“This was a drug deal gone bad, trying to cover up Gary Hinman’s killing by doing another murder the next day to make it look like a copycat murder, which were the Tate murders. And when that murder didn’t hit newspapers like a Black Panther murder, they did the LaBianca murders. It’s a series of blunders by people who were trying to cover their tracks, not this grand scheme of 'Helter Skelter.'”

Joe Berlinger · said date not stated · reported 2026-09-05

Berlinger describes the murders as a chain of cover-up blunders stemming from a botched drug deal, not a grand Helter Skelter scheme.