Two Devotees of Manson Guilty of Death Threats
Wednesday, March 17th, 1976
SACRAMENTO, Mar. 17 — Manson cultist Sandra Good and her friend, Susan Murphy, were convicted by a jury Tuesday of conspiring to send death threats to business and government leaders.
The jury deliberated a little more than 1 1/2 hours before finding the defendants guilty on all counts.
Miss Good and Miss Murphy were charged with conspiring to mail 171 letters to business and government leaders, and Miss Good also was charged with making threats in four telephone interviews.
The two friends of Lynette Fromme, who was convicted of the Sept. 5 attempted assassination of President Ford, sat passively in their chairs as the verdicts were read by court clerk Walter Fitzpatrick.
Miss Murphy, who was free without bail, asked to be remanded to custody immediately, which the judge ordered. Miss Good, who was not free on bail, asked to be sentenced immediately, but the judge set an April 13 date to pass sentence.
She could receive up to 25 years in prison — five years for each of the five counts.
Miss Murphy, a former nurse, could be sentenced to five years in prison for the one conspiracy count.
The threats said a so-called International People’s Court of Retribution, which Miss Good said was headed by Charles Manson, will kill persons who pollute the earth.
The prosecution said such a court does not exist and the letters were written by two women and Miss Fromme, who was not charged although named as an unindicted co-conspirator.
Miss Good’s co-counsel, William Shubb, said of the verdict: “It think it’s to be expected.”
He said he would have handled the defense differently had he been allowed to run the case but would not say he could have obtained an acquittal.
“I think she got a fair trial,” Shubb told reporters. “If she didn’t, it wasn’t the judge’s fault.”
Miss Good, 31, who has been held on $40,000 bail, and Miss Murphy, 33, showed no outward emotion to the verdicts, which came as no surprise, especially after Miss Good’s closing statement to the jury that she wished she had mailed the letters and said she regretted that “possibly I did not kill somebody.”
Miss Murphy’s co-counsel, John Moulds, asked about her passive role throughout the trial, said, “She apparently made some decision about going along for the ride.”
Miss Good and Miss Fromme were early followers of Charles Manson, who is serving a life term in prison for the 1969 Sharon Tate murders. Miss Murphy, although she never met Manson, said in the trial she was a “sister in Manson’s church.”
Asked about grounds for a possible appeal, Moulds laughed and said, “Maybe the incompetence of counsel.”
Asst. U.S. Atty. Bruce Babcock said it was a “just verdict.”
He also said he thought Miss Good should get the maximum sentence.
“It seems to me that she has admitted she is a menace to society and we should put her away for as long as we can,” he said. “It seems to me that if anybody deserves the maximum, it’s her.”
Earlier in the day, Miss Good told the jury that a wave of assassins headed by imprisoned killer Charles Manson will murder and torture businessmen who pollute the earth.
But she said that letters she had intended to mail giving that message to thousands of corporation executives were not threats but “warnings.”
“No one knows the truth about the Manson family. Until we are given a courtroom, these warnings will come to pass,” Miss Good, 31, who acted as her own lawyer, said in a rambling statement to the jury.
The statement was the only defense Miss Good made to the charges. Miss Murphy is a former roommate of Miss Good and Miss Fromme, but says she never met Manson.
Asst. U.S. Atty. Bruce Babcock said the “wave of assassins” existed only in the imaginations of Miss Good and her former roommate, Miss Fromme.
Miss Fromme, named as a co-conspirator, was not indicted on the death threat charges because the government felt the life term she got for attempted assassination was punishment enough, Babcock said.
The prosecutor said he believed Miss Fromme tried to shoot Ford in Capitol Park here last Sept. 5 to give added impact to the plot to terrorize businessmen by mail threats.
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