Drugs Found Near Tate Murder Site
Pills, Marijuana Located In Slain Hair Stylist’s Car Outside
Estate
August 13, 1969
Los Angeles Times
By Dial Torgerson
Times Staff Writer
Narcotics were found in an expensive sports car parked outside the Benedict
Canyon estate were actress Sharon Tate and four companions were slain, it was
learned Tuesday.
Police decline to confirm or deny the report. The detective heading a
nineteen-man team working on a multiple murders would say only:
"That narcotic aspects are under investigation."
The drugs were found in the 1966 black Porsche owned by wealthy Hollywood
hair stylist Jay Sebring.
Among the drugs were a small quantity of marijuana, pills resembling
methedrine (or "speed") and possibly LSD.
Earlier Lieutenant Robert Helder, head of the Tate case team had been asked
if narcotics have been found at the scene. "Not in the house." he said.
Backgrounds Being Probed
Police said the backgrounds of the victims of the murder were
being investigated to see if narcotic records were involved. They did not
disclose the results of the investigation.
But friends of one of the victims-Polish immigrant filmmaker Voyteck
Frykowski, 37-said that he was known to have been a user of narcotics.
Test to determine if the victims had been using narcotics are under way at
the Los Angeles County coroner's office. Results are not expected to be
available for several more days.
Lieutenant Helder said there was no evidence of a drinking party in progress
at the estate the night of the killings. But it was known that:
1-there had been a party at the home Friday night. The deaths are believed to
have occurred early Saturday.
2-Frykowski's and at least some of the others who died in the outburst of
stabbing and shooting were members of the "pot-oriented" Hollywood Group, among
whom use of marijuana was commonplace.
Killed with Miss Tate, Sebring and Frykowski where Abigail Folger,
26-year-old coffee family heiress, and Steven Parent, 18, a friend of the estate
caretaker, William E. Garretson, 19, who was arrested after the killings but
released Monday.
Garretson's mother, Mrs. Mary Garretson, said in Lancaster, Ohio, she expects
her son to return home as soon as he was rested.
Son "Tired And Incoherent"
She said she had talked to him by phone senses his release and
he was "tired and incoherent."
"He will stay here," she said, "everyone loves him here and knows he couldn't
have done anything wrong."
The probe of the narcotics aspects of the case necessarily led please into
two lines of investigation:
1 -That the killer or killers might have been "freaked out" on drugs and
murdered in a paranoid frenzy.
2 -That they might have been linked to the narcotics trade and involved in
either the sale or theft of drugs.
Lieutenant Helder told newsmen earlier that he felt the killings were
premeditated, because the telephone lines leading to the actresses home at the
end of Cielo drive had been cut.
The lines are 18 ft. above the ground. They were slashed not far from where
Parent was shot to death as he sat in his car on the driveway of this secluded
home.
Lieutenant Helder’s supposition that the crimes were premeditated would
presumably make a "freak-out" type of killing unlikely. But police were not
concentrating on any one theory. Two lieutenants and 17 detectives are following
up every possibility.
Chemical tests were believed being made of the drugs found in the black
Porsche.
It was found parked next to Miss Folger’s new Pontiac Firebird on the black
top entry way to the Cielo Drive Estate. The Parent youths car was 100 ft. away,
angled toward the entry gate where Cielo Drive ends in the sprawling estate
begins.
Film director Roman Polanski, husband of Miss Tate, rented the home from the
owner. Polanski was in London at the time of the murders. He flew home Sunday.
He is now in seclusion at an undisclosed location.
Funeral arrangements had been made Tuesday for all of the victims except
Frykowski. Miss Tate's funeral, which will be private, is expected to be
conducted today.
Frykowski's mother and brother reportedly had been granted permission by the
Polish government to come to America for funeral services tentatively planned
for Thursday in New York City. Friends of are arranging the service.
About 100 persons attended Rosary services for young Parent Tuesday night at
the church of the Nativity at El Monte. Requiem mass will be at 9:00 AM today at
the church, followed by burial in Queen of Heaven Cemetery.
