July 20, 2023 • 36 mins
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca tragically find themselves thrust into the darkest depths of human cruelty.
Bounded by the twisted whims of their captors, the LaBiancas are subjected to unimaginable terror, and their lives are extinguished in a merciless act of violence. Joseph Scott Morgan and Dave Mack delve deep into the horrifying details of the LaBianca murders, orchestrated by Charles Manson and carried out by Patricia Krenwinkel, Leslie Van Houten, and Tex Watson.
They provide a comprehensive historical context and detailed account of the unsettling events leading to the murders, delve into the gruesome details of the crime scenes, uncover the Manson family's bizarre motives, and reveal the disturbing after-effects of their reign of terror.
Time-coded Highlights:
- 00:20 - Joe Scott Morgan sets the stage, introducing the Manson family and the LaBianca murders.
- 01:46 - Dave Mack shares his personal connection to the Tate-LaBianca murders.
- 03:00 - Mack discusses the societal fear instilled by the Manson family crimes. He paints a vivid picture of the public's reaction to the horrifying events.
- 04:00 - Joe Scott reveals an intriguing fact about the discovery of the LaBianca’s bodies, and describes the panic and fear that these murders instilled in the public and the challenges the police faced.
- 07:00 - Dave Mack brings up news of Leslie Van Houten's recent release from prison and details the disturbing events leading up to the LaBianca murders, providing more details about the people involved, including Charles Manson and Tex Watson.
- 10:20 - Morgan provides insight into the Manson family's use of LSD and training in stealthy home invasions, known as 'creepy crawling', and discusses the initial investigation of the LaBianca murder and how investigators initially thought it might be a copycat crime due to the brutality of the Tate murders.
- 14:28 - Mack shares his personal experience of living in the area during the time of the murders and narrates the chilling events of the LaBianca murders.
- 18:16 - Rosemary LaBianca's brave fight against her attackers and a glimpse into her final moments.
- 19:21 - Details of the injuries sustained by Leno LaBianca, which included multiple stab wounds to his neck and abdomen, leading to his death by massive hemorrhage. The carving fork left in Lino's abdomen is mentioned, highlighting the gruesome nature of the crime scene.
- 24:05 - Morgan explains the importance of preserving evidence at a crime scene, using impaled objects as an example. His expertise in forensic investigation guides listeners through the complexities of examining a crime scene.
- 30:11 - Morgan differentiates between postmortem and antemortem injuries. His explanation aids listeners in understanding the forensic nuances of a murder investigation.
- 33:05 - Morgan explores the concept of asymmetry in an attack. His analysis of Leslie Van Houten's dominant position during the crime provides an understanding of the crime dynamics.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Buddy Backs with Joseph Scott Morgan. The song Home Sick
is a song from my youth. It resonates in my ears,
came out in the seventies and if you've never heard it,
it kind of takes you back on a bit of
(00:30):
a time travel if you will. I love ars. Other
people have recorded I think Travis TripIt recorded it and
rerecorded it, but it takes you back in time to
that moment you begin to think as kids, as kids
of the sixties, where were you well. I was just
a little thing back then. I was playing in the
backyard of my grandparents' house, where I lived most of
(00:52):
the time. It was a very people It's a well
worn phrase, people say it's very innocent time, and it
was for me, playing in my sandpile, enjoying life in
the Deep South. The further thing from my mind back
then was probably mass homicide in the news nationally. It
sent a chill down everyone spine of the horrors that
(01:16):
were revealed back in nineteen sixty nine, of what was
going on in Alick County, particularly as it applied to
the Manson family. Today owned body bags. We're going to
turn back the page a little bit and we're going
to re examine the murders of the Lobyankas.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
August eleventh, nineteen sixty nine, Rosemary Labianca's teenage son discovers
the brutal murders carried out by three of Charles Manson's
followers the night before. Leno LaBianca had been stabbed twelve
times with a knife or bayonet and seven times with
a two tined carving fork, leaving fourteen puncture wounds in
(01:58):
his abdomen, was still stuck in his abdomen, and a
kitchen knife pierced his throat. The word war had also
been carved into his abdomen. Rosemary Lebianca had a total
of forty one stab wounds on the front and back
of her body, and autopsy showed that many of the
wounds were post mortem.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body bags. Hey,
Dave mac where were you in sixty nine?
Speaker 3 (02:29):
I was a very very young child. This murder, the
Tate Lobianca murders, as they are commonly referred to, I
it actually impacted my life on a personal level and
professionally over the years because I lived in that area
when this happened. I was born and raised in southern California,
born in Hawthorne and raised in Orange County predominantly. But anyway,
(02:50):
when this happened, here's the thing that people may or man,
I know, and Joe you might not know. It happened
August eighth, August ninth, nineteen sixty nine. Think about some
other things that was actually happening in the world a
couple weeks earlier. Neil Armstrong Man on the Moon.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
You bet, buddy, I remember it. I remember watching on
black and white television my grandparents' house. It was a
magical thing.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
So that's a huge deal.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Made everybody, I mean just made everybody feel like anything's possible.
And a week after the murders, what else happened? Wouldstock
in New York right, so imagine and by the way,
and mixed into this same time period Chap Equittic and
Teddy Kennedy, So we had a lot going on in
the United States of America at the time that Rosemary
(03:37):
and Leno Labianco were murdered. It impacted my life because
being in southern California when Sharon Tate along with her friends,
and off the top of my head, I remember it
was Abagail Folger and Voytek Freikowski, Jay se Bring and
then they had the like a guy that was like
the yardkeeper. Anyway, that was such a big deal because
(03:58):
first of all, Sharon Tate was a beautif model, she
was an actress married to Roman Polanski, the master of
the macab Because of Rosemary's Baby, you start thinking about
how all these things kind of come together, and it's
like crazy time. But the next night the Labyancas, and
that was fear in the hearts of people. Sharon Tate
and celebrity rich people getting murdered is one thing, but
(04:21):
the Lobyancas were looked at as just regular people like
the rest of us. And now nobody's safe.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
There's one little interesting factoid I think that some people
might not be aware of, and I got it to
give you an idea, a measure for how innocent Tim's
were when the Labyanca's bodies were actually discovered. That cannot
get access to the home, that is the family that
(04:51):
they were trying to open the door to get in.
Guess where they got the key from to unlock the
door to get into the house under the mat No,
they went and dig this just for a second. They
went out to the vehicle parked in the driveway, and
the keys were in the ignition, and they take the
(05:13):
key out of the ignition and make access to this
house with that key. And can you just imagine when
Rosemary Labanca's children went into this environment and they see
these words scrawled in blood on the walls, on the doors.
(05:34):
I think, most famously the words helter skelter. By the way,
I think it was misspelled. And there's several interesting things
about this is because some people think that it was
intentionally misspelled. There were little clues along the way. I
don't know if any of these people were that sophisticated.
You walk in and you see this horror show, and
it was truly a horror show. Lots and lots of
(05:56):
blood evidence at the scene, and I don't know that
you could necessarily take the measure of it. You have
the police coming off the so called Tate homicides on
clo and then you walk into this environment and you know,
there was resistance at first by the police to at
least publicly show any kind of connectivity between what had
(06:20):
happened previously with Sharon Tate and that group of people
and then what had happened with the Labiancas, and it
all goes to what was trying to be accomplished here.
I think with the police one of the biggest things
for them is they were trying to prevent a panic
because can you imagine what those conversations were like, you know,
(06:41):
in the detective bureau when you've got arguably two blood
baths that have taken place, and you've got the shadow
of celebrity that's kind of hanging over both of these events,
with Sharon Tate and everyone up on Colo, and then
you've got the Lobyancas. Okay, they're starting up here in
(07:01):
relative to the celebrities. Now they're going out here where
the rest of us mix and mingle, the mere mortals
among us.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
And the one thing to think of again, nineteen sixty
nine was a different time and the way we lived
the Tate Lobianca murders. Joe, we could actually spend all
of today, tomorrow the next day talking just about these murders,
and we would go for twenty four hours a day
for the next few day and wouldn't finish. There's too much.
So focusing on the Labyancas. They were married couple. They
(07:33):
actually were the next day, meaning the day after the
Tate murders had taken place. And the reason it's in
the news this week is because Leslie Van Howden actually
was released from prison after fifty some odd years. Now,
here's the kick, Joe, and you've been around crime scenes
and murders for a long time. I really want to
(07:56):
hear your explanation of what police for looking at when
they got to the scene of the crime. But the
bottom line is with Leslie van Houghten being a Manson
family member, one of the women, well she actually only
was involved in the Labyanca murders. She was not at
the previous night's activities. At the Lobyanca crime scene. You
(08:18):
had Tex Watson, he and Charlie. And by the way,
Charlie Manson was not at the Tape murders. He was, however,
at the Lobbyanca house at the.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
House, but he beat feet before the actual event occurred,
right they get there. Well, I'm gonna skip through this
real fast. Charlie Manson had convinced these young people that
a race war was coming and they needed to have
a safe place out in the desert, which is why
they were maneuvered out there. In reality, they were out there.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Because they'd been stealing volkswagons and converting them into doom
buggies and selling them, and the heat was getting hot,
and so they wanted to get out of town. And
Charlie went there and in their drug whatever decided that
they needed to commit crimes. The Manson family that would
they needed to commit murders that didn't make sense. That's
what the La Beiyanca murder was all about, a murder
(09:09):
that didn't make any sense and would cause fear and
panic in people. And Leslie Van Honton said that in
her own words. By the way, I actually listened to
this yesterday in preparation for the show and heard her
in nineteen seventy one talking to her new lawyer. He said,
how are you going to start a revolution? She actually said,
Joe by committing a senseless murder, which is exactly what
(09:35):
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. It was just a murder. But
anyway I mentioned, Charles Manson was not at the Tate House, well,
he was at the Labyankas. Charles Manson and Text Watson
go inside the Labiyanca's house. And by the way, these
mental giants. The Manson family. They've been driving around for
a couple hours looking for a place that they could
go in and commit this heinous act. Right they didn't
(09:57):
find one right away, and so Leslie van Hown said
she fell asleep in the car as they were driving around.
When she woke up, Charles and Tex Watson had gone
in the house and they'd already tied up Leno and
Rosemary LaBianca. They found Lino on the couch in the
living room in the den, and so they tied him up,
and then Charlie Manson went in and they got Rosemary
(10:19):
out of bed, she was already in bed, got her
up and you know, sign of the Times, maybe Joe.
But before they brought Rosemary Labyanca out of the bedroom,
she was already in her night clothes. And do you
know what she did? And they let her They let
her put on a dress. Rosemary Lobianca was allowed to
put on a dress over her night clothes, to be
(10:41):
a dressed appropriately for what she thought was just a robbery.
Charles Manson and Text Watson said, you're not going to
be hurt. We just want your money. So they got
the cash and then Charlie goes outside, they send the
girls in. They sent Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia Crinwinkle
to go in and kill Rosemary Lobbyond.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Okay, One interesting little aside here is that you think
about Manson and kind of how he had been prepping
this crew. That's the way you have to look at it.
It's an organized crime venture, is what it comes down to.
Because they were a collection of thieves, is essentially what
they were. And of course they're fueled by asurgic acid
(11:20):
to a great degree. You know, it's been well documented
stated that they would drop LSD. There's some people that
have actually opined that Manson himself would fake taking LSD
and then everybody else would have it on board and
he could influence them and begin to talk to them
(11:40):
when they're tripping essentially. But one of the things that
he would do, to give you back to this idea
of thievery, this being a theft ring, is that he
introduced them to something called creepy crawling. He would actually
have these people go out and purposefully go into residences
in a stealth like manner, and the trick was not
(12:04):
to be caught, and they would go in and perhaps
rearrange things and not necessarily take anything, but just to
kind of hone these skills so that they could go
in and commit thievery, stealing, if you will, burglary and
not be caught. I think here's the big question though,
If that's the case, what is it that would motivate
(12:29):
a band of thieves that lived out in the desert,
away from society. What is it that caused them to
commit such a horrible, horrible crime. There's a couple of
(13:02):
classic images black and white photography of the exterior of
the scene up on Siela, where the Tate home was
and where that multiple homicide took place. In One that
really jumps to mind is there's an image of one
of my heroes at the scene, and that's doctor Tom Magucci,
(13:23):
who was with the Medical Examiner corner back during that
time at Los Angeles, probably arguably one of the greatest
forensic pathologists that's ever worked in my way of estimation.
But he was at the scene and what he bore
witness to there. He's talked about or had talked about
previously on many occasions at the Tate residence. Horrible things
(13:47):
that happened, obviously over the years, and we see this
carnage that erupts from time to time, But I don't
know that anybody could really fully appreciate what they were
seeing then and try to make sense of it, the
level of brutality. And so one interesting little point bringing
it back to the Lobyanca double homicide, is that apparently
(14:12):
at first the investigators really were thinking that they might
be dealing with a copycat crime. That the word had
leaked out at that point in time about how horrific
the Tate homicides were, and then you see this horror
show that takes place at the Lobbyanca household. They're thinking, Okay,
(14:34):
somebody read about this and they just wanted to see
if they could duplicate it. What do you think about that, Dave.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
I lived there in this area at that time as
a young child, And one of the things that I
think people forget it's about copycat crimes. There was so
much made about Sharon Tate because she was eight and
a half months pregnant when she was murdered, and this
was a horrible crime scene and it was splashed everywhere.
And then you have this normal class Rosemary and Lena
(15:01):
LaBianca being murdered, and there was some thought that copycat
crimes were going to occur. My family personally, we were
moving into a new a different home, a bigger home.
In the process of the move Joe Scott Morgan, I
remember going to that house on our move in was
delayed for some reason. I was a kid, I don't
you know. I didn't know why at the time, but
I know that when we got there the week after Halloween,
(15:25):
you could still see the chalk outline in the next
door neighbors driveway where a dead body had been. We
didn't know if it was actually a Halloween prank or
if there was a copycat murder, because that's what we
were all talking about at the time. One thing people
need to know is that while the murders took place
August eight, nine ten, the Tate Lobianca murders, that they
(15:49):
were not caught right away. It was actually a couple
of months, and there was a lot of tabloid journalism
at work and a lot of very poorly researched information,
So there was there's a lot of lies, a lot
of myths were being created at the time, but when
you get right down to it, there were only three
people inside the house for the Lobbyancas that actually committed
the murders, and that's Tax Watson, Patricia Crinwinkle, and Leslie
(16:14):
van Houghton Charles Manson. He did go in the house
and he in text tied up Leno and Rosemary Lobyanca.
But Charles left because he's that kind of guy. And
he told them the night before at the Tate resident
that it had been very messy, and he said, don't
you know, let's make it more clean. And when he
(16:36):
of course, he takes off with other members of the
family there and he leaves the job of murder up
to Patricia cram with Leslie van Houghton, who were supposed
to take out Rosemary, and tex who was supposed to
take out Leno. When it actually happened, Leslie van Houghton
had never killed anybody before, and she wrote and talked
about some things that I'm kind of I'm hoping you'll
(16:57):
explain this to us. She actually pointed out some things
that were just horrific to me. But setting the stage
inside the house, Lino and Rosemary LaBianca have both been
tied up. Their hands are tied in the case of
Rosemary LaBianca. A pillow case had been placed over her
head and it had been tied off with a lamp cord.
But they didn't bother like rip the cord off the lamp.
(17:20):
The lamp was still attached. So Rosemary LaBianca hands tied
up the pillow case over her head and she's sitting there.
Lino meanwhile Lebyanka had his hands tied and he also
is sitting and waiting for the robbery to finish, because
that's what they were told. Since Charles Manson and those
guys are down the road, that's when the murder begins.
(17:41):
Tex Watson took charge of killing Lino LaBianca, Patricia Creenwinkle,
and Leslie Van Houghten. It was their job to kill
Rosemary in her bedroom. To Rosemary Labyanca, already we had
text Watson stabbing away on Lino just I mean horrifically.
But Leslie Houghton said later that it wasn't new for Text,
(18:03):
he had done this before, he had killed before. For
Leslie Van Houghten to kill Rosemary Labyanca, it was horrific,
to the point that she didn't know what it was
like cutting through human flesh. She thought it would be
different Joseph Scott Morgan, and I wonder how many of us,
because I've never thought about it until I read that,
how many us really thought about what it would be?
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Like?
Speaker 3 (18:25):
What force does it take to actually kill somebody with
a knife. That's a personal thing. If you're shooting somebody,
you can do it from a distance. With a knife,
you're up close and personal. It is very personal. And
so while Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia Creamwinkle are trying
to kill Rosemary Lebyanka in her bedroom, Rosemary fights back
(18:47):
and the lamp cord used to keep that pillow case
on her head, well, the lamp now becomes a weapon.
She can't see, but she was fighting for her life
and winning. She was beating Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia
Creenwigill to the point where they yelled for Text Watson.
He's in the middle of stabbing Lino and they're like, Tex,
you got to get in here now. He had already
(19:08):
stabbed Lena LaBianca a lot. Leno had no fight left
in him, so Tex left him to go back and
help them kill Rosemary Labyanca.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
With the participation of Van Houghten. I think that it's
important to remember that she was out of the so
called Manson family. She was one of the youngest members
nineteen at the time, I believe.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
High school cheerleader and prince at homecoming princess.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Yeah, from this area of the country as well. She's
one of these kind of people that was kind of
glommed on to Manson. However, later reports say that she
was kind of a leader among these folks, but she
wasn't present when the Tait murders took place. She was
specifically brought in to handle the Lobyancas, these random people
(19:59):
that they had identified. And what's quite interesting when you
begin to kind of explore what happened at this residence
that particular night with Lobyanca, mister Lobianca, all of his
injuries are essentially anterior, which means on the front of
his body, and there are multiple stab wounds to his
(20:22):
neck and to his abdomen. And he died as a
result of massive hemorrhage, which means that every time this
knife is plunged into his body, that you're creating another
channel for blood to kind of seep out, and he's
going to be bleeding out internally. When you begin to
(20:44):
look through the autopsy reports on him. His right carotid artery,
which is the major artery in the neck that essentially
supplies the brain with blood, is the right one on
the right aspect of people will essentially index finger just
to the right of your trachea. It's rest right in
(21:05):
this area. So that knife was buried through that surface
into his neck. It's completely what they've referred to as transsected.
In addition to that, he's got a laceration of his trachea.
So if you take that orientation that we just mentioned
about the carotid artery and slightly move over to the
(21:26):
midline which people refer to as the wind pipe with
the trachia, it's lacerated as well, which means that Dave,
this is not just merely a slice when they say laceration,
You've got this kind of blunting action that's taking the
edges and the margins of this thing. Would not have
(21:48):
been very neat and moving from the top of the body.
Just to give you an idea of how extensive this was,
they had taken the knife and buried it into not
just his small bowel, but also his large bowel, into
his colon, so you've got insults that are running the
full length of his upper body, and when the body
(22:10):
is received at the morgue, I can only imagine at
that moment in time they're trying to make sense of
One of the things that you're always asked about with
these types of events, are sequencing in what order did
these things actually occur? And you begin to think about, well,
it's not necessarily possible to be able to tell anyone
(22:32):
what sequence they actually took place in. There's been a
lot of as they used to say, ink slung over
the injuries that LaBianca sustained probably one of the more
striking things. Even at the scene, the corner investigator made
note of the fact that there was some kind of
rudimentary engraving on the surface of this man's abdomen, and
(22:55):
the word, as it turns out, was the word war.
This means that the individual that had done this would
have had to have had the will to sit there
and make this happen, to actually sit there and be
able to perhaps tolerate the sounds of this man as
(23:16):
life is leaving his body, taking the tip of a
knife which they believe was utilized, and making it through
the dermis of his skin, so that the individuals could
appreciate that later on when they walked onto the scene.
This goes into areas like motivation, you know, why would
somebody do this? And going back with our theme here,
(23:37):
the idea that back during this time the police are
trying to make sense of this. And then interestingly enough,
one of the things that was also documented was this
idea of the carving fork that was left behind the
individual little points on forks or referred to as times, well,
(23:57):
the times for carving fork, two of them. I think
that in some of the media that's out there, these
movies that have been created over the years, I think
there was one in particular, very graphic where they showed
the victim the actor was stabbed with a fork and
it was kind of bouncing about and that sort of thing.
This was actually a superficial wound. And the corner investigator
(24:20):
makes an interesting point here, and this goes to the
larger group of evidence here in this case where he
talks about if they had not removed that fork, that
carving fork from mister Labianca's abdomen, it could very well
have fallen out and they would have lost the evidence
at that moment in time. For us in forensics, you
(24:43):
know kind of our rule of thumb, and this actually
applies in medicine too. If you ever see these things
where people say, well, if there's an object impaled in
somebody's body, don't remove it, because it's going to If
you remove it, you're going to promote blood flow. Okay,
you're creating this kind of defect in the But for
us in forensics, we want to be able to appreciate
(25:05):
an item in sight too, is what it's referred to
as in place rather in place, so that it can
be fully documented and appreciated by the forensic pathologist. Keep
in mind, most of the time you're not going to
have a forensic pathologist at the scene to see the
body in its pristine post mortem state, So you try
(25:25):
to leave any kind of elements that are in or
on the body in place, and that way it'll be
more thoroughly examined at the morgue. And in this particular case,
they actually had to remove it because they very well
could have lost that evidence. And of course we know
that it's significant because it goes to the behavior of
the individual. It wasn't just simply a knife wound. We're
(25:50):
talking about multiple weapons that led to mister Lobianca's death.
(26:16):
Many of the deaths that I've investigated over the course
of my career, for good or bad, I have an
ability of kind of placing myself in the position of victims,
or at least kind of trying to imagine what they
had gone through. With single victims, it's it's hard, I think,
or it's less nuanced when you have family members that
(26:39):
are killed simultaneously. There's something about from in my case,
my own humanity that begins to think about the relationship
that these individuals within a home like this had La Bianca's.
I'm referring to what was going through their minds at
that moment in time, because you have two people that
were apparently happy married, they'd built a life together. Missus
(27:03):
Lobianca managed to address store. Mister Lobianca was a grocery executive.
They had built a home together, not simply a house,
but a home, and they were still involved in their
children's lives. And you think, in those last moments before
you leave this earth, what was going through their mind?
(27:24):
The pure horror, the pure terror, because it's not just
what's happening to you. You begin to kind of imagine
what's happening to my loved one, what's happening to my
beloved spouse that might be in the other room. You're
hearing screams, you're hearing commotion, and maybe not thinking about
the pain that's being inflicted upon you, but about the
(27:45):
pain that's being inflicted upon them.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca had been told when they were
woken up, they were told, this is justin robbery. We're
just taking your money and you're not going to be hurt.
They were tied up with that in mind. That's a
text Watson told and that's what Charles Manson told him,
We're not going to be hurt. All the way up
until the point where the killing began, they were told,
you're not going to be hurt. Rosemary LaBianca was in
(28:09):
her bedroom with Leslie Van Holton and Patricia Crinwinkle. She
hears commotion going on while Tex Watson is stabbing Lena LaBianca,
and she asked, what's going on with Lenoleno? Are you okay?
And that's what caused her, Rosemary LaBianca to actually really
fight back hard to the point where Patricia Crinwinkle and
(28:30):
Leslie van Houghton could not control her. They screamed out
for text to get help. Because of Rosemary LaBianca. She
just I don't the heart of that woman. But I
have a question for you, Joe, because I'm curious after
the fact. Could you tell in an examination the difference
between a wound being done by Leslie van Houghton and
(28:52):
Patricia Crinwinkle versus a wound created by Tex Watson, who
is obviously going to hit harder. Could you tell a
difference between that type of a knife wound that's.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
Going to be heavily depended day First off, on the
instrument that's used, how robust the instrument is that is
being utilized in order to inflict the injuries, and what
structures this instrument is going to strike. Because it's not
as we've talked about before on body bags, it's not
just passing through the skin and through the muscle. You
(29:25):
have to think about any kind of bony prominences that
are there, whether it's ribs or the spine. In Miss
Labianca's case in particular, because her spinal cord is essentially transacted,
what type of force would it take in order to
inflict these There's another important piece to this. There was
(29:46):
a need on the part of the Manson family as
it applied to vn how and I believe for her
to get her hands dirty. So the question arises, how
many of these insults that that both of these victims,
and Rosemary in particular, because hers were as bad as
it is to talk about carving on Lobianca's body and
(30:09):
this carving knife that was utilized on him in its measure,
I think that Rosemary got the real horror show thrown
at her. Her injuries were over the top. A lot
of that has to go to you were mentioning how
much she fought. She had to be restrained. They had
to guarantee that she was not going to get back
up off of that floor. Most of her injuries are
(30:30):
posterior on her back. You begin to think about that
and the level of force that's used, and also how
many of these injury tracks where she sustained these stab wounds,
how many of these actually had hemorrhage in them, Because
that's the big delineation here for us between this idea
(30:52):
of post mortem and anti mortem injuries. You know, you
think about the anti mortem injuries, these wounds that are
inflicted on her. You think about, well, how many of
these came while she was still alive, and how many
of these happened afterwards. And they're randomized. It's not like
they're necessarily in any particular order or have penetrated specific
(31:19):
anatomical structures and stayed in that particular area. A lot
of the stuff that has occurred to her is randomized.
It's all over her body, so that gives you an
idea of what kind of fight had ensued initially, and
when you begin to look at it, you begin to
think about the horror that was inflicted upon her. What
(31:40):
we do know is that they have enumerated these injuries
and she had sustained I think, if I'm not mistaken,
twenty two insults on the upper portion of her back
and fourteen on the lower portion of her back. And
one of these that gives you an idea as to
(32:01):
how much power was involved in this, is that she's
got transsecting injury of her neck. Place your finger at
the base of your skull. The first vertebral body that
you have there is c one that's referred to as
the atlas, and you just think about atlas holding up
the world. From mythology, you go to the second vertebral body,
(32:26):
which is immediately below the atlas, and then the third.
There is a wound that passes between that junction right there,
and the vertebral bodies are some of the most robust
elements in our body as far as the skeletal structure goes.
They transacted that day. That's how much power was involved
(32:48):
in this, which means that that knife passed through in
between those two vertebral bodies and completely transsected her cerebral
spinal cord.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
The one thing that I I did see with Leslie
van Houghton describing the killing, this is her exact words.
I was supposed to mess her up, and I took
the knife and I started stabbing, and I turned into
an animal almost. I just completely let out on that
woman's back. You just mentioned the wounds on her back,
(33:21):
Leslie van Houghten talking about I completely let out on
that woman's back. But then she says, it's not like
cutting a piece of meat. It's much tougher. I had
to use both hands and all my pressure and all
my strength behind it to get it in. What actually
is she describing there.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
Joe, She's in a dominant position. And remember this is
not something she's doing by herself, Dave. There are other people,
other hands involved in this, and she is essentially in
a dominant position. This is a perfect example of what
we refer to as a symmetry in an attack. That
means you've got one individual that's dominant over another. And
(34:04):
what's really the tail of the tape is that since
these injuries are posterior on Rosemary la Bianca's body, that
means that she's faced down more than likely throughout most
of this attack, and you have access to that particular
plane of the body. The knife is being driven downward.
(34:25):
When say, look, if you're ever attacked by a bear,
crawl up into a kind of contract yourself up into
a ball. And one of the reasons is is that
I've often envisioned in my mind that our back is
almost like a turtle shell. We have all of these
bony prominences and structures posteriorly because you know, our ribs
are not just on the front of our body and sides.
(34:46):
They mixed in into the back and they attached to
our spine, and so you've got this kind of rigidity
that comes in well, no wonder she is stating and
has admitted to having to drive this knife through these
bony structures with both hands, and essentially to give you
(35:08):
an idea as to how much force was involved. Not
only do we have this laceration of the spinal cord,
but in addition to that, there was so much force
used during the midst of this attack that Rosemary LaBianca
also sustained injuries of her lung it perforated, along also
(35:31):
her stomach, and in addition to that her spleen was lacerated.
And for what For absolutely what you asked that question,
I think we all do. It's just a random event
that occurred where these two people who had nothing to
do with race wars, had nothing to do with hippie culture,
(35:51):
had nothing to do with anything other than just simply living.
Their lives are gone and now Leslie Van Houghton is free.
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body Backs
Buddy Backs with Joseph Scott Morgan. The song Home Sick
is a song from my youth. It resonates in my ears,
came out in the seventies and if you've never heard it,
it kind of takes you back on a bit of
(00:30):
a time travel if you will. I love ars. Other
people have recorded I think Travis TripIt recorded it and
rerecorded it, but it takes you back in time to
that moment you begin to think as kids, as kids
of the sixties, where were you well. I was just
a little thing back then. I was playing in the
backyard of my grandparents' house, where I lived most of
(00:52):
the time. It was a very people It's a well
worn phrase, people say it's very innocent time, and it
was for me, playing in my sandpile, enjoying life in
the Deep South. The further thing from my mind back
then was probably mass homicide in the news nationally. It
sent a chill down everyone spine of the horrors that
(01:16):
were revealed back in nineteen sixty nine, of what was
going on in Alick County, particularly as it applied to
the Manson family. Today owned body bags. We're going to
turn back the page a little bit and we're going
to re examine the murders of the Lobyankas.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
August eleventh, nineteen sixty nine, Rosemary Labianca's teenage son discovers
the brutal murders carried out by three of Charles Manson's
followers the night before. Leno LaBianca had been stabbed twelve
times with a knife or bayonet and seven times with
a two tined carving fork, leaving fourteen puncture wounds in
(01:58):
his abdomen, was still stuck in his abdomen, and a
kitchen knife pierced his throat. The word war had also
been carved into his abdomen. Rosemary Lebianca had a total
of forty one stab wounds on the front and back
of her body, and autopsy showed that many of the
wounds were post mortem.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body bags. Hey,
Dave mac where were you in sixty nine?
Speaker 3 (02:29):
I was a very very young child. This murder, the
Tate Lobianca murders, as they are commonly referred to, I
it actually impacted my life on a personal level and
professionally over the years because I lived in that area
when this happened. I was born and raised in southern California,
born in Hawthorne and raised in Orange County predominantly. But anyway,
(02:50):
when this happened, here's the thing that people may or man,
I know, and Joe you might not know. It happened
August eighth, August ninth, nineteen sixty nine. Think about some
other things that was actually happening in the world a
couple weeks earlier. Neil Armstrong Man on the Moon.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
You bet, buddy, I remember it. I remember watching on
black and white television my grandparents' house. It was a
magical thing.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
So that's a huge deal.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Made everybody, I mean just made everybody feel like anything's possible.
And a week after the murders, what else happened? Wouldstock
in New York right, so imagine and by the way,
and mixed into this same time period Chap Equittic and
Teddy Kennedy, So we had a lot going on in
the United States of America at the time that Rosemary
(03:37):
and Leno Labianco were murdered. It impacted my life because
being in southern California when Sharon Tate along with her friends,
and off the top of my head, I remember it
was Abagail Folger and Voytek Freikowski, Jay se Bring and
then they had the like a guy that was like
the yardkeeper. Anyway, that was such a big deal because
(03:58):
first of all, Sharon Tate was a beautif model, she
was an actress married to Roman Polanski, the master of
the macab Because of Rosemary's Baby, you start thinking about
how all these things kind of come together, and it's
like crazy time. But the next night the Labyancas, and
that was fear in the hearts of people. Sharon Tate
and celebrity rich people getting murdered is one thing, but
(04:21):
the Lobyancas were looked at as just regular people like
the rest of us. And now nobody's safe.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
There's one little interesting factoid I think that some people
might not be aware of, and I got it to
give you an idea, a measure for how innocent Tim's
were when the Labyanca's bodies were actually discovered. That cannot
get access to the home, that is the family that
(04:51):
they were trying to open the door to get in.
Guess where they got the key from to unlock the
door to get into the house under the mat No,
they went and dig this just for a second. They
went out to the vehicle parked in the driveway, and
the keys were in the ignition, and they take the
(05:13):
key out of the ignition and make access to this
house with that key. And can you just imagine when
Rosemary Labanca's children went into this environment and they see
these words scrawled in blood on the walls, on the doors.
(05:34):
I think, most famously the words helter skelter. By the way,
I think it was misspelled. And there's several interesting things
about this is because some people think that it was
intentionally misspelled. There were little clues along the way. I
don't know if any of these people were that sophisticated.
You walk in and you see this horror show, and
it was truly a horror show. Lots and lots of
(05:56):
blood evidence at the scene, and I don't know that
you could necessarily take the measure of it. You have
the police coming off the so called Tate homicides on
clo and then you walk into this environment and you know,
there was resistance at first by the police to at
least publicly show any kind of connectivity between what had
(06:20):
happened previously with Sharon Tate and that group of people
and then what had happened with the Labiancas, and it
all goes to what was trying to be accomplished here.
I think with the police one of the biggest things
for them is they were trying to prevent a panic
because can you imagine what those conversations were like, you know,
(06:41):
in the detective bureau when you've got arguably two blood
baths that have taken place, and you've got the shadow
of celebrity that's kind of hanging over both of these events,
with Sharon Tate and everyone up on Colo, and then
you've got the Lobyancas. Okay, they're starting up here in
(07:01):
relative to the celebrities. Now they're going out here where
the rest of us mix and mingle, the mere mortals
among us.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
And the one thing to think of again, nineteen sixty
nine was a different time and the way we lived
the Tate Lobianca murders. Joe, we could actually spend all
of today, tomorrow the next day talking just about these murders,
and we would go for twenty four hours a day
for the next few day and wouldn't finish. There's too much.
So focusing on the Labyancas. They were married couple. They
(07:33):
actually were the next day, meaning the day after the
Tate murders had taken place. And the reason it's in
the news this week is because Leslie Van Howden actually
was released from prison after fifty some odd years. Now,
here's the kick, Joe, and you've been around crime scenes
and murders for a long time. I really want to
(07:56):
hear your explanation of what police for looking at when
they got to the scene of the crime. But the
bottom line is with Leslie van Houghten being a Manson
family member, one of the women, well she actually only
was involved in the Labyanca murders. She was not at
the previous night's activities. At the Lobyanca crime scene. You
(08:18):
had Tex Watson, he and Charlie. And by the way,
Charlie Manson was not at the Tape murders. He was, however,
at the Lobbyanca house at the.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
House, but he beat feet before the actual event occurred,
right they get there. Well, I'm gonna skip through this
real fast. Charlie Manson had convinced these young people that
a race war was coming and they needed to have
a safe place out in the desert, which is why
they were maneuvered out there. In reality, they were out there.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Because they'd been stealing volkswagons and converting them into doom
buggies and selling them, and the heat was getting hot,
and so they wanted to get out of town. And
Charlie went there and in their drug whatever decided that
they needed to commit crimes. The Manson family that would
they needed to commit murders that didn't make sense. That's
what the La Beiyanca murder was all about, a murder
(09:09):
that didn't make any sense and would cause fear and
panic in people. And Leslie Van Honton said that in
her own words. By the way, I actually listened to
this yesterday in preparation for the show and heard her
in nineteen seventy one talking to her new lawyer. He said,
how are you going to start a revolution? She actually said,
Joe by committing a senseless murder, which is exactly what
(09:35):
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. It was just a murder. But
anyway I mentioned, Charles Manson was not at the Tate House, well,
he was at the Labyankas. Charles Manson and Text Watson
go inside the Labiyanca's house. And by the way, these
mental giants. The Manson family. They've been driving around for
a couple hours looking for a place that they could
go in and commit this heinous act. Right they didn't
(09:57):
find one right away, and so Leslie van Hown said
she fell asleep in the car as they were driving around.
When she woke up, Charles and Tex Watson had gone
in the house and they'd already tied up Leno and
Rosemary LaBianca. They found Lino on the couch in the
living room in the den, and so they tied him up,
and then Charlie Manson went in and they got Rosemary
(10:19):
out of bed, she was already in bed, got her
up and you know, sign of the Times, maybe Joe.
But before they brought Rosemary Labyanca out of the bedroom,
she was already in her night clothes. And do you
know what she did? And they let her They let
her put on a dress. Rosemary Lobianca was allowed to
put on a dress over her night clothes, to be
(10:41):
a dressed appropriately for what she thought was just a robbery.
Charles Manson and Text Watson said, you're not going to
be hurt. We just want your money. So they got
the cash and then Charlie goes outside, they send the
girls in. They sent Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia Crinwinkle
to go in and kill Rosemary Lobbyond.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Okay, One interesting little aside here is that you think
about Manson and kind of how he had been prepping
this crew. That's the way you have to look at it.
It's an organized crime venture, is what it comes down to.
Because they were a collection of thieves, is essentially what
they were. And of course they're fueled by asurgic acid
(11:20):
to a great degree. You know, it's been well documented
stated that they would drop LSD. There's some people that
have actually opined that Manson himself would fake taking LSD
and then everybody else would have it on board and
he could influence them and begin to talk to them
(11:40):
when they're tripping essentially. But one of the things that
he would do, to give you back to this idea
of thievery, this being a theft ring, is that he
introduced them to something called creepy crawling. He would actually
have these people go out and purposefully go into residences
in a stealth like manner, and the trick was not
(12:04):
to be caught, and they would go in and perhaps
rearrange things and not necessarily take anything, but just to
kind of hone these skills so that they could go
in and commit thievery, stealing, if you will, burglary and
not be caught. I think here's the big question though,
If that's the case, what is it that would motivate
(12:29):
a band of thieves that lived out in the desert,
away from society. What is it that caused them to
commit such a horrible, horrible crime. There's a couple of
(13:02):
classic images black and white photography of the exterior of
the scene up on Siela, where the Tate home was
and where that multiple homicide took place. In One that
really jumps to mind is there's an image of one
of my heroes at the scene, and that's doctor Tom Magucci,
(13:23):
who was with the Medical Examiner corner back during that
time at Los Angeles, probably arguably one of the greatest
forensic pathologists that's ever worked in my way of estimation.
But he was at the scene and what he bore
witness to there. He's talked about or had talked about
previously on many occasions at the Tate residence. Horrible things
(13:47):
that happened, obviously over the years, and we see this
carnage that erupts from time to time, But I don't
know that anybody could really fully appreciate what they were
seeing then and try to make sense of it, the
level of brutality. And so one interesting little point bringing
it back to the Lobyanca double homicide, is that apparently
(14:12):
at first the investigators really were thinking that they might
be dealing with a copycat crime. That the word had
leaked out at that point in time about how horrific
the Tate homicides were, and then you see this horror
show that takes place at the Lobbyanca household. They're thinking, Okay,
(14:34):
somebody read about this and they just wanted to see
if they could duplicate it. What do you think about that, Dave.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
I lived there in this area at that time as
a young child, And one of the things that I
think people forget it's about copycat crimes. There was so
much made about Sharon Tate because she was eight and
a half months pregnant when she was murdered, and this
was a horrible crime scene and it was splashed everywhere.
And then you have this normal class Rosemary and Lena
(15:01):
LaBianca being murdered, and there was some thought that copycat
crimes were going to occur. My family personally, we were
moving into a new a different home, a bigger home.
In the process of the move Joe Scott Morgan, I
remember going to that house on our move in was
delayed for some reason. I was a kid, I don't
you know. I didn't know why at the time, but
I know that when we got there the week after Halloween,
(15:25):
you could still see the chalk outline in the next
door neighbors driveway where a dead body had been. We
didn't know if it was actually a Halloween prank or
if there was a copycat murder, because that's what we
were all talking about at the time. One thing people
need to know is that while the murders took place
August eight, nine ten, the Tate Lobianca murders, that they
(15:49):
were not caught right away. It was actually a couple
of months, and there was a lot of tabloid journalism
at work and a lot of very poorly researched information,
So there was there's a lot of lies, a lot
of myths were being created at the time, but when
you get right down to it, there were only three
people inside the house for the Lobbyancas that actually committed
the murders, and that's Tax Watson, Patricia Crinwinkle, and Leslie
(16:14):
van Houghton Charles Manson. He did go in the house
and he in text tied up Leno and Rosemary Lobyanca.
But Charles left because he's that kind of guy. And
he told them the night before at the Tate resident
that it had been very messy, and he said, don't
you know, let's make it more clean. And when he
(16:36):
of course, he takes off with other members of the
family there and he leaves the job of murder up
to Patricia cram with Leslie van Houghton, who were supposed
to take out Rosemary, and tex who was supposed to
take out Leno. When it actually happened, Leslie van Houghton
had never killed anybody before, and she wrote and talked
about some things that I'm kind of I'm hoping you'll
(16:57):
explain this to us. She actually pointed out some things
that were just horrific to me. But setting the stage
inside the house, Lino and Rosemary LaBianca have both been
tied up. Their hands are tied in the case of
Rosemary LaBianca. A pillow case had been placed over her
head and it had been tied off with a lamp cord.
But they didn't bother like rip the cord off the lamp.
(17:20):
The lamp was still attached. So Rosemary LaBianca hands tied
up the pillow case over her head and she's sitting there.
Lino meanwhile Lebyanka had his hands tied and he also
is sitting and waiting for the robbery to finish, because
that's what they were told. Since Charles Manson and those
guys are down the road, that's when the murder begins.
(17:41):
Tex Watson took charge of killing Lino LaBianca, Patricia Creenwinkle,
and Leslie Van Houghten. It was their job to kill
Rosemary in her bedroom. To Rosemary Labyanca, already we had
text Watson stabbing away on Lino just I mean horrifically.
But Leslie Houghton said later that it wasn't new for Text,
(18:03):
he had done this before, he had killed before. For
Leslie Van Houghten to kill Rosemary Labyanca, it was horrific,
to the point that she didn't know what it was
like cutting through human flesh. She thought it would be
different Joseph Scott Morgan, and I wonder how many of us,
because I've never thought about it until I read that,
how many us really thought about what it would be?
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Like?
Speaker 3 (18:25):
What force does it take to actually kill somebody with
a knife. That's a personal thing. If you're shooting somebody,
you can do it from a distance. With a knife,
you're up close and personal. It is very personal. And
so while Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia Creamwinkle are trying
to kill Rosemary Lebyanka in her bedroom, Rosemary fights back
(18:47):
and the lamp cord used to keep that pillow case
on her head, well, the lamp now becomes a weapon.
She can't see, but she was fighting for her life
and winning. She was beating Leslie Van Houghton and Patricia
Creenwigill to the point where they yelled for Text Watson.
He's in the middle of stabbing Lino and they're like, Tex,
you got to get in here now. He had already
(19:08):
stabbed Lena LaBianca a lot. Leno had no fight left
in him, so Tex left him to go back and
help them kill Rosemary Labyanca.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
With the participation of Van Houghten. I think that it's
important to remember that she was out of the so
called Manson family. She was one of the youngest members
nineteen at the time, I believe.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
High school cheerleader and prince at homecoming princess.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Yeah, from this area of the country as well. She's
one of these kind of people that was kind of
glommed on to Manson. However, later reports say that she
was kind of a leader among these folks, but she
wasn't present when the Tait murders took place. She was
specifically brought in to handle the Lobyancas, these random people
(19:59):
that they had identified. And what's quite interesting when you
begin to kind of explore what happened at this residence
that particular night with Lobyanca, mister Lobianca, all of his
injuries are essentially anterior, which means on the front of
his body, and there are multiple stab wounds to his
(20:22):
neck and to his abdomen. And he died as a
result of massive hemorrhage, which means that every time this
knife is plunged into his body, that you're creating another
channel for blood to kind of seep out, and he's
going to be bleeding out internally. When you begin to
(20:44):
look through the autopsy reports on him. His right carotid artery,
which is the major artery in the neck that essentially
supplies the brain with blood, is the right one on
the right aspect of people will essentially index finger just
to the right of your trachea. It's rest right in
(21:05):
this area. So that knife was buried through that surface
into his neck. It's completely what they've referred to as transsected.
In addition to that, he's got a laceration of his trachea.
So if you take that orientation that we just mentioned
about the carotid artery and slightly move over to the
(21:26):
midline which people refer to as the wind pipe with
the trachia, it's lacerated as well, which means that Dave,
this is not just merely a slice when they say laceration,
You've got this kind of blunting action that's taking the
edges and the margins of this thing. Would not have
(21:48):
been very neat and moving from the top of the body.
Just to give you an idea of how extensive this was,
they had taken the knife and buried it into not
just his small bowel, but also his large bowel, into
his colon, so you've got insults that are running the
full length of his upper body, and when the body
(22:10):
is received at the morgue, I can only imagine at
that moment in time they're trying to make sense of
One of the things that you're always asked about with
these types of events, are sequencing in what order did
these things actually occur? And you begin to think about, well,
it's not necessarily possible to be able to tell anyone
(22:32):
what sequence they actually took place in. There's been a
lot of as they used to say, ink slung over
the injuries that LaBianca sustained probably one of the more
striking things. Even at the scene, the corner investigator made
note of the fact that there was some kind of
rudimentary engraving on the surface of this man's abdomen, and
(22:55):
the word, as it turns out, was the word war.
This means that the individual that had done this would
have had to have had the will to sit there
and make this happen, to actually sit there and be
able to perhaps tolerate the sounds of this man as
(23:16):
life is leaving his body, taking the tip of a
knife which they believe was utilized, and making it through
the dermis of his skin, so that the individuals could
appreciate that later on when they walked onto the scene.
This goes into areas like motivation, you know, why would
somebody do this? And going back with our theme here,
(23:37):
the idea that back during this time the police are
trying to make sense of this. And then interestingly enough,
one of the things that was also documented was this
idea of the carving fork that was left behind the
individual little points on forks or referred to as times, well,
(23:57):
the times for carving fork, two of them. I think
that in some of the media that's out there, these
movies that have been created over the years, I think
there was one in particular, very graphic where they showed
the victim the actor was stabbed with a fork and
it was kind of bouncing about and that sort of thing.
This was actually a superficial wound. And the corner investigator
(24:20):
makes an interesting point here, and this goes to the
larger group of evidence here in this case where he
talks about if they had not removed that fork, that
carving fork from mister Labianca's abdomen, it could very well
have fallen out and they would have lost the evidence
at that moment in time. For us in forensics, you
(24:43):
know kind of our rule of thumb, and this actually
applies in medicine too. If you ever see these things
where people say, well, if there's an object impaled in
somebody's body, don't remove it, because it's going to If
you remove it, you're going to promote blood flow. Okay,
you're creating this kind of defect in the But for
us in forensics, we want to be able to appreciate
(25:05):
an item in sight too, is what it's referred to
as in place rather in place, so that it can
be fully documented and appreciated by the forensic pathologist. Keep
in mind, most of the time you're not going to
have a forensic pathologist at the scene to see the
body in its pristine post mortem state, So you try
(25:25):
to leave any kind of elements that are in or
on the body in place, and that way it'll be
more thoroughly examined at the morgue. And in this particular case,
they actually had to remove it because they very well
could have lost that evidence. And of course we know
that it's significant because it goes to the behavior of
the individual. It wasn't just simply a knife wound. We're
(25:50):
talking about multiple weapons that led to mister Lobianca's death.
(26:16):
Many of the deaths that I've investigated over the course
of my career, for good or bad, I have an
ability of kind of placing myself in the position of victims,
or at least kind of trying to imagine what they
had gone through. With single victims, it's it's hard, I think,
or it's less nuanced when you have family members that
(26:39):
are killed simultaneously. There's something about from in my case,
my own humanity that begins to think about the relationship
that these individuals within a home like this had La Bianca's.
I'm referring to what was going through their minds at
that moment in time, because you have two people that
were apparently happy married, they'd built a life together. Missus
(27:03):
Lobianca managed to address store. Mister Lobianca was a grocery executive.
They had built a home together, not simply a house,
but a home, and they were still involved in their
children's lives. And you think, in those last moments before
you leave this earth, what was going through their mind?
(27:24):
The pure horror, the pure terror, because it's not just
what's happening to you. You begin to kind of imagine
what's happening to my loved one, what's happening to my
beloved spouse that might be in the other room. You're
hearing screams, you're hearing commotion, and maybe not thinking about
the pain that's being inflicted upon you, but about the
(27:45):
pain that's being inflicted upon them.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Leno and Rosemary LaBianca had been told when they were
woken up, they were told, this is justin robbery. We're
just taking your money and you're not going to be hurt.
They were tied up with that in mind. That's a
text Watson told and that's what Charles Manson told him,
We're not going to be hurt. All the way up
until the point where the killing began, they were told,
you're not going to be hurt. Rosemary LaBianca was in
(28:09):
her bedroom with Leslie Van Holton and Patricia Crinwinkle. She
hears commotion going on while Tex Watson is stabbing Lena LaBianca,
and she asked, what's going on with Lenoleno? Are you okay?
And that's what caused her, Rosemary LaBianca to actually really
fight back hard to the point where Patricia Crinwinkle and
(28:30):
Leslie van Houghton could not control her. They screamed out
for text to get help. Because of Rosemary LaBianca. She
just I don't the heart of that woman. But I
have a question for you, Joe, because I'm curious after
the fact. Could you tell in an examination the difference
between a wound being done by Leslie van Houghton and
(28:52):
Patricia Crinwinkle versus a wound created by Tex Watson, who
is obviously going to hit harder. Could you tell a
difference between that type of a knife wound that's.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
Going to be heavily depended day First off, on the
instrument that's used, how robust the instrument is that is
being utilized in order to inflict the injuries, and what
structures this instrument is going to strike. Because it's not
as we've talked about before on body bags, it's not
just passing through the skin and through the muscle. You
(29:25):
have to think about any kind of bony prominences that
are there, whether it's ribs or the spine. In Miss
Labianca's case in particular, because her spinal cord is essentially transacted,
what type of force would it take in order to
inflict these There's another important piece to this. There was
(29:46):
a need on the part of the Manson family as
it applied to vn how and I believe for her
to get her hands dirty. So the question arises, how
many of these insults that that both of these victims,
and Rosemary in particular, because hers were as bad as
it is to talk about carving on Lobianca's body and
(30:09):
this carving knife that was utilized on him in its measure,
I think that Rosemary got the real horror show thrown
at her. Her injuries were over the top. A lot
of that has to go to you were mentioning how
much she fought. She had to be restrained. They had
to guarantee that she was not going to get back
up off of that floor. Most of her injuries are
(30:30):
posterior on her back. You begin to think about that
and the level of force that's used, and also how
many of these injury tracks where she sustained these stab wounds,
how many of these actually had hemorrhage in them, Because
that's the big delineation here for us between this idea
(30:52):
of post mortem and anti mortem injuries. You know, you
think about the anti mortem injuries, these wounds that are
inflicted on her. You think about, well, how many of
these came while she was still alive, and how many
of these happened afterwards. And they're randomized. It's not like
they're necessarily in any particular order or have penetrated specific
(31:19):
anatomical structures and stayed in that particular area. A lot
of the stuff that has occurred to her is randomized.
It's all over her body, so that gives you an
idea of what kind of fight had ensued initially, and
when you begin to look at it, you begin to
think about the horror that was inflicted upon her. What
(31:40):
we do know is that they have enumerated these injuries
and she had sustained I think, if I'm not mistaken,
twenty two insults on the upper portion of her back
and fourteen on the lower portion of her back. And
one of these that gives you an idea as to
(32:01):
how much power was involved in this, is that she's
got transsecting injury of her neck. Place your finger at
the base of your skull. The first vertebral body that
you have there is c one that's referred to as
the atlas, and you just think about atlas holding up
the world. From mythology, you go to the second vertebral body,
(32:26):
which is immediately below the atlas, and then the third.
There is a wound that passes between that junction right there,
and the vertebral bodies are some of the most robust
elements in our body as far as the skeletal structure goes.
They transacted that day. That's how much power was involved
(32:48):
in this, which means that that knife passed through in
between those two vertebral bodies and completely transsected her cerebral
spinal cord.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
The one thing that I I did see with Leslie
van Houghton describing the killing, this is her exact words.
I was supposed to mess her up, and I took
the knife and I started stabbing, and I turned into
an animal almost. I just completely let out on that
woman's back. You just mentioned the wounds on her back,
(33:21):
Leslie van Houghten talking about I completely let out on
that woman's back. But then she says, it's not like
cutting a piece of meat. It's much tougher. I had
to use both hands and all my pressure and all
my strength behind it to get it in. What actually
is she describing there.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
Joe, She's in a dominant position. And remember this is
not something she's doing by herself, Dave. There are other people,
other hands involved in this, and she is essentially in
a dominant position. This is a perfect example of what
we refer to as a symmetry in an attack. That
means you've got one individual that's dominant over another. And
(34:04):
what's really the tail of the tape is that since
these injuries are posterior on Rosemary la Bianca's body, that
means that she's faced down more than likely throughout most
of this attack, and you have access to that particular
plane of the body. The knife is being driven downward.
(34:25):
When say, look, if you're ever attacked by a bear,
crawl up into a kind of contract yourself up into
a ball. And one of the reasons is is that
I've often envisioned in my mind that our back is
almost like a turtle shell. We have all of these
bony prominences and structures posteriorly because you know, our ribs
are not just on the front of our body and sides.
(34:46):
They mixed in into the back and they attached to
our spine, and so you've got this kind of rigidity
that comes in well, no wonder she is stating and
has admitted to having to drive this knife through these
bony structures with both hands, and essentially to give you
(35:08):
an idea as to how much force was involved. Not
only do we have this laceration of the spinal cord,
but in addition to that, there was so much force
used during the midst of this attack that Rosemary LaBianca
also sustained injuries of her lung it perforated, along also
(35:31):
her stomach, and in addition to that her spleen was lacerated.
And for what For absolutely what you asked that question,
I think we all do. It's just a random event
that occurred where these two people who had nothing to
do with race wars, had nothing to do with hippie culture,
(35:51):
had nothing to do with anything other than just simply living.
Their lives are gone and now Leslie Van Houghton is free.
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body Backs
Host
Joseph Scott Morgan
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