U.S. mass killer, cult leader Charles Manson dies at 83

FILE PHOTO - Charles Manson talks during an interview August 25, 1989. REUTERS/File Photo

(Reuters) - Charles Manson, the wild-eyed cult leader who orchestrated a string of gruesome killings in Southern California by his "family" of young followers, shattering the peace-and-love ethos of the late 1960s, died on Sunday, prison officials said. He was 83.

Manson died of natural causes Sunday evening at a Kern County hospital, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said in a statement. It gave no further details of the circumstances surrounding his death.