After 46 years in prison, what happens to the Manson Family now?

The housekeeper, Winifred Chapman, arrived at 10050 Cielo Drive the morning after the first night of killings and found the bodies.

She found actress Sharon Tate, eight and a half months pregnant, and four others.

The following night, Leno and Rosemary LaBianca were murdered in their Los Feliz home.

The killings were committed by members of a group led by Charles Manson, later known as the Manson Family.

The initial investigation was hampered by a lack of obvious motive.

Why would anyone do this?

Why these houses, these people, these nights?

Why leave the scene without a message, without a demand, without a reason?

The record does not establish the motive here, not yet.

That would require evidence, and the evidence had not yet surfaced.

The housekeeper had only the morning, the bodies, and the silence of a Benedict Canyon property that no longer made sense.

It is a scene without a story.

It is also a scene that demands one.

THE BREAK IN THE CASE

The break came in October 1969, in a jail cell, not at a crime scene.

Susan Atkins, jailed on unrelated charges, confided in her cellmate, Veronica Graham.

Graham reported the confession to authorities.

Atkins later testified before a grand jury.

The exact content of that confession is not detailed in the source; only that she confided and testified.

It is a gap in the record.

The case needed more than a cellmate's word.

The prosecution found it in Linda Kasabian, who drove the car and acted as lookout.

Kasabian was granted immunity in exchange for her testimony.

The prosecution relied on her heavily.

Physical evidence backed her account: fingerprints, a gun found during a search, and the murder weapons.

The investigation was led by Lieutenant Earl Deemer of the Los Angeles Police Department.

Deemer had the pieces.

He had the witnesses.

He had the weapons.

What he did not have, at first, was a motive that made sense.

The murders seemed random.

The victims seemed unconnected.

The break in the case was not a single moment.

It was a confession, a testimony, and a trail of objects.

It is a relief, the way a door finally opens.

It is also fragile.

A cellmate's report.

A co-defendant's immunity.

A story that depends on the people who chose to tell it.

Kasabian chose to talk.

Atkins chose to talk, then testified.

The record holds what they said.