A Vicious Circle of Violence
By: H. Allegra Lansing
Tags: Denver, Manson Murders, Family, True Crime, Murder

Granddaughter of Manson Family victim meets the same fate

On July 3rd this summer, Ariana Jean Wolk, the granddaughter of Manson Family victim Rosemary LaBianca was murdered in Denver, Colorado.

Ariana Jean Wolk

Rosemary and her husband Leno were among the victims of the Tate/LaBianca killings in August 1969. Perpetrated by members of the Manson cult, Rosemary and Leno were stabbed to death in their Los Angeles home the night after the nearby killing of actress Sharon Tate and four others. Members of the cult were later convicted of murder for the Tate/LaBianca killings, including the ringleader Charles Manson.

Ariana is one of two children of Suzan LaBerge, Rosemary’s eldest child and only daughter. In a vicious twist of fate, Ariana was murdered in the same manner as the grandmother that she never knew — she was stabbed to death.

On Saturday, August 9, 1969, Rosemary LaBianca and her husband Leno were driving home from a trip to Lake Isabella. Rosemary’s son Frank was at the lake with a friend and had borrowed the couple’s boat for the week. Leno and Rosemary drove back to Lake Isabella with Suzan, then 21-years old, to bring the boat home. They had planned to bring Frank with them, but Rosemary’s 15-year old son begged to stay another day.

The LaBianca’s dropped Suzan off at her apartment, stopped to pick up a newspaper late that Saturday night, and then headed to their Los Feliz home on Waverly Drive. Just an hour or so later, Charles Manson arrived at the LaBianca home with Tex Watson, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten along with three others. Manson and Watson entered the home, tied up the couple and took a wallet belonging to Mrs. LaBianca before Manson went out to the car and sent Krenwinkel and Van Houten back in, to assist Watson with murdering the couple.

Rosemary and Leno were discovered the next day by Suzan and Frank.

Suzan LaBerge (left) with her mother and stepfather

Suzan has had a difficult life, to say the least. There were allegedly issues between mother and daughter that summer, and Suzan was later accused of stealing from both the home and her stepfather’s business, taking items that should have been distributed between herself and her siblings, including Leno’s three children from his first marriage. Suzan reputedly suffered a nervous breakdown in the aftermath of the murders, but then found peace through Christianity.

When she discovered that Tex Watson, the murderer of her family, was also a born-again Christian, Suzan did what many of us would find unthinkable:

In 1986, Suzan LaBerge, daughter of Rosemary LaBianca, anonymously wrote to Watson…

After corresponding secretly for a year, Suzan visited Tex at the California Men’s Colony, near San Luis Obispo. It didn’t take long for her to become convinced of Watson’s remorse, whereby she told him who she really was. Suzan vowed to help his parole efforts. She informed the parole board in 1990 that, “During our visit, I shared the forgiveness I felt toward him and I felt very certain that Charles was deeply remorseful for what he had done.” (The Long, Chilling Shadow of Manson by Richard C. Paddock © August 06, 1994 Los Angeles Times)

Suzan argued to the parole board that he had paid his debt to society! She even met his family.

Suzan and Tex Watson, with his children

When Doris Tate saw Suzan show up at Watson’s parole hearing and defend the sonofabitch, she tore into her. Doris reportedly walked out of that hearing and in the parking lot, within the hearing of several witnesses, yelled to LaBerge, ‘You are one STUPID SHIT!’

A few years later, Suzan wound up living in the same small coastal California town as Sharon’s youngest sister Patti, and her three children. In the book Restless Souls, co-written by Patti’s daughter Alisa Statman, she stated that she believes something nefarious was going on when LaBerge approached her mother. Not only was Watson’s new BFF living earshot of Patti, but one of Suzan’s children was enrolled in the same class as one of Patti’s kids.

Perhaps she was motivated by attention, or the money she thought she’d get for such a powerful, transformative story of forgiveness. And I don’t hold it past her to use a relationship with the Tate family to funnel information to Watson, to help with his potential release. For many victims of violent crime, forgiveness sometimes feels like the only way to heal.

Suzan’s brother Frank died in 2017 of alcohol-related liver cirrhosis. Suzan was divorced from her husband, with whom she had two daughters. During the divorce proceedings, allegations of child abuse were levied against Suzan by her husband.

Now, in what seems to be the most ironic and tragic twists of fate, Suzan has lost her daughter to violence. According to the Denver Post, Ariana was stabbed in the 1500 block of Oneida, Denver and died at the scene, shortly after 5am, mountain time. A 24-year old suspect has been arrested on suspicion of first degree murder.

Ariana was found in her apartment, in her bed, in a pool of blood. According to sources, Ariana had moved into an upstairs apartment unit a few months before her death, after an incident of domestic violence according to authorities. The individual in question was ruled out by law enforcement, and quickly shifted to reports by neighbors of a man seen with Wolk the day she was killed.

The victim in happier times. She resembles her grandmother Rosemary LaBianca.

One neighbor witnessed what appeared to be an altercation between the victim and a young man with dark hair. The victim had been pushed down, and needed assistance to stand and return to her apartment. The dark-haired man then visited the neighbor’s apartment, asked to smoke weed with her, and told her that Ms. Wolk was threatening to harm herself. He then returned to the victim’s apartment. The neighbor saw the young man once more, in the early dawn hours just before Ariana’s body was discovered, shirtless in the back yard.

Reports from friends and neighbors indicate that Ariana was an alcoholic who, under the influence, often invited random ‘transients’ to her home.

Police discovered video footage of Wolk with 24-year old Jose Sandoval-Romero. They linked Sandoval-Romero to a finger print found on a Starbucks cup, on the front yard of the victim’s apartment.

After fleeing to Colorado Springs, the suspect was apprehended. Police noted that he had cuts on his right hand consistent with a knife ‘slipping as he was making stabbing motions’.

Sandoval-Romero then admitted to police that he killed Ariana Wolk.

The 24-year old suspect

We send our deepest condolences to Ariana’s mother and loved ones. Nobody should endure tragedy such as this and we pray for justice for her murder, and peace to her family.

This is excerpted from an article that originally appeared at MansonFamily.net