The smearing wouldn't necessarily be from the act of moving Sharon's body, but rather to cover up the finger/handprints in the blood on her that would likely have been made by two persons carrying her outside in her state of rigor.
Hi everyone! I'm new to everything, including this board and the case, so I'm just now discovering things that you all probably already knew. So of course I've got questions. (hope this works! Um, I'm quoting from a bunch of different posts, hope it's not too confusing...) How farfetched is that though? LOL, maybe it's because I don't remember much before the age of computers, but I can't think of too many other things a teenager sitting home alone would do in the middle of the night. Isn't that what the other kid was doing when he heard the loud arguments around 4am? I was even thinking maybe, here's Garretson, feeling so alone that he invites anyone he meets to stop by, but no one ever does. Then Steven shows up out of the blue--but he's only there to sell him a radio (or get some nookie, depending on who you ask, LOL). So after he leaves, Garretson is feeling extra lonely, and possibly unnerved/scared, so he sits down and asks his former roommate to come back. Not that he'd be writing all night, but at least a part of it. In the evidence report, it lists two packets of letters taken from the guest house. Anyone know if they collaborated Garretson's story? Heh, I also noticed how they found Steven's checkbook in the car - but they still had trouble identifying him? I haven't seen this discussed anywhere, and I've been wondering: what are the chances Patty Montgomery is really Patricia Krenwinkel? When I saw that name in the transcript, I kinda off-handedly went "Gee, Patty is short for Patricia, and Montgomery is close to Mobile" but didn't think anything more of it. So it really startled me when a couple of days later I read that the fake name Krenwinkel gave when she was arrested in Mobile was Marnie Montgomery. (Apparently Tex used Montgomery as an alias too?) It's probably still just a coincidence, but I had to ask. I only know about him through the mention in the transcript. Is there more? I think he said he thought they were locked. Also, one place says Katie opened the door in looked in, another says she tried the door but it was locked, and a third says the barking scared her off. It could be she looked through the window - didn't Garretson see the cop through the window right before he busted in? I would love to find out what really happened there. What are you saying he's lying about? Not that I'm questioning you, I just couldn't tell what you were referring to. Also, like I said, I'm new--has CM's return really been established? Even so, i don't think it's that hard to believe they didn't see Garretson, especially if Garretson was lying low - seems they had other things on their mind. During the lie detector test, Garretson said the dogs were barking two or three hours after Steven left. Is that anything significant? Thought it was kind of interesting. I tend to be trusting (okay, gullible), so I'm going to take Garretson mostly at face value. I think he either heard/saw just enough to scare him but not enough to give him any idea what was really going on - and as years went on, either his mind filled in the blanks with what he's heard about the case, or he went ahead and made it all up so he would have something more interesting for E! to show. Or, he saw a lot and was so terrified he went into shock and his mind blocked everything out, leaving huge gaps in his memory. But I don't know anything about shock--is that kind of scenario possible? Okay, I have tons more questions and comments, but figured I went on long enough!
Welcome, damfino! That's a damfino moniker you got there!!! I'm sort of new here, too, and I'm learning things left and right. I've only read Helter Skelter which is abbreviated as HS on here, just in case you don't know. So for 30 something years, that's what I've been going by. Didn't realize there was so many theories and evidence that didn't support the HS theory put forth by Vincent Bugliosi (VB). Not until I got a computer with good internet access did I discover the world of Tate-LaBianca. Now, my eyes are opened to other possiblities. However, the maddening thing is, unanswered and unanswerable questions keep piling up. I WANT ANSWERS! Only, this case is so confusing and lots and lots of stuff that doesn't add up to the official version of things. I do want to agree with you on Garretson. I think he saw more than what he says he did, and I think he went into shock and then spent the rest of his life in either drunken or a drug induced haze, trying to forget it all. What he saw probably traumatized him. Now, I think the drugs or alcohol has ruined his brain and he's just a shell now. How he got away with not telling the truth is beyond me. Perhaps it was just too much for his mind, he blocked it out and thus, passed his polygraph test, for all intents and purposes, he IS telling the truth because his mind blocked out the trauma. The mind is one unexplainable thing. I took a class in psychology concerning the brain, and it was just too 'cerebral' ;D for me and had to drop it. No, seriously, from what I remember about it, the mind is a miraculous organ in our body, but you can't really explain it or define what it does because its just too complicated. Your brain can protect you from bad things if it wants to, in other words. I think that's what happened to our Mr. Garretson. Got to feel sorry for the guy. I believe he probably suffered from what we now call Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. About 11-15 years ago, when I went back to college to get my teaching degree, I took a psychology class and we had to do these reports and I did one on Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome which was a fairly new thing in the pychology world and the article mentioned that a lot of children who lived in the projects where there was lots of shooting suffered from it. My son got back from Afghanistan last year, and I know he's suffering from it, but he won't and can't get help for it. The military doesn't smile upon its soldiers getting mental health help. :'( But anyway, welcome and I agree with you about WG being so messed up from what he saw, he truly doesn't remember it.
Welcome damfino-a great post to start with. Good to have you. Never thought about Patty M being Krenwinkle but with the girls supposedly swimming at the pool previous to the murders, then it is a great thought. (and quite possible) I do not know what was in the letters in the guesthouse, your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps I am looking at it from a nowadays perspective-it would be so much easier to just pick up the phone and call the ex roomate and say hey. It is just a weird thought to me to be letter writing so much... The lack of idetifying Steven Parent has always gotten to me...in the one report or addendum, it has Garretson on his way out saying that it could have been Parent in the car. But, if my memory is not going on me, HS states that William could NOT identifty Parent and claimed not to know who it was. The checkbook, the papers, and the plates on the car, would have made it easy for the police to ID him. Why he wasn't ID'd sooner and was checked into the morgue as a John Doe, is beyond me..the bodies were not removed from the scene until around (from memory) 4:45 or so-there were many hours to try and get a name for him. The sherrif in Texas where Tex was arrested (what a mouthful) was Tom Montgomery and a relation of Tex...so the use of the name is again, quite feasible. Anyways...enough of my cat ramble---welcome aboard.
Wasnt Texs second name Montgomery, his fathers second name? Garretson changed his story some years later. Said he hed glanced through the window and saw gabby running through the lawn and a girl chasing her. Heard words I give up I am dead already but could not make any sense of it and let it pass. I think it is only a chunk of the story he knows, he may never finish it. Police had a lot of work to do that day so it doesnt seem that strange they were behind with Parents identity. Garretson initially tried to cut himself off from anything outside, not recognizing Parent shouldnt be that weird either. Its a shame the house has been pulled down and replaced. I guess the guesthouse either. It would be interesting to take the same model of gun Tex had with himself, go there at midnight and fire four shots at the gate. Then hear what flies off. Apparently Garretson, in one of his accounts, mistook the sound for firecrackers in another he heard nothing. But the shots were fired just at the gate. There were four people in the condo. And no one heard anything. Sharon, Jay and Gabby were not asleep. Firecrackers or not, it was close. At least one window was open, the one Tex crawled through. What about neighbors? Never heard a mention of Polanskies neighbors Firecrackers are tossed, dogs going mad and no reaction whatsoever. How much one has to be stunned not to hear anything? Gabby was reading a book when Sadie opened the door so at least she was partially aware of the world around. There are many houses like the one in Cielo drive, with decorative random stone cladding and stud frame to the inside. it might be possible to recreate fairly faithfully this particular moment. Place four stoned people in the house, get the gun, fire it four times, get the dogs and so on. Investigators may have done it already, I suppose. If they had, Id be interested what they had come to.
Has anyone here watched that Turning Point with Diane Sawyer years ago on these crimes? It was on YouTube for awhile. It was a great show. She talked to Manson, PK, and LV. If it's not on YouTube anymore, can someone post it again, because I remember PK talking about what she did when she got to the guest house. I just thought it would add to the discussion on this... I have it on some VCR tape baried somewhere. God only knows where. Tammie
From what I know, PK went to the guest house, tried the door handle, it was locked and she went back to the main house. However, I'm confused now. Did she do this after they murdered the other four or before the murdering began or was it during? Also, when they began murdering them, was SA trying to kill Voytek and PK was trying to kill Abigail, so what was Tex doing at this time? Was he keeping tabs on Sharon and Jay? Mrs. Seymour Katts said she heard the sound of a gun shooting 4 times between 12:30 and 1:00, and sat there and listened, but didn't hear anything else, so she went back to sleep. Whose to say that Sharon and the others maybe heard the shots, too, like Garretson, thought it was firecrackers or a car backfiring. I live in a really safe part of town except for three weird criminal things that happened last year and I hear cars backfiring all the time but that's because we live on a busy street and a half a block away from a major street and we have cars and motorcycles going through, sometimes their engines backfiring at all hours of the day/night, so maybe, if they heard those sounds, maybe that's what they thought. If I was on that Ghost Hunters show, and was at Dave Oman or Orman's house, that is one question that I would of asked the spirits of Jay and Sharon, among others. I wish I could get myself into that house and talk to the spirits. Could answer lots of questions.
Thanks for the warm welcome! You guys are awesome, especially for not ripping me apart. That's just funny to me that Tex has Montgomery in his family and used it as a name. I never knew that. I'm in southern Alabama, which is why my mind made the Montgomery-Mobile connection - and it turned out not to even be a factor. (I used to live in Ohio, and I did that there too. Grover Cleveland? Chris Columbus? Cities in Ohio!) In Mobile there's a small police museum, and right as you step in or even pass by the window outside, you see this huge, freaking picture of Patricia Krenwinkel plastered to the wall with the words "Mobile's Most Famous Arrest" above it - LOL, kinda caught my eye. Anyway, they had some local articles there, and that's where I saw that she told the police her name was Marnie Montgomery. I kinda went, "Hey, wait a minute..." BottledBrunette (lol, love your name!) - thanks for the info on shock and PTSS! That's a topic I've always wanted to learn more about that. I'm really sorry to hear about your son - I hope he gets whatever help he needs! Catscradle - I wonder where the guy he was writing to lived, and if it was long distance or not. Garretson did call his mother collect for her birthday. Or maybe he was afraid the guy still wanted to kick his ass for throwing him out? lol Simon- The gun shots always bothered me too. Especially if you go with the theory that Frykowski was a heavy drug dealer and was waiting for someone. I admit if I heard gunshots, I would probably just convince myself, oh it's nothing--but if I or someone I knew was involved in something that could be shady, I'd probably want to check it out. And the fact that it was so close...Did they really not hear it? Or did they think it was farther away than it was? Rhiannon- Ooh, thanks, I'm going to look for that now...Arg, okay, I thought I'd come across it in my searches before but hadn't gotten around to watching it--but now I can't find it at all. Keeping an eye out!
damfino "The gun shots always bothered me too. Especially if you go with the theory that Frykowski was a heavy drug dealer and was waiting for someone. I admit if I heard gunshots, I would probably just convince myself, oh it's nothing--but if I or someone I knew was involved in something that could be shady, I'd probably want to check it out. And the fact that it was so close...Did they really not hear it? Or did they think it was farther away than it was?" Didn't it say in HS that due to the odd shape of the canyon that the sounds were muffled? Or some crazy sounding thing like that? Has this ever been tested?
[quote author=jadedjamie link=topic=4361.msg38109#msg38109 date=1251556598] Speaking of Manson and friends going back, something occurred to me. Do we know how long it took Jay to die? The reason I ask is because of two things. One, Jay looked as if he were going into the "Sleeping Lion" position. This is the fetal position that patients with severe head wounds and or coma go into before they die. That would mean he could have been in a deep coma and the killers mistakenly thought he was already dead when they left. The reason why I ask this is the gunshots that were reported that night. It is strange to me that people reported them so far apart. From 1:00 am to 4:00 am. It is nothing, I am sure, but for some reason that just nags at me. Jamie [/quote] Always assuming on my part, I just assumed that: 1) when Jay was carried outside and then brought back inside again, that he was laid in a fetal position, like Sharon (this is my assumption from reading here that they were carried outside); 2) when they were herded into the living room, maybe he was kneeling and they shot him and he fell like that; 3) he was shot in an area that is always out of camera shot, was trying to crawl towards Sharon, or just crawling, was intercepted in mid crawl by Tex and stabbed there, thus his body being in the position it was in; 4)he was in "Sleeping Lion" position as suggested by, I think jaime. If I'm wrong, I'm sorry, I'm going by memory. So those are my assumptions on why Jay's body is in the position it was in.
[quote author=catscradle77 link=topic=4361.msg38384#msg38384 date=1251883813] Welcome damfino-a great post to start with. Good to have you. Never thought about Patty M being Krenwinkle but with the girls supposedly swimming at the pool previous to the murders, then it is a great thought. (and quite possible) I do not know what was in the letters in the guesthouse, your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps I am looking at it from a nowadays perspective-it would be so much easier to just pick up the phone and call the ex roomate and say hey. It is just a weird thought to me to be letter writing so much... The lack of idetifying Steven Parent has always gotten to me...in the one report or addendum, it has Garretson on his way out saying that it could have been Parent in the car. But, if my memory is not going on me, HS states that William could NOT identifty Parent and claimed not to know who it was. The checkbook, the papers, and the plates on the car, would have made it easy for the police to ID him. Why he wasn't ID'd sooner and was checked into the morgue as a John Doe, is beyond me..the bodies were not removed from the scene until around (from memory) 4:45 or so-there were many hours to try and get a name for him. The sherrif in Texas where Tex was arrested (what a mouthful) was Tom Montgomery and a relation of Tex...so the use of the name is again, quite feasible. Anyways...enough of my cat ramble---welcome aboard. [/quote] I could be wrong, but I think the cops weren't as nice as they are now , and they didn't really have that much empathy for the victims that they do now. I could be wrong, now.
I, too, am somewhat new to this site (have been reading for a while, but rarely post as I just don't feel I know enough to provide any good additions! LOL)...I also grew up on the HS theory, although I always thought it was a bit farfetched. It is quite interesting to read the posts and hear all of the different theories out there. It does make one wonder. There seem to be too many coincidences to dismiss them all. Unfortunately, none of them are ever going to tell the whole truth (if they themselves even recall what that is anymore). I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for all of the great information posted here!
Just wanted to tell everyone an interesting little "true" story. About ten years ago I was relaxing on my gf's bed when she came flying in the room to tell me she heard 2 gunshots. Anyhow, we found out later that they were indeed shots and here's the kicker---the gun was fired on the walk directly under the window of my gf's room, not 10 feet beyond the wall her bed was pushed up against. I HEARD NOTHING! So from first hand experience I can tell you that it is possible to not notice a weapon firing in near proximity. First of all, I figure Parent's car was roughly 30 to 50 feet from the residence. Add to that the fact that Frykowski was snoozing on the couch in the livingroom AND the stereo was on at a medium to loud volume AND he had just taken some drugs...get it? As far as the others, they were even further from Parent's car considering they were at the other end of the house. Needless to say, I don't find it at all strange that the initial shots weren't heard by anyone in that house.
[quote author=greeneyes71 link=topic=4361.msg38435#msg38435 date=1251932175] I, too, am somewhat new to this site (have been reading for a while, but rarely post as I just don't feel I know enough to provide any good additions! LOL)...I also grew up on the HS theory, although I always thought it was a bit farfetched. It is quite interesting to read the posts and hear all of the different theories out there. It does make one wonder. There seem to be too many coincidences to dismiss them all. Unfortunately, none of them are ever going to tell the whole truth (if they themselves even recall what that is anymore). I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for all of the great information posted here! [/quote] Hi, greeneyes71. Nice to meet you.
[quote author=SonOf69 link=topic=4361.msg38481#msg38481 date=1251974683] Just wanted to tell everyone an interesting little "true" story. About ten years ago I was relaxing on my gf's bed when she came flying in the room to tell me she heard 2 gunshots. Anyhow, we found out later that they were indeed shots and here's the kicker---the gun was fired on the walk directly under the window of my gf's room, not 10 feet beyond the wall her bed was pushed up against. I HEARD NOTHING! So from first hand experience I can tell you that it is possible to not notice a weapon firing in near proximity. First of all, I figure Parent's car was roughly 30 to 50 feet from the residence. Add to that the fact that Frykowski was snoozing on the couch in the livingroom AND the stereo was on at a medium to loud volume AND he had just taken some drugs...get it? As far as the others, they were even further from Parent's car considering they were at the other end of the house. Needless to say, I don't find it at all strange that the initial shots weren't heard by anyone in that house. [/quote] Good observations, SonOf69. You are probably right about everything you said. It is weird how sound travels. I have two thoughts on that matter. Either the victims heard the gunshots and didn't think anything about it, or they didn't hear it because the way HS explained it. Sorry to say, we will never know.
Hi BB! Glad to be here. I have been fascinated with this case since highschool. I have never really bought in to the theory that CM made them do it - you have to have a little of it in you to commit murder. Not that I am an expert on brainwashing, and I understand that drugs were involved, but it is just so hard to believe. There are so many here, too many to mention, that bring up such excellent points. It has been very interesting reading.
I have been debating putting up the Sharon and Steven-a few people have asked about it...how does everyone feel about it?
