Charles Manson: What happened when a journalist asked notorious serial killer to describe himself in one sentence

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Twenty years after orchestrating the gruesome murders of pregnant actress Sharon Tate and six others in Los Angeles during the summer of 1969, Charles Manson was asked to describe who he was in one sentence.

Leaping forward in his chair, the cult leader giggled, raised his eyebrows and pulled faces before responding: "Nobody."

After taking a pause for dramatic effect, he continued: "I'm nobody.

"I'm a tramp, a bum, a hobo. I'm a boxcar and jug o' wine. And a straight razor, if you get too close to me."

Manson, whose name became synonymous with violence and madness, died on Sunday of natural causes at the age of 83.

A recent photo showed the gray-bearded killer's face still bearing the scar of a swastika he carved into his forehead decades earlier.

He became one of the 20th century's most notorious criminals when he directed his mostly young, female followers to murder seven people in what prosecutors said was a plan to incite a race war - an idea he got from a twisted reading of the Beatles song "Helter Skelter."

Despite the overwhelming evidence against him, Manson maintained during his tumultuous trial in 1970 that he was innocent and that society itself was guilty.

"These children that come at you with knives, they are your children. You taught them; I didn't teach them. I just tried to help them stand up," he said in a courtroom soliloquy.

Although Manson did not personally kill any of the seven victims, he was found guilty of ordering their murders.