Mass murderer Charles Manson is getting ready to marry a woman more than fifty years younger than him. Maybe. It gets a little confusing. The 80-year-old leader of the Manson Family, who terrorized California in the 1960s and famously murdered actress Sharon Tate, will reportedly wed the 26-year-old Afton Elaine Burton. Burton, who goes by the name “Star,” moved from her home in the Midwest to Corcoran, California to be close to Manson, and to run several websites dedicated to his release. According to the Associated Press, the couple have a marriage license already. “No date has been set, but a wedding coordinator has been assigned by the prison to handle the nuptials, and the couple has until early February to get married before they would have to reapply. The Kings County marriage license, viewed Monday by The Associated Press, was issued Nov. 7.” Manson, however, has maintained that the wedding story is a fiction, telling Rolling Stone last year that it was part of a hoax on the media that he and Burton were playing. “That’s a bunch of garbage,” Manson said in the December 2013 interview. “That’s trash. We’re playing that for public consumption.”
The course of true love never did run smooth. Tate’s sister, Debra, thinks the marriage is “ludicrous,” telling AP that “it’s insane. What would any young woman in her right mind want with an 80-year-old man?” The answer may be to do with Burton’s belief that Manson is innocent. “She said she is interested in working on his case, and marrying him would allow her to get information not available to nonrelatives.’There’s certain things next of kin can do,’ she said without elaborating.” The prison holds weddings on the first Sunday of each month. Up to ten guests (who are not inmates) can be invited. We assume that the Beatles’ “Helter Skelter” will be their wedding song.
