SAN DIEGO, Feb. 10 (UPI) — Sirhan Sirhan, convicted of murder in the 1968 shooting death of Robert F. Kennedy, will seek parole for the 14th time Wednesday in San Diego.
Kennedy was shot in Los Angeles’ Ambassador Hotel at a victory rally on June 5, 1968, the night he won the California Democratic Party primary election. He was 42. Five others were wounded.
Sirhan, 71, was sentenced to death but had his sentence commuted to life in prison after California abolished capital punishment. After his most recent parole hearing, in 2011, parole commissioners said Sirhan had not shown adequate remorse or understanding of his crime. Sirhan has said he has no recollection of shooting Kennedy.
Among those expected at the hearing Wednesday is Paul Schrade, 91, a former union leader who was with Kennedy the night of the assassination, and who was also shot. It is Schrade’s contention that a second gunman was present. Sirhan “couldn’t shoot Robert Kennedy and didn’t, he was never in the position to do this,” he told KGTV San Diego this week.
“There’s strong evidence of a second gunman. They (investigators) could not match the Kennedy bullet. He got hit in the back of the neck, it was the only whole bullet, it did not match Sirhan’s gun. He never shot Robert Kennedy,” he said.
Schrade said he has spent 40 years researching the shootings, and suspects a government cover-up, adding, “Massive destruction of evidence, right after the trial.”
