LOS ANGELES - In the dearly five decades since the notorious Manson murders stunned Los Angeles, there has been endless fascination and revulsion surrounding Charles Manson and his cult “family.”

Manson did not fade quietly during his decades behind bars, but continued to make headlines with interviews, bad conduct in prison and, more recently, health issues that eventually claimed his life on Sunday at age 83.

The killers: Where are they now?

Patricia Krenwinkel was a secretary when she met Manson at a party. She quit her job the next day and joined Manson’s “family.” She was found guilty of seven counts of murder in the killings, including stabbing the LaBiancas to death and writing “DEATH TO PIGS” on the wall in the victims’ blood.

Krenwinkel, along with Susan Atkins and Leslie Van Houten, later condemned Manson and urged young people not to think of him as a hero.

After Atkins’ death, Krenwinkel, now 69, became California’s longest-serving female inmate. According to state prison officials, Krenwinkel is a model inmate involved in rehabilitative programs at the prison.

She is being housed at the California Institution for Women near Chino. Late last year, state parole officials postponed a decision on setting Krenwinkel free after her attorney made new claims that she had been abused by Manson or another person. The inquiry into the allegations took nearly six months. On June 22, parole commissioners again denied parole for Krenwinkel.

Leslie Van Houten: A jury found that the former homecoming princess was guilty of holding down Rosemary LaBianca in her Los Feliz home while an accomplice stabbed her. She was convicted of murder and conspiracy in 1978 at her third trial for the crimes, just months after she’d been released on bail following a hung jury verdict.

Van Houten said she was introduced to Manson by a boyfriend and came to view him as Jesus Christ, believing in his bizarre plan to commit murders and spark a race war.

She is serving her life sentence at the California Institution for Women near Chino, prison officials say, and has been disciplinary-free her entire sentence.
Van Houten, 68, told a parole board in 2002 that she was “deeply ashamed” of her role in the killings. "I take very seriously not just the murders but what made me make myself available to someone like Manson."

A state review board recommended parole for her in April, but Gov. Jerry Brown reversed that decision. She had previously been denied parole 19 times.

In September, the board again recommended parole.

Charles "Tex" Watson, Manson’s self-described right-hand man, was sentenced to death for his part in the killings but was later given life in prison after the death penalty was overturned. In prison, Watson married, divorced, fathered four children and became an ordained minister.

Watson, 71, is housed at the Mule Creek Prison in Ione, Calif., about 40 miles outside Sacramento, where he works as a janitor and attends Bible studies and services in the prison chapel, according to the ministry’s website. He has been denied parole 17 times. His most recent parole hearing was held Oct. 27, when a panel once again found him unsuitable for release from prison for at least five more years.

Susan Atkins, a former topless dancer who became one of Manson’s closest disciples, died in prison in 2009 at age 61. Atkins, called the “scariest of the Manson girls” by a former prosecutor, confessed to killing actress Sharon Tate, the pregnant wife of director Roman Polanski, who was stabbed 16 times as she pleaded with the killers to spare her unborn son and then hanged. At sentencing, where Atkins was condemned to death, she taunted the court, saying, “You’d best lock your doors,” and “watch your own kids.”

Her sentence was later converted to life in prison.

In prison, Atkins embraced Christianity and apologized for her role in the crimes, and the prison staff advocated unsuccessfully for her release in 2005. She was denied parole 13 times.

Bruce Davis, 75, was convicted in 1972 for taking part in the killings of Gary Hinman, an aspiring musician, and Donald "Shorty" Shea, a stuntman and a ranch hand at the Chatsworth ranch where Manson and his followers lived. Both murders occurred before the Tate-LaBianca killings, in which Davis did not participate.

Hinman’s body was found in his home, with the words “political piggy” drawn on the wall with his blood.

In January 2016, Gov. Jerry Brown rejected his parole, the third time a governor has done so, saying that Davis remains a danger to public safety. In his decision, Brown said that the “horror of the murders committed by the Manson Family in 1969 and the fear they instilled in the public will never be forgotten.”

Davis has been denied parole 30 times.

The final word

“People are saying that this should be some kind of relief, but oddly enough it really isn’t. While Charlie may be gone, it’s the ones that are still alive that perpetrate everything, and it was up to their imaginations for what brutal things were going to be done. In an odd way, I see them as much more dangerous individuals.”
--Debra Tate, the sister of Sharon Tate, in an interview with ABC News.

Story Date: November 21, 2017