SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 18 — A Charles Manson cult member serving a prison term for trying to assassinate then-President Gerald Ford in 1975, Friday denied that two ex-convicts found shot in Sacramento had ties to the notorious band.

“That’s not true. They are no part of us and have not done anything for or against us,” Lynette Fromme said in a telephone call to The Associated Press from inside the Federal Correctional Institution in suburban Pleasanton.

Edward Barabas, 27, and James Craig, 38, were found early Wednesday in the trunk of a burning car parked near downtown Sacramento. Barabas was dead and Craig was hospitalized in critical condition.

They had been released last March from Folsom prison.

Barabas’s father said his son had been living with Priscilla Cooper, reported to be a Manson follower, in Sacramento.

Miss Fromme, 30, disputed reports that Miss Cooper was a member of the Manson cult and had carved a cross on her forehead. During his trial for the murders of actress Sharon Tate and others, Manson carved such a cross on his forehead. Miss Fromme said Miss Cooper never had a cross on her forehead.

Phil Guthrie, information officer for the state Corrections Department, said Barabas and Craig were members of the Aryan Brotherhood, a prison gang of white inmates. He said Barabas once had been put in protective custody at Soledad prison because he had been threatened by black and Mexican-American gangs.

Miss Cooper and Craig served prison terms on charges stemming from two 1972 Stockon area murders.