Today in History - May 21: 'Twinkie defence' gets killer off cold-blooded murder charges

Former San Francisco council member Dan White was acquitted of the murder of his colleague Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone on May 21, 1979.

White shot Milk and Moscone in their offices in cold blood.

White had resigned as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in November, citing his struggles to get by financially in the elected position.

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Four days later, he changed his mind and tried to reverse his resignation.

But the paperwork was binding, and Moscone refused to reappoint him to the position, at the behest of Milk.

Milk was the first openly gay man elected to major political office anywhere in the US.

White slipped through a window of City Hall to avoid a metal detector, then walked into Moscone's office and killed him.

As he ran down a hall, fellow supervisor Dianne Feinstein called out to talk to him, unaware of what he had just done.

"I have something to do first," White told her.

He then went into Milk's office and asked to speak with him in private.

With the doors closed, White shot White five times.

Feinstein would later find Milk's body.

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White's lawyers successfully argued a chemical imbalance in his brain led to the killings, as illustrated by his increased intake of junk food.

The notorious "Twinkie defence" led to his acquittal of murder and conviction of voluntary manslaughter.

Contrary to popular belief, his lawyers did not argue that his consumption of Twinkies, a popular sweet treat, led to the killing.

He spent just five years in prison before getting parole.

"Dan White has gotten away with murder. It's as simple as that," another supervisor said.

The night of White's conviction, protesters set fire to police cars.

"Make sure you put in the paper that I ate too many Twinkies," one arsonist told a reporter.

Police retaliated by beating gay men indiscriminately across the city.

A Navy vessel was named after Harvey Milk, a Navy veteran, in 2021.

Last year, the Trump administration ordered the ship be renamed.

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For more from our Today in History archive, click here

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