Summit Gist

American cult leader and criminal Charles Manson, being led away in handcuffs after being found guilty of first-degree murder in all seven of the Tate and LaBianca killings. Photograph taken in 1971. Charles Milles Manson (né Maddox; November 12, 1934 – November 19, 2017) was an American criminal, cult leader and musician who led the Manson Family, a cult based in California, in the late 1960s. Some of the members committed a series of at least nine murders at four locations in July and August 1969. In 1971, Manson was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for the deaths of seven people, including the film actress Sharon Tate. The prosecution contended that, while Manson never directly ordered the murders, his ideology constituted an overt act of conspiracy Before the murders, Manson had spent more than half of his life in correctional institutions. While gathering his cult following, Manson was a singer-songwriter on the fringe of the Los Angeles music indus...