the other, at the same time carrying 43 feet of rope, all of which, conveniently, he just happened to bring along. Also, there were the wires. If they had been cut before the murders, this indicated premeditation, not a spontaneous flare-up. If cut after, why?

Or could the murders have been the result of a drug “burn,” the killer(s) arriving to make a delivery or buy, an argument over money or bad drugs erupting into violence? This was the second, and in many ways the most likely, of the five theories the detectives would list in their first investigative report.

The third theory was a variation of the second, the killer(s) deciding to keep both the money and the drugs.

The fourth was the residential burglary theory.

The fifth, that these were “deaths by hire,” the killer(s) being sent to the house to eliminate one or more of the victims, then, in order to escape identification, finding it necessary to kill all. But would a hired killer choose as one of his weapons something as large, conspicuous, and unwieldy as a bayonet? And would he keep stabbing and stabbing and stabbing in a mad frenzy, as so obviously had been done in this case?

The drug theories seemed to make the most sense. In the investigation that followed, as the police interviewed acquaintances of the victims, and the victims’ habits and life styles emerged into clearer focus, the possibility that drugs were in some way linked to the motive became in some minds such a certainty that when given a clue which could have solved the case, they refused even to consider it.

The police were not the only ones to think of drugs.

On hearing of the deaths, actor Steve McQueen, long-time friend of Jay Sebring, suggested that the hair stylist’s home should be rid of narcotics to protect his family and business. Though McQueen did not himself participate in the “housecleaning,” by the time LAPD got around to searching Sebring’s residence, anything embarrassing had been removed.

Others developed instant paranoia. No one was sure who the police would question, or when. An unidentified film figure told a Life reporter: “Toilets are flushing all over Beverly Hills; the entire Los Angeles sewer system is stoned.”

FILM STAR, 4 OTHERS

DEAD IN BLOOD ORGY

Sharon Tate Victim

In “Ritual” Murders

The headlines dominated the front pages of the afternoon papers, became the big news on radio and TV. The bizarre nature of the crime, the number of victims, and their prominence—a beautiful movie star, the heiress to a coffee fortune, her jet-set playboy paramour, an internationally known hair stylist—would combine to make this probably the most publicized murder case in history, excepting only the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Even the staid New York Times, which rarely reports crime on its front page, did so the next day, and many days thereafter.

The accounts that day and the next were notable for the unusual amount of detail they contained. So much information had been given out, in fact, that the detectives would have difficulty finding “polygraph keys” for questioning suspects.

In any homicide, it is standard practice to withhold certain information which presumably only the police and the killer(s) know. If a suspect confesses, or agrees to a polygraph examination, these keys can then be used to determine if he is telling the truth.

Owing to the many leaks, the detectives assigned to the “Tate case,” as the press was already calling the murders, could only come up with five: (1) That the knife used was probably a bayonet. (2) That the gun was probably a .22 caliber revolver. (3) The exact dimensions of the rope, as well as the way it was looped and tied. And (4) and (5), that a pair of horn-rimmed glasses and a Buck knife had been found.