Monday, August 29, 2022

Charles Allen Beard

 

There are a few Manson Family members or associates that little or next to nothing is known about. Charles Beard is one of those people. In this post we will tell you all about Charles and what happened to him.

Lynette Fromme wrote in her book Reflexion a little about Charles Beard in the name she used for him, Chuck Grey with an asterisk. She writes at the beginning of her book, "The persons and events described in this book are real and true. In some instances, pseudonyms have been used to protect the privacy of individuals. In such cases the altered names are indicated by an asterisk (*) the first time they appear."

Lyn writes on pages 278 and 279. "Chuck Grey* wasn't a bad kid- at over six feet tall, hardly a kid at all- but in the eyes of the law he was underage. He had lived with the law all his life. Both his parents were police officers. He didn't say so until he realized we wouldn't hold it against him. Charlie told him the cops had been running us all over the county, and he wondered if his dad could help to keep them off our back. Chuck rolled his eyes.

"He's been on my back for seventeen years," he said. 

"A bully?"

"You could say that. We hardly know each other. All he knows how to do is give orders. They're never at home much anyway, and when they're not at work, they're sleeping."

"Are they looking for you?"

"Not really, they don't care, but they put on a show 'cause they don't want people to think they're bad parents."

Chuck was man-some, with green eyes that looked hungry for acceptance. He shaded that look beneath a low brow and a "fuck it" attitude, spending most of his time at the farmhouse."

Lyn continues on page 318. "One sunny day I heard a commotion outside, and Pearl came into George's house looking traumatized. From the doorway I saw two sheriff's squad cars in the yard, and seventeen-year-old Chuck Grey in the back of one of them. A scatter of people who had stopped in their tracks of their daily routines looked stunned. Finally, someone explained to me that Chuck, the son of two police officers, had just been arrested for rape. A woman in the first squad car had identified him as the man who hijacked her at knifepoint on Santa Susana Pass not a mile from The Ranch, and raped her on the backseat of her car. As shocking as the charge, the woman was almost sixty years old.

Murmurs of disbelief and denial failed to pick up momentum. The complacency on Chuck's face announced that he had done the deed. Those of us wondered why, based upon his good looks and access to girls, didn't understand rape. Chuck went away and didn't come back."

 I offer Lyn's recollections because it's about as close we are going to get to any background on Chuck other than what is on Deemer's List.

 


Chuck was born in Sacramento with the name and DOB as is on Deemer's list. His mother remarried a man with the last name of Green in 1962 when Chuck was 10-years-old. Chuck used his step-father's last name as his own.

Chuck was arrested for kidnapping and rape on July 21 1969. The rape occurred on July 17 1969 at 2:30 am, it was reported to law enforcement at 9:50 am that same day. The location of the kidnapping and rape according to the report was the N/E area of the Chatsworth hills.

The victim, Marilyn Marshall, passed away in 2004. She was 32 years old at the time of the kidnap/rape, not 60 as Lyn thought.

In the early morning hours of July 17 1969 Marilyn and a companion, Ronald Black went up in the Chatsworth hills for a little alone time in his vehicle, a white van.

The suspect, Chuck, was said to be driving a '57 Ford, White, two-door, license plate HET 365.

What follows is the narrative on the police report. It is difficult to read because it is handwritten and not a great copy. I've transcribed it as well as I can, there are a few words I could not make out or deduce from what had been written. It's full of abbreviations which I explain the first time they appear in the report.

The vict [victim] stated that on the abv [above] date and time she was in the Chatsworth hills with wit 1 [Witness 1] Black, Ronald (arrest GTA RPT booking [there's a number here but I can't make the whole thing out] Vict and wit 1 were outside of wit 1 veh [vehicle]

Susp [suspect] came from behind vict and stated "Don't move". Vict felt a poss [possible] 22 rifle next to her back and shoulder and stated "You've got to be kidding"

Susp stated "No I'm not, get in the car I'll tell you where to drive" Vict complied and wit 1 drove in front of the vict in a white van ???

Vict lost sight of wit 1 at which time the susp stated "turn here" (indicating RT) vict complied and after completing turn slowed down and jumped out of the veh. Vict began to run and suspect followed

Susp caught vict and held a 10" hunting knife up to vict and stated "I won't hurt you" and threw knife to side, susp then removed vict clothes and his own and forced vict to lie down ??? west at which time susp had sexual intercourse with vict, penetrating vaginal orfice.

After completing sexual intercourse with vict susp stated "My name is Iverson. What's your name?" vict gave name and susp stated "If you tell the cops I'll kill you and your kids"

Susp then left in an unk [unknown] direction. Vict ran to a paved public highway and called for assistance.

Injury: MT at Northridge receiving by Dr. Collins who stated, laceration, contusion, abrasion ?? ???? shoulder

Pelvic exam- some dirt (earth) and pieces of leaves in and about the vaginal area Vaginal and cervical smears taken slides to LAPD Sutured ?? laceration on back of head.

The report written after Chuck's arrest says that he was booked under the name Charles Alan Manson with a birth date 12-31-46. Once in court for the arraignment he told the court he was 17 years old. His mother provided a birth certificate and his true name to the court. Chuck then had his case transferred to juvenile court.

The evidence against him was slides that contained sperm and a finger print that was Chuck's found on the victim's vehicle.

Since the case was bound over to juvenile court there are no more documents relating to this case. Juvenile records are sealed and I'm kind of surprised that these two documents still exist. I can only assume Chuck was convicted and served some time.

Documents relating to this case.

Chuck's story doesn't end there and what follows is a mind bender.

December 13 1972 Charles Alan Green, 21, of Sacramento was arrested along with two other men, Edwin Lee Earle, 21, and Patrick Leo Mlenek, 19, for the murders of two Mexican nationals who were found in a shallow grave near the town of Folsom. Earle was armed with the revolver thought to be used in the killing. Subsequent articles say a total of five people were picked up and questioned but released without charges. Earle was the sole person tried and convicted of the murders. This gives you an idea who Chuck was running with after being released from juvenile hall.


 

 Many thanks to Starviego who started a thread on Chuck Green at MoA'69 and Taborfresca who posted a link to an appeal which sealed the deal in identifying Charles Green in the appeal as the same Chuck Green who was with the Family.

August 24 1977 a 25-year-old Chuck Green married 16-year-old Karen Fredrickson in Carson City Nevada. They had a rocky relationship. By October 1977 the two were on the verge of splitting up. On October 11 1977, along with a friend of Chuck's, he and Karen went for a drive to a neighboring county. Ultimately Chuck shot Karen in the face with a shot gun and killed her. He was quickly apprehended and charged with murder, robbery and kidnapping, The cruel and callous manner of her death is described in the appeal.

Taborfresca noticed a footnote in the appeal (FN 31) that read "On several occasions the report indicated that defendant was marginally involved with the Hell's Angels motorcycle gang and had used the alias "Charles Manson." "



Chuck received the death penalty for murdering his young wife. He was the first person to receive the death penalty after it was reinstated in California. 



The appeal was beneficial to Chuck. The appeals court threw out the kidnapping and robbery charges. Following the 1977 Furman-Gregg death penalty cases the California legislature, like many states, decided that there should be one of six special circumstances to be met for the death penalty to be imposed by the jury. The DA trying the case used the special circumstance of the murder having been committed during the act of a felony crime. He named two, in fact, robbery and kidnapping. The appeals court threw out robbery because it occurred after the murder. The murder did not occur during the commission of the robbery.

The kidnapping special circumstance was thrown out as well because the DA, at trial, argued three separate kidnapping events, 1. Picking Karen up 2. Driving her to the river and 3. Walking her to the killing spot (90 feet). The appeals court didn’t consider #1 because she went willingly as a result of a lie for kidnapping to be actionable the victim must act in response to force or a threat of force. It didn’t consider #3 because the distance she was forced to travel was too short. That left #2 which they agreed was permissible but because the appeals court didn’t know which of the three the jurors based their decision on (or perhaps all three) the kidnapping special circumstance was thrown out. Chuck’s sentence was converted to life in prison with the possibility of parole. (Thank you, David, for explaining to me what the appeal meant)

Chuck is still in prison, under the name Charles Alan Green. He is at Mule Creek Prison where Tex Watson was housed for many years until his transfer to a San Diego prison. I have no idea if the two had a reunion or if they were there at the same time. Chuck has had more than 10 parole hearings and has been denied or he has stipulated unsuitability on the parole hearing date. On February 5 2020 Chuck was granted parole, on May 29 2020 the governor reversed the parole board’s decision. Since I haven’t read the transcripts, I don’t know if the Manson taint had anything to do with the reversal.

Karen’s parents went to Chuck’s parole hearings to give victim’s impact statements any time he has come up for parole. Her father died in 2015.

It was Doris Tate, Sharon Tate’s mom, who was instrumental in getting Proposition 8, the Victim’s Rights Bill passed in 1982 so that Karen’s parents had a right to have a say in what happened to their daughter’s killer.


Los Angeles Times

Thanks to Buntline who wouldn't let go of Charles Allen Beard until he knew the whole story.

UPDATE! This just in from Cielodrive who was able to get a copy of Green's parole reversal. All I can say is WOW, this guy was bad news.



Cielodrive was also able to get some mug shots of Green.






32 comments:

Doug said...

Bunty is a true CHAMPION!!

Buntline said...

Really amazing work, Deb. Well done! One of the enduring mysteries finally resolved after all these decades.

Sadly, anyone that reads the details of his 16 year old wife’s murder will know that Green is absolutely despicable. I have no doubt that he was involved in more murders. He was remorseless.

Torque said...

Fascinating stuff here, Deb. Thanks for the solid research. Its significant to me, that the more I learn about the Spahn Ranch area, the more I find a climate of crime and violent crime in the surrounding vicinity. Its almost like violence was in the drinking water.

orwhut said...

The poor girl had her face blown off at 16 and James Willett was forced to dig hid own grave yet Charlie lived for to be 83. His don't snitch policy served him well.

cielodrivecom said...

Well done Deb!

starviego said...

Great research Deb and Buntline! Charlie sure surrounded himself with a bunch of scumbags.

starviego said...

DebS said:

Chuck was arrested for kidnapping and rape on July 21 1969.

Ella Jo places him at Spahn Ranch on July 28, a week later, during the Spahn Ranch mini-raid. So it sounds like he made bail.
(Box 56A pg2886)

DebS said...

Starviego, Chuck was a juvenile, it wouldn't have been a matter of bail for him. He may have been released to his parents but that's doubtful. Lynette says in her book, which is quoted in my post, that once Chuck was arrested, they never saw him again.

Ella Jo is probably mistaken about the date.

G. Greene-Whyte said...

Wow! Dude is awful. That story stayed with me after reading Fromme.

G. Greene-Whyte said...

Are you requesting his transcripts by any chance?

DebS said...

GW, Cielodrive is the master at getting parole hearing transcripts so I will leave that up to him. He has shared with me the Governor's reversal and some mug shots which I'm going to put in the post now. All of which Cielodrive got this morning after reading the post!

Gorodish said...

starviego typed:

Ella Jo places him at Spahn Ranch on July 28, a week later, during the Spahn Ranch mini-raid. So it sounds like he made bail.

I can't put my finger on the transcript at the moment, but when I first read it I was pretty sure Ella Jo slipped and said Chuck Green, when she meant Charles Watson. Probably an easy slip when you figure both were 6 feet tall, lean, dark-haired and bearded.

Matt said...

He looks like a nice guy...


Gorodish said...

Matt typed:

He looks like a nice guy...

He looks like a washed-up singer from a late 80s early death metal band.

DebS said...

Gorodish typed...
Matt typed:

He looks like a nice guy...

He looks like a washed-up singer from a late 80s early death metal band.
-------

I looked at his neck tattoo and immediately thought, cigar band!

Buntline II said...

Wow, Cielo! He still looks plenty dangerous at 70!

It seems that Lynette Fromme, (and presumably the rest of his Spahn buddies), is completely unaware of what he became of him. We've yet to find any evidence that the authorities are aware of his connection to Manson, except that he once used the alias Charles Allen Manson. Although this fact is largely irrelevant, I doubt it would endear him to Newsom.

Peter said...

"He then asked Creech if he should "off" Khan, and Creech replied that Khan was a friend and would not talk."

Narrator Voice: "He talked."

Unknown said...

He looks like a cool dude.

starviego said...

Great job CieloDrive!

--------------

Fromme:
"He had lived with the law all his life. Both his parents were police officers. He didn't say so until he realized we wouldn't hold it against him."

Parole Release Review:
"..his family members were gang members or associated with gang members, including his father, a gang member who was killed by gang violence."


Weird. Cops or gang members? What kind of 'gang' could his father have been in? Bikers? OC? We need to ask JD.



DebS said...

Starviego, Buntline and I have been emailing privately and he discovered that Chuck's grandfather, his mother's father, was in law enforcement. Chuck told Lynette that he had "lived with the law all his life" so it would make sense that it was his grandfather that was who he was speaking of. Chuck's mother and father split up when Chuck was young and she remarried to Willis Green in 1962. Chuck's birth father, Beard, didn't die until 2004. Chuck's stepfather, Willis Green, died in 1971. I'm working on finding Green's cause of death, it may be that it was Green that was associated with gang members.

Hang in there, we realize there are things that don't quite add up and we are working on it. Remember too that the governor's parole reversals are not always 100% correct as we have seen in Family member parole reversals. If Cielodrive can get Chuck's parole hearing transcripts they might shed light on the true picture.

G. Greene-Whyte said...

I've been trying to wrap my head around why he'd say his parents were in LE to a bunch of crooks when they were not. Did his grandparents raise him for a time?

DebS said...

GW, as Buntline and I get into this a bit more we are learning more. The step-father that Chuck had before Green was in law enforcement. Chuck's mom, Joan, had been married three times by the time Chuck was 11 years old. The grandfather worked at Folsom Prison.

Lyn may not have remembered exactly what Chuck said about his relatives being police officers. It's possible, given Chuck's revolving door of fathers, that he did not express a true picture of what parents he was speaking about. It is also possible that the grandparents had a hand in raising Chuck.

The parole transcripts may reveal more. Plus, Buntline is tenacious and won't rest until he gets the facts down and sorted out to his satisfaction!

David said...

Deb et al,

Cool stuff. Now we know what his role was in the 1972 murders- body disposal.

BlueJayWay said...

Thank you Deb and Buntline for your amazing work.

After processing these revelations on Chuck Green, a couple of thoughts crossed my mind.

The key dates in both the Marilyn Marshall kidnapping/rape and the Mark Walts murder share a very small window of time. Same for the dates of Chuck's arrest and the police inquiry at Spahn's regarding Walts.

Also, the Chuck Green police report stated the rape victim was kidnapped using a .22 caliber long rifle and what little information I've read on Mark Walts' murder indicates he was murdered with a .22 caliber weapon.

DebS said...

That is a very good observation, BlueJayWay. The murder of Mark Walts has never been solved. It makes me wonder if Chuck Green was questioned about the murder. Since Green was a juvenile, we might never know the answer but someone in Mark Walts family might be able to find out. I believe he has a brother who is still looking for answers.

Jenn said...

Side note to BlueJayWay:

Have you ever been to Blue Jay Way and seen the house? If not, I’d be happy to send you a photo of it.

BlueJayWay said...

Jenn:

I've driven by it but I would the like the photo, please. I wasn't able to get a great look at it as I had to sort of rush by it. Thanks!

ColScott said...

what the fuck he was granted Parole LAST WEEK?

DebS said...

Yes, Col! We are working on making sure the governor reverses the parole. Cielodrive contacted the DDA for the 2020 hearing and the DDA was not aware that Chuck was associated with the Family. It's not in his file. That DDA is no longer with the county that convicted Chuck so we are waiting on the transcript for the current hearing to learn who went to the hearing this time.

Jay said...

Very well researched post. So many strange, violent, downright troubled people moved in and out of the narrative of the whole scene. The more you see and learn about this, the less you see 'cult,' and the more you see 'criminal enterprise.'

Squeaky is actually a pretty good writer. I'm hoping she might crank out another memoir.

BKL67 said...

Sorry if this is a stupid question but I have to ask. Seeing that this Charles Allen Beard/Green committed rape in July 69 and used Charles Manson's name and apparently Charles Manson was charged with rape also sometime that summer, I believe the victim was a teenager, is it possible that the two alledged crimes are in fact one in the same and the details have just got mixed up along the way and have become part of the Manson lore? Or is it possible this Charles Allen Beard raped more than one girl that summer and used Charles Manson's name on each ocassion? In the Governors reversal it states Beard/Green had multiple sexual assaults and it doesn't look like anything came of the rape charge against Manson. Maybe the murders superseded the lesser charges but Manson's name didn't get connected to those until months later, there would have been plenty of time to prosecute him for a sexual assault and parole violation and I know Manson got off of a lot of petty crimes in the two years leading up to the murders but they were mostly stupid little hippie crimes, a rape would be a violent crime, I can't see him just getting a walk on that. So any thoughts or insights? Thank you!!!

starviego said...

Charlie raped a girl named Christine Smith, 16, aka 'the girl from Reseda.' He was investigated for this but never prosecuted, apparently because the victim did not cooperated.