Bruce Davis, reportedly the right-hand-man of Charles Manson, has died in a California prison hospital at age 83. Davis was convicted of murdering Gary Hinman and Donald “Shorty” Shea, a movie stuntman. Hinman’s murder, in July of 1969, preceded the bloodbath for which the “Manson family” is known.
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On August 9, 1969, a squad of Manson’s followers murdered actress Sharon Tate, celebrity hairdresser Jay Sebring, Roman Polanski’s friend Voytek Frykowski, coffee heiress Abigail Folger, and Steven Parent. Only 18, Parent was staying with the resident of a guest house on the Benedict Canyon property, and he was the first victim.
California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) approved more than $140 million in unemployment benefits for at least 20,000 prisoners.
The next night in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles, Manson tasked his followers to kill Leno and Rosemary LaBianca. In their home the killers scrawled “DEATH TO PIGS” and “HEALTER SKELTER,” which helped police track them down. For all the depravity, these were not the worst mass murders in California history.
On May 19, 1971, near Yuba City, California, farmer Goro Kagehiro found the grave of Kenneth Whiteacre, stabbed to death and mutilated with a machete. Police soon discovered the mutilated bodies of Charles Fleming, Melford Sample, Donald Smith, John J. Haluka, Warren Kelley, Sigurd Beierman, William Emery Kamp, Clarence Hocking, James W. Howard, Jonah R. Smallwood, Elbert T. Riley, Paul B. Allen, Edward Martin Cupp, Albert Hayes, Raymond Muchache, John H. Jackson, Lloyd Wallace Wenzel, Mark Beverly Shields, Sam Bonafide, and Joseph Maczak. Four unidentified victims brought the count to 25, a record in the U.S. at the time.
With several of the bodies police found receipts made out to Juan Corona, a previously deported Mexican national who worked as a labor contractor. A search of Corona’s home rendered a meat cleaver, machete, double-bladed ax and wooden club, all stained with blood. Police also found a gun and a ledger book with the names of seven victims. The dead included blacks and Native Americans but the case was never treated as a hate crime or motivated by racism.
In 1973, a jury found Corona guilty of murder and sentenced him to 25 consecutive life terms. In 1978, a state appeal court overturned the conviction and Corona’s second trial in 1982 took seven months and cost taxpayers $5 million. The jury found Corona guilty and restored the 25 life sentences.
On March 4, 2019, Corona died at age 85, outliving fellow Corcoran prison inmate Charles Manson, who died at 83 in 2017. Historians are still debating whether Manson was part of the CIA’s LSD experiments, and possibly the reason he was not sent back to prison when he violated parole. That might have saved a few innocent lives, but a different dynamic is now in place.
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On his way out the door in 2018, recurring Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 1391, which allows anyone under age 16 to murder and mutilate any number of victims, be tried only in juvenile court, and gain release at age 25.
The state’s adult criminals caught a break during the Covid pandemic. California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) approved more than $140 million in unemployment benefits for at least 20,000 prisoners. Convicts who made fraudulent claims included convicted murderers Scott Peterson and Cary Stayner. Death row inmates accounted for at least 158 claims landing more than $420,000 in benefits, all intended for workers who lost their jobs.
Consider also the case of Rodney Quine, who in 1980 murdered Shahid al Baig, a father of three, who begged for his life. In prison, Quine claimed that, since the age of nine, he believed he was really a woman. Without examining any of the physical evidence, judge Jon Tigar not only believed Quine but ordered up “gender reassignment” surgery at taxpayer expense. That drew a protest from Farida Baig, daughter of Quine’s victim.
The convicted murderer is now Shiloh Heavenly Quine, inmate WB1121 at the Central California Women’s Facility. Californians can be forgiven for believing that Quine, Corona, Manson, Davis et al., never got what they deserved. And if anybody thought California’s ruling class is kinder to criminals than their victims it would be hard to blame them.
Meanwhile, Manson follower Leslie Van Houten was released on parole in 2023. At this writing, Charles “Tex” Watson and Bobby Beausoleil remain in prison.
READ MORE from Lloyd Billingsley:
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Lloyd Billingsley is a policy fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, California.
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