Bruce Davis died in a California prison hospital at age 83 on Sept. 11. He was pronounced dead at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville at 11:03 p.m. A cause of death was not immediately disclosed.
Bruce Davis and the 1972 convictions
Davis was convicted in 1972 of two counts of murder and sentenced to life in prison. The convictions covered the slayings of Gary Hinman and Donald “Shorty” Shea, and he served most of his time behind bars at San Quentin State Prison.
Parole records said Hinman was targeted because he was viewed as a potential aid for the cult’s planned move from Los Angeles to the desert. Records also said Davis held Hinman at gunpoint while Charles Manson slashed him from his ear to his chin.
Julie Garland questions 2024 parole hearing
Shea was a stuntman who also worked at Spahn Ranch in Chatsworth. Charles Manson told his followers that Shea was a police informant and trying to kick them off the ranch. Steve Grogan and Charles “Tex” Watson joined Charles Manson and Davis in taking Shea to a secluded area and stabbing him multiple times, and Davis admitted to cutting Shea.
Davis was not involved in the killings of Sharon Tate and four others in Benedict Canyon, but prosecutors and state officials repeatedly described him as an integral member of Charles Manson’s inner circle. In a 2014 parole hearing, Davis said, “I wanted to be Charlie’s favorite guy,” and at another hearing he said he did not know about the Tate killings until the morning after they happened.
Gavin Newsom blocked release
Davis had been found suitable for parole eight different times since 2010, but California Govs. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsom blocked his release on multiple occasions. In 2021, Newsom rejected Davis’s release, saying he “does not understand that it was his agreement to participate in Mr. Manson’s plans that resulted in the torture and murder of his victims, regardless of whether he ultimately inflicted the fatal blows,” and that his conduct “may make him vulnerable to repeating these patterns in the future.”
During his last parole hearing in 2024, panel members heavily questioned Davis’s desire to write a memoir if released and go on a series of speaking engagements. Davis called those plans a “redemption tour,” and the hearing was postponed after he was confronted about his decision to go on a podcast dubbed “The Lighter Side of Serial Killers.”
Parole Board Commissioner Julie Garland said, “Your plan to reach out publicly about your story, which necessarily includes your involvement with the Manson family, would bring notoriety and glorification to that,” and, “And I will tell you, when I heard that you were on this podcast, I was like, ‘What the heck? What is he thinking?’”
With Davis dead, the unresolved question is the cause of death. His prison record now closes at the California Medical Facility, after a parole history that kept moving through review and rejection without ever reaching release.
