Robert Kennedy Jr. has lengthy maintained that Sirhan Sirhan, who has spent almost 60 years in jail for killing his father, is harmless of the crime — and {that a} second gunman was concerned within the assassination of Sen. Robert Kennedy in 1968.
That perception has fueled division between him and nearly all of his siblings in addition to their mom, Ethel, when she was alive. And it’s certain to warmth up once more as Sirhan, 81, might be eligible for parole once more subsequent yr.
“I imagine Cesar killed my father,” Kennedy Jr. wrote in a 2021 San Francisco Chronicle op-ed of safety guard Thane Eugene Cesar, who died in 2019 and was by no means charged. “Sirhan,” Kennedy Jr. wrote, “just isn’t my father’s killer.”
It was revealed Wednesday that Kennedy Jr., the present US Well being and Human Companies Secretary, despatched a letter to then US Lawyer Basic Eric Holder in 2012 requesting a brand new investigation into his father’s demise and the two-gunman concept. The letter to Holder, who served underneath Barack Obama, got here to mild in paperwork on the assassination declassified by the Trump administration.
When Kennedy Jr., 71, really helpful to the California Board of Parole Hearings that Sirhan be given parole in 2021 — the sixteenth time he confronted the board — six of his siblings, led by their mom, Ethel, slammed the transfer.
“Our household and our nation suffered an unspeakable loss because of the inhumanity of 1 man,” stated Ethel in a Sept. 7, 2021, submit on her daughter Kerry Kennedy’s X account — including: “He shouldn’t have the chance to terrorize once more.”
Ethel handed away Oct. 10, 2024, at age 96.
Her youngsters Joe, Courtney, Kerry, Chris, Max and Rory have opposed Sirhan’s parole. Son Douglas, like Kennedy Jr., is in favor.
Daughter Kathleen Kennedy Townsend informed the Washington Publish in 2018 that Kennedy Jr. “makes a compelling case” about Sirhan not performing alone, however has not commented on the matter since.
Kennedy Jr.’s 2012 letter to Holder included a three-page “Abstract of Proof for the New Investigation” compiled by Paul Schrade. A former labor chief and confidant of RFK, Schrade was amongst 5 individuals wounded within the fusillade of bullets that resulted in Kennedy’s demise at Los Angeles’s Ambassador Resort following his Democratic presidential main victory in California.
Schrade, who was shot within the head by Sirhan in the course of the melee, spent years attempting to show his concept that there have been two gunmen concerned within the assassination.
“Paul and his workforce of nationally distinguished attorneys together with former US Lawyer Rob Bonner strongly imagine this new proof is conclusive and requires a brand new investigation,” Kennedy Jr. wrote in his letter to Holder. “I agree and assist his request for a brand new investigation.”
The request was primarily based on “new forensic exams on a journalist’s audiotape recorded throughout this crime and located within the FBI’s information,” stated Schrade in his personal letter to Holder dated July 29, 2012.
An acoustics knowledgeable who examined the recording maintained that 13 photographs had been fired. Sirhan fired all eight photographs from his .22 caliber Ivar Johnson revolver and didn’t reload, stated Schrade in his letter to Holder.
Schrade, who died in 2022 at age 97, additionally pointed to the post-mortem report that confirmed that RFK was shot from behind. Eyewitnesses stated that Sirhan had stood in entrance of the candidate.
“I’ve been a robust advocate for the discharge of Mr. Sirhan B. Sirhan since I realized of proof that was not introduced to the court docket throughout his trial,” stated Kennedy Jr. in an August 27, 2021, letter to the Board of Parole Hearings. “After years of cautious investigation, I arrived on the conviction that the story of my father’s homicide was not as reduce and dried as portrayed at trial.
“Whereas Sirhan clearly fired photographs at my father, overwhelming proof means that these weren’t the photographs that took his life.”
Cesar, employed as a safety guard for the evening “was within the actual place to fireside the photographs as described within the post-mortem. Three witnesses noticed him draw his gun — which he later admitted — and one stated she noticed him fireplace it,” Kennedy Jr. wrote in 2021. “The Los Angeles police by no means bothered to look at the gun. Cesar, who was moonlighting that evening from his high-security clearance job on the Lockheed plant, acknowledged a loathing for the Kennedys and their race-mixing sympathizers.”
Sirhan has persistently maintained that he doesn’t recall the occasions that came about on the day of the assassination.
Different not too long ago launched information on the assassination launched by director of nationwide intelligence Tulsi Gabbard revealed quite a few menacing handwritten notes in Sirhan’s bed room within the Pasadena, Calif., dwelling he shared along with his mom and three siblings.
“My dedication to take away RFK is turning into extra the extra of an unshakeable obsession,” learn one of many scribbled notes included within the file.
When Sirhan was up for parole in 2021, the Kennedy household combat over his impending launch led to at least one facet “double-crossing” the opposite, insider sources informed The Publish on the time.
The relations towards Sirhan’s launch had promised that they’d not make a press release to the parole board, sources informed The Publish.
“The evening earlier than the listening to I acquired a letter from the parole board by way of the LAPD,” Sirhan’s lawyer Angela Berry informed The Publish in 2021. “It learn, ‘On behalf of the Kennedy household, we oppose the discharge of Sirhan.’ [Kennedy Jr.] had been staying out of it particularly on the belief that his household was going to remain out of it … I acquired ahold of him immediately letting him know what occurred.”
In response, Kennedy Jr. stayed up late writing a letter in favor of Sirhan’s launch that hardly made it into the listening to, sources stated.
“The parole listening to began at 8:30 a.m. and Robert’s letter streamed in at 10:30 a.m.,” Berry stated. “It learn partially, ‘I’ve to guarantee you that the letter you bought just isn’t on behalf of the entire Kennedy household.’ That was the very very last thing the listening to officer learn into the file.”
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