Before Charles Manson became known for his actions that lead to the horror on August 9, 1969, he was already showing his power of persuasion and that his small stature didn’t stop him from getting what he wanted.
In 1961 both Charles, who was 26 years old, and the Hollywood actor Danny Trejo, who was 17 years old, were serving time together in the Los Angeles County Jail. Danny had a gang inside and would mock Charles and describe him as being a “greasy, dirty, scrawny” man.
But eventually, Charles managed to convince him and his gang that he had hypnotic powers that would have the same effect as marijuana and even heroin and he gave them guided meditations in exchange for protection. Danny described it:
The dude sat us down and told us to close our eyes. For 15 minutes, in great detail, he walked us through the process of copping the dope, finding a place to fix, cooking the heroin in a spoon, drawing it into a needle, and sticking it in our veins.
Even before I fake-fixed, I could taste it in my mouth. Any junkie knows what that is like. By the time he described it hitting my bloodstream, I felt the warmth flowing through my body. If that white boy wasn’t a career criminal, he could have been a professional hypnotist.