6 Biggest Bombshells From Netflix's Documentary 'Chaos: The Manson Murders': CIA's Alleged Involvement, Cover-Ups and More

Based on the 2019 book CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Tom O'Neill and Dan Piepenbring, director Errol Morris' Netflix documentary Chaos: The Manson Murders explored the infamous, brutal Tate-LaBianca murders committed by the Manson family in the summer of 1969. It also examined the conspiracy theories surrounding the infamous killing spree 55 years later.

The film, which premiered on March 7, looked into Charles Manson's manipulative abilities and how he possibly learned them from the CIA's MKUltra program when he moved to San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district. At the time, the CIA was developing a top-secret experimental program by recruiting subjects for LSD studies to determine whether drugs could enervate people's minds and force confessions.

"[I know] I sound crazy if I say, well, there were these research scientists who were working secretly for the government who were trying to do exactly what Manson did with the girls — create people who would kill without regret or remorse, on command, and not recalling how or why they did it," O'Neill told Morris in the documentary. "And those research scientists came into contact with him during this pivotal time that he was turning into Charles Manson, guru/cult leader of these obedient slaves that would do whatever he said."

Manson's parole officer, Roger Smith, told the author he often met the cult leader at the clinic.

Scientist Louis "Jolly" West was also a frequent visitor of the clinic, which he called a "laboratory disguised as a hippie crash pad." He reportedly used the place to call up subjects for his study on the LSD effects on young people.

According to O'Neill, West induced insanity in the participants — who were reportedly unaware of what was happening — for a decade. He supported the case by mentioning the court-appointed psychiatrist who examined Lee Harvey Oswald's killer, Jack Ruby. The assassin was reportedly suffering a "major mental illness precipitated by the stress of (his) trial" before he testified.

When asked about the hunches of O'Neill's book about Manson and the CIA, Morris said it was a "concern" during the making of the documentary film.

"Of course. But I identify with Tom O'Neill. In many ways, it is a story of a detective who won't give up and speaking as a detective and a person who has worked on detective stories and as a person who was a private investigator for years, the desire to actually solve a case, whatever solving a case may mean, but that desire to finish the sentence and put a period at the end, and say case closed, is overwhelming," the director told Variety. "It becomes even more overwhelming the harder it is to finish that sentence and put the period at the end."

Morris added, "Tom asked this question: How did Manson convince these women and men to kill for him? How did he do this? Tom’s answer is that you need some kind of external conspiracy in order to make sense out of it. But can we prove that Manson was programmed as an assassin? Let’s put it this way, there’s stuff that suggests something like that, but it is far from proven."

Beyond MKUltra, O'Neill noted the U.S. government was also overseeing two projects when Manson moved to San Francisco: the CIA's CHAOS and the FBI's COINTELPRO. Both programs were created as countermeasures in case an anti-establishment upheaval suddenly transpired at the time.

"Those programs were designed to infiltrate left-wing groups, especially the [Black] Panthers, and neutralize them," O'Neill said. "That's what their own documents say — do whatever it took to basically make them ineffective, wipe them out."

The award-winning investigative journalist explained that, while the Manson murders were not "orchestrated" by the government, the killing spree served the purposes of the two projects.

Netflix's Chaos: The Manson Murders scrutinized the potential law enforcement cover-ups before the murders happened, with O'Neill intrigued by Manson's unrevoked parole despite being arrested six times. The parole officer also wrote letters to the probation officer, saying Manson behaved well.

O'Neill pointed out that the Los Angeles Police Department took months to solve the Tate-LaBianca murders and entangle the Manson family in the case. The documentary film included archival evidence, showing law enforcement declaring the crimes were not connected despite "having the same mode of murder," including the word "pig" written on the wall using blood.

He also claimed the sheriffs informed the department of the Hinman case, in which the killers wrote "political piggy" on the wall. However, the detectives reportedly told the LAPD they were going after a lead about narcotics traffickers.

A week after the killings, the LAPD made 26 arrests after it raided Spahn Ranch on car theft charges. Everyone was released three days later.

"Somebody wanted that group out there," O'Neill added, suggesting some members of the Manson family reported it.

Director Morris' documentary featured Bobby Beausoleil, an associate of the Manson family and one of the convicted murderers of Gary Hinman.

Per Beausoleil, he met Manson in the music industry and became his confidant. However, a bad drug deal reportedly led him to kill Hinman in July 1969 — more than a week before the Tate-LaBianca murders — at Manson's urging.

"Charlie's way of protecting himself... was the typical convict way of insurance," Beausoleil said. "If someone is a potential snitch, then you make that person complicit in illegal activity. You have something on them just as they have something on you."

He added, "There's no doubt in my mind what the motivation was. None. Zero. Charlie had got paranoid of his own people. He wanted to bind them to him through they're committing bad crimes, that was the true motive."

According to Beausoleil, Manson was "not a mastermind" nor an effective cult leader in the "mundane" case.

On the other hand, Morris suggested record producer Terry Melcher's rejection of Manson as a musical artist was a key reason for the killings.

Chaos: The Manson Murders dove into the narrative mentioned in Manson prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi's 1974 bestseller Helter Skelter, which suggested the late criminal prophesied a war between the Black and white races.

"In Manson's mind, the term 'helter skelter' meant the Black man rising up against the white establishment and murdering the entire white race, with the exception of him and his followers, who escaped 'helter skelter' by going to the desert and living in the bottomless pit," Bugliosi said in archival footage.

Stephen Kay, an attorney who also worked to convict Manson, added Manson saw The Beatles' track "Helter Skelter" as a sign of an imminent race war.

However, O'Neill said there is no evidence to support the claim and that Bugliosi was aware "the more sensational a case he presented, the better sales the book would have."

Following another raid in Death Valley National Park, Susan Atkins was arrested in connection with Hinman's fatal stabbing. She reportedly told her two cellmates she was a part of the Tate-LaBianca murders, though O'Neill found the admission suspicious as the authorities possibly put her behind bars with the two career criminals to trigger her murder confession.

According to O'Neill, replacing Atkins' court-appointed attorney with a different lawyer "with strong client control" was also skeptical.

"They needed Atkins to testify to indict Manson, [Tex] Watson, [Leslie] Van Houten, [Patricia] Krenwinkel, and [Linda] Kasabian, so they got Atkins away from her lawyer, who had been court-appointed and would've defended her properly, and got her a new attorney," O'Neill explained. "I have the memos — they held a meeting and they said, 'Who do we have that would have more control over her and get from her what we need?'"

He continued, "They were basically all working for the prosecution."