• Beausoleil Retrial Set for Los Angeles

Beausoleil Retrial Set for Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 24 – The retrial of 21-year-old Robert Beausoleil for the July, 1969 slaying of Malibu musician Gary Hinman, 34, will be held in Los Angeles, Superior Court Judge William B. Keene ruled Friday.

Keene turned down a defense motion that the trial he held elsewhere because Beausoleil in his first trial, had been linked with the Charles Manson hippie clan, which his attorney said had been given “excessive” publicity in the Sharon Tate and LaBianca murder cases.

Beausoleil’s first trial for the death of Hinman ended in a hung jury last July.

Keene set March 20 for retrial and said if there is any question about the defendant getting a fair hearing, it can be determined during the questioning of prospective jurors.

The judge said he intends to order the simultaneous trials of Beausoleil and the defendants in the Tate-LaBianca slayings, including the 35-year-old Manson and Susan Atkins, 21, in separate courtrooms.

Keene said arrangements would make it possible to shield the jurors in both cases from undue publicity.

Beausoleil is not charged in the Tate-LaBianca murders, but testimony at his first trial linked him with Manson and the Spahn Ranch at Chatsworth, where the Manson “family” lived for a time.

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