New York Daily News
Original Story Date: 050497
Original Story Section: Media Business
Manson Murders
To JFK Killing
The man who put Charles Manson
away and slammed O.J. Simpson in
print is now turning his sharp
prosecutorial skills to another big
case: the JFK assassination.
But unlike the scores of other [Image]
writers who have taken on the
much-studied subject, "Helter Skelter"
author Vincent Bugliosi is going to
argue that the killing wasn't a
conspiracy.
"My view is Lee Harvey Oswald acted
alone," Bugliosi told the Daily News
yesterday.
In the book, which will be published by
W.W. Norton next year and probably span
two volumes, Bugliosi plans to demolish
many of the conspiracy theories that
have cropped up during the past 34
years since that November 22, 1963
murder in Dallas.
"A lot of these theories seem to be
valid but when you put them under a
microsope, they fall apart," said the
former Los Angeles district attorney.
In fact, he's got the long knives out
for one pop theory of the assassination
that made it to film as Oliver Stone's
"J.F.K.", that the U.S. government had
a hand in knocking off the President.
Bugliosi said he turned into an
anti-conspiracy buff when he was called
on four years ago to play the role of
the prosecuting attorney in "The Trial
of Lee Harvey Oswald," the mammoth
26-hour courtroom drama on British TV.
To many publishing insiders, Bugliosi's
take sounds a lot like that of author
Gerald Posner, who wrote the 1993 best
seller, "Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald
and the Assassination of J.F.K."
But Starling Lawrence, editor in chief
at Norton, is banking on the star power
of Bugliosi.
"There were a lot of other books
written about the Charles Manson case,
but the book everyone remembers is
'Helter Skelter.' " he said.
