• Tate Slayer Suspect Watson Wins Delay, Separate Trial

Tate Slayer Suspect Watson Wins Delay, Separate Trial

LOS ANGELES, May 21 – Manson “family” member Charles (Tex) Watson apparently will not be tried with the other five defendants in the slaughter-killing of actress Sharon Tate and six others.

Watson, who allegedly wielded the murder weapons — a knife and gun — In all the murders, filed a motion for rehearing in his extradition and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals said today it would consider the motion June 17 — two days after the trial is scheduled to begin In Los Angeles.

The court upheld on May 6 Gov. Preston Smith’s Jan. 6 order extraditing Watson and Watson’s attorney had 15 days in which to file a motion for rehearing. He waited until the next to the last day.

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, one of two deputy district attorneys handling the prosecution of the case called the situation “disgraceful.”

“The condition of the judicial system in Texas is nothing short of shameful,” Deputy D. A. Vince Bugliosi charged. “It’s calculated to frustrate the due administration of justice…shameful isn’t strong enough — it’s disgraceful.”

Bugliosi said Watson will have to be tried separately at a cost to Los Angeles taxpayers of “a half million dollars.”

Watson’s home-town lawyer, Bill Boyd of McKinney, Tex., has fought to delay the extradition at every step. He claims the Tate murders have received more publicity in California “than the Robert Kennedy Assassination” and that his client could not get a fair trial in Los Angeles.

Six persons, including the cult leader Charles Manson, were indicted for the slaying of the actress, three of her jet-set friends and a casual visitor in her exclusive Benedict Canyon home, and for the slayings the following day of market owner Leno La Bianca and his wife Rosemary.

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