Oh, you’ve all heard of him.

Of course you have. We all know who he is. Charles Manson is the man who broke into Hollywood director Roman Polanski’s house with his so-called ‘Family’ and stabbed five people to death, including Polanski’s wife, Sharon Tate, who was nearly nine months pregnant with their baby.

Except he didn’t.

Charles Manson wasn’t even there that night.

Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel and a former airline baggage handler called Tex Watson were the ones who actually invaded the Polanski house on Cielo Drive on August 9, 1969.

According to Manson’s biographer, Jeff Guinn, even as a child Manson liked to recruit gullible classmates, mostly girls, to attack other students he didn’t like.

Afterwards, he’d swear to teachers his followers were just doing what they wanted – he couldn’t be held responsible for their actions. And because no one thought a six-year-old was capable of such Machiavellian manipulation, he got away with it.

Manson was clearly a psychopath, of course.

He showed all the classic signs: a devious, manipulative personality from a very young age, total lack of empathy or remorse, callous arrogance and indifference to the suffering of others, thrill-seeking recklessness, superficial charm.

Just like me, in fact.

But what about his disciples?

Susan Atkins and Patricia Krenwinkel were just twenty-one when they cold-bloodedly stabbed a heavily pregnant woman to death as she pleaded with them to let her live long enough to give birth to her baby. Were they psychopaths, too? If these young women had never met Manson, would they have still have become killers?

Or would they have drifted along in obscurity: settled down, married, raised children, become apple-cheeked grandmas?

It’s an interesting question, isn’t it?

Unlike Manson, neither of them had shown any sociopathic tendencies before the killings. In fact, Krenwinkel had considered becoming a nun before deciding instead to attend a Jesuit college, only to drop out after one term.

Admittedly, they both came from unhappy homes, which made them vulnerable. But until they met Charles Manson, they were just sad, lonely young girls. It’s enough to send a chill down your spine, isn’t it?

What if Manson hadn’t played guitar at the house where Atkins was living with friends?

What if Krenwinkel hadn’t bumped into him at the beach and been told, for the first time in her life, that she was beautiful?

Charles Manson was a natural born killer: his life was going to erupt in violence sooner or later. But if they hadn’t met him, those young women might have gone all their lives without harming anyone.

I’m not making excuses for them, of course.

They chose to follow Manson, to join his doomsday cult, to kill without pity, without remorse, and take pleasure in it.

But to coin a phrase, some people are born psychopaths, and some have psychopathy thrust upon them.