Since actress Sharon Tate was slain in her Benedict Canyon home, at least 18,335 people have been murdered in the city of Los Angeles. But no killers have become as notorious as the bizarre cult members responsible for the gruesome slaughter of Aug. 9, 1969.

While Tate's husband, film director Roman Polanski, was in Europe, the pregnant actress and four visitors were beaten, stabbed and shot. The word PIGS was scrawled on the front door in Tate's blood.

A wave of fear swept the city, heightened by the discovery the next day of store owners Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, who had been tortured and killed in a similar fashion in their Los Feliz home.

Only months later did the public hear of Charles Manson, a wild-eyed career criminal and his "family," runaways from middle-class life who lived with him on a remote San Fernando Valley ranch.

Even a quarter of a century later, the names are chillingly familiar: Susan Atkins. Patricia Krenwinkel. Leslie Van Houten. Tex Watson. All are serving life terms in prison for the Tate-LaBianca murders along with their long-haired guru--a wanna-be songwriter who hung around the fringes of the Los Angeles music scene.

Even now as he sits isolated in one of California's toughest prisons, Manson has gained a new mystique as a kind of criminal antihero. People play his songs, peddle his writings and sell his likeness on T-shirts and dresses for girls. Near the prison, at least one follower has taken up residence, waiting to see Charlie again.

For the relatives of Manson's victims, the past has proved difficult to forget. Some have devoted their lives to keeping Manson behind bars. Another has found God and forgiven her mother's killer.

One even has won reparations from Manson.

Bartek Frykowski was 9 years old and living in Poland when his father, Voytek Frykowski, a friend of Polanski's, was stabbed 51 times and shot at the Benedict Canyon estate.

"Manson destroyed my life really," Frykowski said from the German village where he lives. "Always this case was with me. I became a different man without a father."

Finally seeing results from a lawsuit filed more than two decades ago, Frykowski has received $75,000 in royalties for a song Manson wrote before the murders. "Look at Your Game Girl" was used by Manson to lure young hippie women into his fold.

Last year, Guns N' Roses recorded it on an album that has sold more than 2 million copies worldwide--with Manson's share of the profits going to Frykowski.