The revelations concerning Robert Trujillo’s encounter with the dark underworld inhabited by the followers of Charles Manson came in an appearance on The Offspring’s popular podcast “Time to Relax with The Offspring,” in which Dexter and Noodles from the legendary punk rock band grilled their fellow Californian on his life and career. While the early part of the interview focused mainly on the music — particularly the musicians who are mutual friends of the two groups or who have played together in the past — as the long-form podcast goes on, the discussion takes a darker turn to discuss how close Trujillo and his family came to the Manson Family when the bassist was just a child.
Per Blabbermouth, in August 1971 a group of Charles Manson devotees planned a robbery of the Western Surplus in Hawthorne, California, with the intention of then performing an armed hijacking of a flight from LAX. They believed that by doing so they could force the authorities to free their leader, who following his murder trial had been sentenced to death in 1971, though his sentence was later reduced to life imprisonment after the outlawing of capital punishment in California in 1972.
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The incident in question became known as the “Manson Family Santa Shootout,” and devolved into a gun battle leading to several injuries and the police apprehending the remaining Family members, whose plan was ultimately foiled. According to Trijullo, all this played out in the few blocks surrounding the home of his grandparents, where he just so happened to be as the crime was taking place.
