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Interviews
An Interview with
Prof. Philip Melanson
©Paul
Nellen, Hamburg Germany, 1994
The interview with Prof. Melanson
was done in the rooms of the RFK Assassination Archive, University of
Massachusetts, Dartmouth: N. Dartmouth, MA 02747-2300, USA. Phone:
+1-508-999-8686.
"I'm a professor of Political
Science here at the University of Massachusetts/Dartmouth. I've
written 5 books on American political assassinations including the RFK
case. I'm the chair of the committee that oversees the archives here.
We are the largest collection in the world and the most complete and
the richest and have all the official files here as well as private
papers and audio tapes and video tapes. It is a marvellous resource
for students, for the public and for interested researchers and
journalists like yourself. We get a lot of inquiries and a lot of use.
This is the only place where all the material is together and is
publicly accessible and complete. There are collections on other
places, but it deserves a central facility for this case."
How much does the university support
the archive?
"We have indirect support by the
university, in that Helen Koss, who is our archivist, is employed by
the university. It does a lot of work on this collection. Mostly our
funding comes from private university sources, the library associates
group gives us money to operate, the alumni association gives us
money, the university research committee, so we don't have really a
specific budget for the RFK collection. We do it on our own."
Can you show us something from the
archive?
"We have the 50,000 page LA Police
file, which wasn't released til 1988. We have 32,000 pages of FBI
documents. That wouldn't make it very accessible, but we have indices
that list the names of witnesses and subject matter, so that anyone
can access both the LAPD and FBI files in terms of what they
interested in. Then we have an index to the hundreds and hundreds of
hours of tape recordings that we have, which includes documentaries,
witnesses interviews, the original investigative interviews, some of
these which were taped by the LAPD. We also have several hundred hours
of videotape. And these indices make it all accessible for the public.
We have a huge collection of photographs. You can see here not only
police photos, but FBI photos. This is a photo of the actual
struggling for Sirhan's gun just after the shooting. These are photos
of the crime scene, we have several hundred of them.
Who took these photos?
"The FBI and the LAPD. What we're
missing, what history and the rest of us are missing is, that there is
no photograph of the actual shooting as it is taking place. There is
no still photo, there is no film. But there may have been such photos.
But if they were, they were lost or destroyed."
Why would they have been destroyed?
"It's possible that they're
destroyed. There is a young man who was taking pictures during the
shooting, by his account and by other witnesses. His film was returned
with pictures before the shooting and after the shooting. But the
authorities don't know what happened to the pictures that might have
been of the shooting. I can only say, historically, that if the
authorities had a real picture of the real shooting, they should have
been joyous to release it because it would have proved their point.
If, on the other hand, they have a picture showing that Sirhan was not
where they said he was, or there was other sinister looking people,
they may well have suppressed that evidence."
"These are the raw files that the
index will lead researchers to. In these boxes are the actual
documents from LAPD and from the FBI. Many of them are censored,
sometimes foolishly, sometimes a lot of material is missing. We had
the luxury of receiving some FBI documents that were placed in
archives in California that were not censored. The ones that we
received here was censored. So, for 300 pages we had the fun of
getting an insight into what is it the FBI did not want us to see. It
wasn't anything earthshaking, but it was very interesting in terms of
the secrecy of US Government. And we have a trial transcript, which is
a very important resource. It's not secret but it's 10,000 pages, and
you can't access it in California conveniently. It's sort of locked
up. So we have that here which is very important for
researchers."
Was the release of these documents
voluntary?
"In 1984, when we opened this
archive, we opened with a private collection from California. And at
that point, every single piece of paper was officially locked up in
the case. Between 1984 and 1988, it took energetic efforts by citizens
and the help of the archive partitioning to get the FBI files, the DA
files and the LAPD files released. And I would say: the FBI did not
resist because the law made them disclose the files. What they
resisted was doing it for free. They tried to make us pay huge amounts
by not granting us a waiver, even though we're a public institution.
We had to get political intervention from Congressmen. We got that
then. The LAPD, though, severely resisted. They lobbied, they said it
would violate privacy, national security, they tried to sabotage our
appearance in LA before the commissions that would do the releasing.
So it was a very tough fight and took four years to accomplish. But
now, the only things that we don't have are not the things that are
were withheld, but the things which have been taken from the files or
destroyed while they were in secret for 20 years. We have everything
that there is to get, but still there is a lot missing."
Do you have anything else here?
"This is a collection of books on
the assassinations. Unlike the JFK case (there are six hundred or more
books written on that subject) this has a very small literature. I
don't know the exact count, but I would say, even given the lowest
circulation books, it is probably not more than fifty, which is rather
interesting. And I would also say, that of those fifty, five are
worthwhile and forty-five are so inaccurate or sensational or poorly
done, they're not worthwhile. So, this is a case where, unlike the JFK
case, the average reader, the interested person has difficulty finding
a good treatment of the case in print. We have all of the books here.
And here the people can compare what the authors say to what the
officials said in the record."
Why is there more interest in the
JFK assassination?
"Well, there are several reasons
for that. One is that RFK was not a President, only a presidential
candidate. But I think, the major thing is that Oswald was seen as a
mystery character. There were questions about where the shots came
from. In this case, it seemed so simple with that smoking gun and a
man was arrested and he confessed and there was a trial. And the
officials were able to use that as propaganda, to say the only people
who think there is a conspiracy are those nuts because...look how
simple the case is! And I think, the public, absent of the real data
which was locked up for twenty years, came to believe that and rightly
so. It was a major propaganda effort by the officials to say this is a
simple case and we've solved it. Today, one of the problems is that
people think that where had these questions been if they weren't
raised originally? They don't realise that we've faced twenty years of
secrecy and that some of the issues are now coming out. Public
awareness of the problems in this case is frankly very, very low
compared to the JFK case."
Why doesn't anyone argue for the
conspiracy theory?
"It's partly a difficulty in
bringing this to public attention. I've written a book, several other
people have written books. But in President Kennedy's case, you've had
thirty years of books, documentaries, re-investigations. One of the
things in this case is that no one outside the original investigation
force; the LAPD and FBI; no one beyond LA, beyond the officials who
give us the original version, has ever looked at this case: not the US
Congress, not the FBI, no one has re-investigated. So I think the
public think maybe there is nothing to be re-investigated if the
Government or somebody hasn't re-investigated. And in fact, that's not
the case. So, there is a lack of interest, even today. One of the
problems is as follows, I think: Oswald died before he could be
brought to trial, and he may have had a different version of the
events and he didn't it present to us. James Earl Ray never got a
trial, and now he's claiming he is innocent in the assassination of
Dr. Martin Luther King and he wants a new trial. Sirhan Sirhan is
sitting in jail, saying 'I did it, I just want to be paroled'. I
think, the public thinks: if the man who was sentenced says that he
did it, why do these other people, myself included, allege to know
more about the events that occurred? He would know. There are complex
reasons for that, that we might go into. But Sirhan ironically himself
is one of the biggest obstacles to public consciousness about the
issues of this case."
Would you care to share a conspiracy
theory?
"My theory about Sirhan's
involvement is that he was definitely firing a gun and therefore
should have been convicted of some kind of attempted murder if in fact
they couldn't prove diminished responsibility. But I see Sirhan
basically as a pawn in a conspiracy. My view is that while he was
there shooting he didn't mastermind a plot to kill RFK. He was not a
conscious participant with others where he was recruited into a plot.
I see him as someone who is/was manipulated through his mind largely,
through hypnosis, to shoot, firing a gun, to be a distraction for
others who assassinated RFK. Unfortunately, Sirhan doesn't know enough
about that to be able to provide leads or show leads on it for us and
it is something that people other than Sirhan will have to try to
figure out."
Who are your colleagues here?
"Helen Koss, a part time student
helper. She's currently writing a book, 'The trial of Sirhan Sirhan'."
How much material do you have here?
"Two hundred tapes, one hundred
books, five hundred plus photos."
When did you start to doubt the
official version?
"I started thinking differently
about this case back in 1976 as a reviewer for a magazine. I was sent
a book by William Turner and John Christian, called 'The Assassination
of RFK'. I read it and it was mind boggling and I thought: if this is
true, if these authors are correct, this case is as controversial, it
has as many questions as President Kennedy's assassination. But I
didn't really know if the authors were telling the truth, I hadn't
researched it. Then I begun doing research in the case in about 1982
or 1984 when I was recruited by the late Greg Stone, who was an aid to
Congressman Allan Lowenstein. And Stone and Lowenstein along with Paul
Schrade, a shooting victim in the assassination and friend of Senator
Kennedy, they had all been pursuing these issues and they recruited me
into the case. And that's when we began doing interviews and trying to
get the documents released. But it was that one book that brought it
to my attention. If I as a sceptical political scientist who knew
there were controversies in the president's shooting, if it took me 8
years to even realise that there were controversies in the RFK case;
and when I read a book I can fully understand how there are people,
the majority of the public perhaps, who haven't come to that
realisation yet."
What was Robert Kennedy's importance
then and now?
"We have to remember: he was the
most effective spokesperson against the Vietnam War. He had run a
presidential campaign that opposed the US war policies, and while
there were others with those views, he was the only one who had a
chance of being elected president. He was also the only candidate that
youth and minorities and united farmworkers and a whole bunch of folks
felt he was really sincerely for their causes and would help them if
elected. He had a constituency that other politicians just didn't
share. Also as we may all know he was perhaps the last charismatic
presidential candidate, the most charismatic from that year to the
present. My view is that RFK would have been elected President if he
had not been assassinated. We must recall that Hubert Humphrey, who
got the nomination when Kennedy was shot, Humphrey almost beat Richard
Nixon to the White House. It was a very close election; no doubt in my
mind that had RFK been the nominee of the party, he was so much more
effective than Humphrey, he would have been President. The importance
of his issues during the campaign was crucial. The fact that we were
deprived of a Kennedy presidency, whether you like or dislike it, is
of momentous consequence historically. And at that time he was also an
irreplaceable political commodity to particular enemies, if we look at
the negative side. If you were organised crime in the US and you saw
RFK headed back to Washington, you must have thought at that point
that you had to do something because it would be intolerable. Because
the Kennedy administration under John and Robert had attacked
organised crime like no other administration. There were certain
enemies that they had energised when President Kennedy was there. And
I think his tough stands at the time of his assassination were unique
too."
Could you explain this point about
organised crime?
"Specifically organised crime was
a major enemy. They had talked about assassinating President Kennedy
and they talked about assassinating RFK when he was Attorney General
because of the vigorous war on crime that the Kennedy administration
pursued. With RFK possibly coming back to the White House, organised
crime, which had always been his enemy, would be very high up in the
list of suspects. RFK was opposing the Vietnam War very vigorously. We
have the whole Oliver Stone thesis about the military-industrial
complex assassinating President Kennedy. Without saying if it's true
or not, the fact is that it was RFK who had the vigorous opposition to
the war and would have made enemies of those who wanted to continue
the present policies, whether they were in the Pentagon or in the
intelligence community. Also RFK had made very dangerous enemies in
the CIA when he was in the White House as his brother's advisor. The
Kennedy brothers shook up the CIA severely after the Bay of Pigs, they
fired some of it's legendary heroes, and RFK had control of the CIA to
a certain extent. So he had made a lot of enemies there as well. And
further down the list: we have the powerful ranchers in the West for
whom Kennedy's support of the United Farmworkers was intolerable.
Kennedy's stand on civil rights had energised those hate groups such
as the KKK and the American Nazi Party. All of his stands brought him
enemies, enemies of the kind that contains, within their groups,
people who wouldn't hesitate to kill or to use violence. I believe
that it was without knowing which of those groups, I don't know which
of those groups, the LAPD doesn't know, the FBI does not know and
history does not know, but it may have been an amalgamation. If we
know that the CIA and organised crime co-operated to try to
assassinate Fidel Castro, it is certainly thinkable that elements of
one or more of these groups co-operated to assassinate RFK. But the
enemies were very real and very formidable."
And RFK's importance today?
"RFK's importance nowadays is that
he left a political legacy of taking on very difficult issues,
championing for those who do not have power in this political system.
And while there are a lot of people like President Clinton who use the
Kennedy legacy or refer to it, I don't see anybody of presidential
calibre who embodies the Kennedy legacy. I don't see someone running
for President in the US who says, 'My constituency is disadvantaged
groups, youth, I'm opposing military build-up...'. We talk about
percentage now. RFK was in a very different category. So his legacy is
there and it is drawn upon. But I don't see it being pursued actively
by anybody of presidential stature. There is not a RFK in the issues
sense or even in the charisma sense in the American political system
today nor has there been since his assassination."
What evidence is there for a
conspiracy?
"There are several categories of
evidence which suggest to me that there was a second gun. First of
all, and most compellingly I think, all of Sirhans bullets were
accounted for. He had eight shots to fire, seven bullets were removed
from the bodies of the shooting victims, there were five people shot
as well as Senator Kennedy, that makes six. Seven bullets were
recovered from their bodies, and one bullet, according to the
officials, was lost in the ceiling. If there were any bullets
recovered from the crime scene, there would be too many bullets for
Sirhans gun. And we have overwhelming evidence, I think, that there
were other bullets there. FBI agent William Bailey has stated that he
saw what would be too many bullets, lodged in a doorframe. We have
photographs identifying bullets in a doorframe. We have reporters and
witnesses and even police officers who said, 'yes, there were bullets
in that doorframe. So there are too many bullets for Sirhan's
gun."
"Secondly, the best evidence, in
my mind, shows that Sirhan Sirhan's bullets could not have killed RFK.
Sirhan Sirhan was in front, he fired from one to six feet away,
depending on your perspective, and RFK was hit from behind, at a
sharply upward angle, at point-blank range. Sirhan Sirhan was in the
wrong place. There were more bullets than could have been fired by his
gun. And the joke is that we have several solid witnesses who saw
another gun. Three witnesses, one more since my book, alleged that a
man in a suit fired a gun. They are not saying that this man killed
Kennedy. They are simply saying: we saw during the shooting a man in a
suit firing a gun. Also there was a witness who saw a man in suit draw
a gun. Also there has always been witness Don Schulman who said that a
security guard drew and fired a gun. So we have other guns there,
Sirhan Sirhan in the wrong place and more bullets than he could fire.
The thing that keeps us from believing this, I think, is that the
authorities took such great pains to cover it all up. For example, the
police removed what in those photos look like extra bullets, too many
bullets for Sirhan Sirhan's gun. They removed ceiling tiles, they
removed the doorframe and destroyed the material. And that material,
according to the witnesses I have talked to, did contain these extra
bullets. Secondly, they manipulated the witnesses. They told two of
the witnesses who saw another gun that it was a secret service man,
implying that he was RFK's protection. The witnesses were ignorant of
the fact that there was no secret service protection for RFK. With the
other witnesses, they simply didn't take their statements that there
was another gun. So they were able to cloud this issue. And I think,
had this issue been reinvestigated a couple of years after the
original assassination, the proof of a second gun would have been easy
to come by. Now it's much more difficult with the passage of time and
the destruction of evidence. But we do have these photos of extra
bullets, and we still have witnesses who give that account."
Will the case be reopened?
"Opportunities to reopen the case
are rather limited. We have currently before the LA Grand Jury a
petition signed by 50 distinguished people (e.g. Oliver Stone, Arthur
Schlesinger). What this petition asks for is not for a full fledged
re-investigation, rather we've asked the Grand Jury to hold the LAPD
accountable for their destruction of evidence or their brow beating of
witnesses, for their failure to pursue leads. So it's a 'law-and-order
law enforcement, hold the agency accountable' kind of petition. We
hope if they do that and prove that the LAPD didn't solve the case
that then other authorities hopefully beyond LA will see that the case
needs to be reopened. Whether that's happen or not? As a political
scientist, I think is doubtful at best. Because even with all of the
awareness of President Kennedy's assassination that Oliver Stone's
film 'JFK' generated, with the public's demand for the release of the
documents, even that case is currently not scheduled for
reinvestigation. And the RFK case is not nearly as controversial for
the public. So the opportunity exists, the evidence exists, we may
make some progress with this petition to the Grand Jury. But I do not
envision a full scale investigation in my political future that I can
foresee."
What was the impact of Bill Klaber's
radio program and your book?
"The result of that was that even
TIME magazine, which has been traditionally very hostile to conspiracy
theories or to reopening the case, talked about Klaber's documentary
and about the case. So it generated some newspaper attention which was
visible. It also paved the way for serious discussions about the case.
The fact that Bill and myself are currently doing a book that will
address the legal process in the trial is a result of his documentary
and the interest of this documentary. I think the indirect effect is
probably greater, in that I would bet that seven to nine-tenths of the
audience that listened to that documentary were never aware that there
was controversy and cover-up in the RFK case. And that has to have an
impact. I believe these people may not be writing to their
congressman, they may not be demanding things right now, but I think
the difference is that, when we talk about the issues of the RFK case,
the public will be more receptive and understand that those issues are
real because of Klaber's documentary. My book had a similar obvious
and hidden impact. I've gotten a lot of mail from people asking what
they can do. In the back of the book is a list of people you can write
to. The second thing that both the Klaber documentary and my book have
done is to encourage responsible witnesses to come forward. This is
interesting in that any time there is a public discussion, you get
irresponsible calls from people saying, 'I know who killed RFK, it was
the Martians or it was my brother'. It is so interesting that both my
book and Klaber's documentary brought forth people with important
stories to tell who did not know that there was a controversy, who did
not know that their story was important or that they had seen anything
until they read the book or until they heard that documentary."
Do you believe the mass media is
part of the cover-up?
"The story of the US mainstream
media in assassination cases is not that they were involved in some
huge conspiracy. But they seem to have a basic tendency which makes it
impossible for them to recognise the truth. Firstly: they regularly
get their information from official sources. That was certainly the
case during the Sixties, but it is still a problem. Secondly: a joke
from the JFK case: 'Polls show that seventy-five to ninety percent of
Americans believe that JFK was assassinated by a conspiracy. That's
the good news. The bad news, the other fifteen percent work for the
FBI, CBS News, NY Times and the Justice Dept. I think that's very
true. They call us 'conspiracy theorists', I call them 'the lone
assassin theorists'. They jumped to the conclusion that there was no
outside involvement, they jumped to the conclusion that we only have
lone nuts in US, that it's only in Europe, in Central and South
America where they have conspiracies and that's their ideological
position and they stick to it. I can show you the newspaper clippings,
where the LA Times and CBS News were giving opinions when it was too
soon to know if Sirhan was guilty and had acted alone. That doesn't
mean they're part of a conspiracy, or allowing the bad guys to get
away, they are just simply too stuck in their ways. OF course, they
can't just change overnight, because if they listened to Klaber's
documentary or read my book they would have to ask themselves, 'Where
were we in 1968, 1975, 1980, what did we report back then?'. And the
answer would be, 'You were wrong, you swallowed the government
propaganda and failed in your duty'. That would be intolerable for the
highly paid, renowned journalists. That is the problem. It is greater
in the RFK case because public awareness that there were controversies
and presumably a conspiracy is far less developed. It is therefore far
easier for the media to dismiss the truth by simply maintaining that
there is no public interest."
Was Dr. William Joseph Bryan, Jr.
really Sirhan's manipulator? What evidence is there?
"The evidence is varied. There are
a couple of points to make, though. Firstly I should mention something
which has relevance to this case, namely the US Government's research
into mind control, hypnosis and LSD, which was completely contrary to
the Constitution, and therefore illegal, and took place during the
Sixties and Seventies. I believe that the Sirhan case was an off-shoot
from that. The Government was researching ways of programming spies,
assassins and saboteurs. A few members of this Government programme,
such as Dr. Bryan, got out of control. Bryan's relationship to Sirhan
came out because he was such a "pompous ass". He told
several colleagues, and other people, that he had hypnotised Sirhan.
That's hardly concrete evidence, but it's all we have; it would be
very doubtful that an official file exists. Since publication of my
book, I've met two of Bryan's former colleagues, whom I know now to
have been much more vital to the Government's mind control research
than Dr. Bryan. Bryan was simply the biggest show-off out of all of
them. I can't reveal the names of these two doctors at this time, but
they worked closely with Bryan on these things and are still alive. I
have a great deal of evidence which I would be happy to give to the
authorities if they wish to have it. Bryan and these two doctors
worked on the same things in the CIA's mind control research. Bryan is
dead, but the other two are still alive. I would really like to see
them questioned about this most bizarre piece of the puzzle. These
were people, who, like Sirhan, were in the right place at the right
time, as Southern California was a hotbed of mind control research.
Bryan and his colleagues worked in clinics there. Sirhan was looking
for help at that time to combat a mysterious ailment. He readily
agreed to be hypnotised. He was a perfect subject, because he was very
easy to influence. After the assassination, when the authorities
hypnotised him on many occasions, attempting to determine his mental
state, they found that he was easy to hypnotise, and so on. That's
very circumstantial, and the public often finds it difficult to
understand. I would also prefer to be discussing the number of bullets
in Sirhan's gun than discussing the possibility of "Manchurian
Candidates". There's less of a leap into the realm of the mind.
But I seriously believe that Sirhan's manipulation through hypnosis
played a really important role in this case."
Why did Sirhan Sirhan need
psychiatric help?
"A year or so before the
assassination, Sirhan had a serious fall from a horse and injured
himself. It destroyed his dreams of becoming a jockey. His whole
character changed. He became very solemn, withdrawn. Strangely enough,
he was described as "cured". Despite this he went from
doctor to doctor, complaining of strange symptoms and more. My theory
is, that after seeing ten or so doctors, and trying some self-hypnosis
to relieve the pain, he was in the perfect position to go to a certain
clinic, which may have been recommended to him, where he landed in the
hands of Dr. Bryan and possibly his colleagues. There's no record of
Sirhan ever visiting a psychiatrist, but he was bound to have done so,
given his interest in hypnosis and his desire to find some way of
relieving the pain he suffered from."
Have you ever received threatening
phone calls or been watched?
"There haven't been any
threatening calls yet. But some things have happened in LA which were
linked to the group I work with."
Which group is that?
"Paul Schrade, Floyd Nelson of the
RFK Assassination Truth Committee, and others.
We were definitely and without doubt
watched. I'm not sure how sinister the purpose was but it is certain
that the LAPD can't stand critics. And there we were, making their
lives difficult and criticising them. We know now, that the former
Chief of Police Daryl Gates set up a secret team who followed people
they suspected, whether that person was Jane Fonda, the Mayor or
people from the Police Commission. Here's a couple of examples:
Floyd's apartment was in a very run
down area in North Hollywood. The police were never there when they
were needed. There were shootings, drugs were being dealt on the
street corner, but there was no sign of the police. Once when I
arrived on RFK business, suddenly there, right in front of the
building was a police car! And I don't mean an undercover car - a
totally normal police car! It was as if they wanted to say, 'Hey,
we're watching you!'
My favourite example is: Once when I
was in LA to take part in the hearings of the police commission
concerning the release of the files, there was a message for me at my
hotel which said that I should contact Commander Matthew Hunt at LAPD.
When I spoke to him, he told me I could not appear before the
commission the next day, because so and so. I shouldn't even try.
However, what was far more interesting for me was, how had he got hold
of my address? I hadn't informed anyone where I was staying and he
hadn't asked any of my colleagues. I think it was LAPD's way to say:
'We know who you are and where you are and we're watching
you...'"
An Interview with
Larry Teeter, Attornet for Sirhan
©Paul
Nellen, Hamburg, Germany 1994
Teeter is playing some Bach on the
piano
"My most enjoyable time was when I
went to Muehlhausen in East-Germany and had a chance to play an organ
in Bach's church where he had his second job... I have been to all of
the cities he worked in. It's a hobby of mine."
"I think it's very interesting the
way the history of his life is not adequately understood. It seems to
me that - I recall reading someone who said that Bach's life was just
his music. But Bach's life was a tremendous struggle against authority
all of his life. And this it seems to me is not given wide
circulation. The reason for that is because it's embarrassing to the
existing class system that this is this kind of life he had. Even at
the beginning for his first job in Arnstadt he was in a struggle with
his employers over performance of duties which were not specified in
his contract. Or in Weimar, he was thrown to jail for having had the
nerve to ask for an increase in salary and for permission to go into
another city to work."
"Bach was terribly abused. He
wrote the "Musical Offering" (Das Musikalische Opfer) and
never received either payment or even an acknowledgement from
Frederick The Great. In fact, when I went to Potsdam, I was told by
the museum's tour guide at the big palace on the hill (Schloss
Sanssouci), that Bach was never allowed to visit that palace because
he was just a composer writing in the German style. So Frederick came
down the hill to the smaller palace, which was destroyed during the
war. He wasn't good enough. And as I just said, he was never paid or
even thanked for his work. And at the end, he died under very
difficult circumstances. What seems to have happened is that, as his
replacement was picked while he was still alive, he had to endure
humiliation, and there were fights up till the end. And then when he
died, his inventory of musical instruments did not even include a
harpsichord, which indicates that he wasn't really well-off. Much of
his music was sold by Carl-Philip Emanuel, so that Anna Magdalena
could survive. This includes a bronze plate of "Die Kunst der
Fuge" - gone forever. Even though it was in Bach's own hand, sold
for the value of the copper itself, not for the music, but just for
the value of the copper itself. I've read that when Bach died, his
family was split up, his children were sent to other people in Bach's
extended family. And Anna-Magdalena ultimately was so poor that she
was left as a public charity case. So, this is a tremendous injustice
and yet it gets suppressed, and nobody knows about it today because
for this to be acknowledged, that certainly the greatest musician of
all time and in my opinion the greatest mind of all time, for this to
happen to him is a tremendous indictment of the way society is
organised. I think that the way we look at history is very important
because it tells us how we are going to look at the present - which is
why I'm Sirhan's lawyer."
"In this particular case, my goal
would be a new trial for Sirhan. On the basis of the fact that his
constitutional rights were grievously violated during the course of
his trial. The prosecution and the police suppressed and destroyed
evidence to an extent that is really most remarkable. There is strong
indication that false evidence was actually presented against Sirhan
Sirhan in - at his trial. And furthermore, his attorneys were severely
ineffective. However, it may be that that ineffectiveness was promoted
or instigated by the prosecution. There are a number of voices to
approach that. But overall, I'm convinced that his trial was grossly
inconsistent with basic requirements of fairness. And the evidence
really points to his innocence. I can say with reasonable confidence
that Sirhan is not the person who shot RFK. But the official story is
that he is. You see the difference between these official stories and
reality. But the official story is the one that gets believed and has
currency. It's the same with the stories about Mozart and Bach: there
is a official image; and you really have to probe quite carefully to
find out that the official image has been constructed to cover up a
reality that's very embarrassing to the existing power structure.
That's the same thing with the Sirhan Sirhan matter."
"The evidence overwhelmingly shows
multiple assailants as having been responsible for the assassination
of RFK - which means a conspiracy. But the official story is that one
man acted alone. The evidence is totally inconsistent with the theory
that Sirhan Sirhan fired a gun from which a bullet came that struck
RFK. But the official story is that's all what happened. Really, those
are the two main points: the evidence shows a conspiracy and it shows
that Sirhan Sirhan was not the person who shot RFK. But you see, these
are very disturbing conclusions, because once these conclusions are
accepted, then the question is: well, what was the real motive of
these conspirators, who were they and how were they able to accomplish
a situation in which a person who did not commit the shooting would be
convicted of it? And the District Attorney's office and the LAPD with
combined forces do really cover up what happened - who were these
people?"
What evidence is there for a
conspiracy?
"Conspiracy is an unlawful
agreement between two or more people to accomplish an unlawful
objective. That's one definition. Proof of conspiracy consists, first
of all, of proof that the number of bullets fired in the pantry that
day exceeded the number of bullets that could have been fired by
Sirhan Sirhan's gun. There is overwhelming proof of more than eight
shots having been fired in the pantry. A number of bullet holes were
observed in various portions of the pantry. There is a famous
photograph of a bullet hole in a doorjamb, also ceiling panels appear
to have holes. Officers who first arrived on the scene put circles
around these."
"Bill
Klaber interviewed Bill Bailey, the first FBI agent to arrive on
the scene and who emphatically insisted that he saw a bullet in a
doorjamb, and who said that anybody who denies it either did not see
the bullet or has another agenda. Well, the LAPD quickly removed
ceiling panels and doorjambs. Did they preserve this evidence? Not
really. It was destroyed in the mid-Seventies under the rational that
there wasn't enough room in the LAPD's lockers to store the material!
Which is most extraordinary, because if any evidence deserves to be
preserved it would be that from a case with this historical
importance. But it was not even introduced at trial because Sirhan's
lawyers conceded that Sirhan was the person who shot RFK, which is
just amazing."
"(You asked...) how they
could have done it? Well, there is some indication that they were
misled. The best evidence that Sirhan Sirhan was not the shooter is
the autopsy report prepared by Dr. Thomas Noguchi. That report clearly
and categorically states that the shot which entered RFK's neck was
fired from a distance no more than two inches from the rear and toward
the left which means behind RFK's right ear. By every single account,
Sirhan Sirhan's gun was separated from RFK's body by several feet, not
one or two inches, several feet. Sirhan Sirhan was standing off in the
front toward the right, but several feet away. Not one witness, either
those at the trial or those interviewed or those came forward
subsequently, has been able or willing to state that Sirhan Sirhan was
standing sufficiently close to RFK to have afflicted the fatal wounds.
By itself, this eliminates Sirhan Sirhan as a suspect in the actual
shooting of RFK. It may not eliminate him as a suspect in the shooting
of some of the other people who were shot there. But as to RFK, the
bullet that hit RFK did not come from Sirhan Sirhan's gun, and the
autopsy report proves that. The trial transcript shows that the
autopsy report had not been made available to Sirhan's trial attorneys
until very shortly before or actually during the trial. This is an
extraordinary delay on the prosecution's part in turning over a
potentially exonerating piece of material evidence."
The judge didn't realise this?
"It's not entirely clear whether
Sirhan Sirhan's lawyers fully understood the meaning of it. No court
dealt with the consequence of this (expert) delay regarding fairness
towards Sirhan or doubted the competence of his lawyers. This is what
I'm trying to get at: the prosecution had, probably enough, created a
situation in which Sirhan's lawyers were purposefully prevented from
discussing whether Sirhan was RFK's murderer in the first place. The
defence was based purely on debating Sirhan's mental state, suggesting
he was drunk and didn't know what he was doing."
"In addition, two bullets were
found in RFK's body: one inside the head, really just bullet
fragments. An identifiable bullet was recovered from RFK's neck and is
described in the autopsy report:"
"A deformed bullet later
identified as .22 calibre is recovered at the terminus of the
woundpath just described at 8:40 a.m. on June 6, 1968. There is a
unilateral transverse deformation. The contour of which is indicated
on the accompanying diagram. The initials "TN" and the
number 41 are placed on the base of the bullet for future
identification."
"Now, this is a photo of the label
on the envelope in which this bullet was placed. This exhibit is
called PEOPLES 47, it was introduced to the trial as PEOPLES 47. You
can see here a diagram, and you notice that the diagram shows a
protrusion at the top of the bullet going off to one side, which
corresponds with Dr. Noguchi's reference, "There is a unilateral
transverse deformation." He also indicates that he put his
initials "TN" on the base of the bullet as well as the
number "41". For many years, this evidence was really
unavailable. It was viewed by a few people, but the general public
couldn't see it. After a huge campaign, the LAPD was forced under
public pressure to release what it purported to be it's files to the
State Archives in Sacramento. As was pointed out in Klaber's
documentary, the research was really astonishing in showing how much
was really missing. We recently had a chance to look at PEOPLES 47. We
photographed PEOPLES 47. The diagram is there, and there is a
reference to 5 grooves in the bullet. But when you look at the bullet
inside the envelope, what you see is a bullet that does not have, as
Dr. Noguchi called it, "a unilateral transverse deformation on
the top". You see an essentially undeformed bullet. And when this
bullet was examined by a firearms expert who was there at our request,
it was noted to have 6 grooves and not 5."
The bullet was changed?
"It does not seem that the bullet
which Dr. Noguchi withdrew from Kennedy's neck was the bullet that was
shown to the jury. But the bullet that was shown to the jury was the
bullet that the police expert DeWayne Wolfer said matched bullets
test-fired from what was called Sirhan's gun. You realise, of course,
the implication: what's being said here is that the evidence suggests
that the neck bullet was removed and another bullet was put in its
place. So the police expert could testify that there was a match
between the so-called - that is, substituted - neckbullet and a
test-fired bullet from Sirhan's gun. Which means - and this is the
main point - that the prosecution's evidence against Sirhan Sirhan was
a manufactured case, a made-up case, a phoney case for which Sirhan
Sirhan was framed."
Who was responsible for this fraud?
"The bullets were in the custody
of the police dept. It's much more difficult to identify who did this
than to determine that it was done. But for Sirhan Sirhan's legal
purposes the impact is clear. If we're right - and it seems that we
are because the bullet inside that envelope does not in any way
resemble this diagram or Dr. Noguchi's description of the bullet in
his autopsy report - if we're right that the bullet was switched than
the case against Sirhan was based upon manufactured evidence and the
real bullet was destroyed. We didn't find any bullet in Sacramento
which has this kind of deformation which resembles either the diagram
or the autopsy description of the neck bullet. So where is the bullet?
Was it discarded, was it destroyed? Destruction of evidence especially
this kind of critical evidence is a complete violation of basic
fairness and due-process. We will use this as the basis for our
attempt to convince the courts first of the State of California, and
if necessary the Federal Courts, to grant Sirhan Sirhan a new trial
under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment of the US
Constitution, which contains the requirement of equal protection of
the laws and to due process which means basic fairness in the conduct
of relations between citizens and the government."
"My first contact with this case
was seeing it on TV when it happened. I saw it, I assumed, "they
have somebody, he was seen at the time, a gun was taken from his
hands, it's an open-and-shut case, he did it", and I went back to
studying for my exams. If somebody had told me in 1968 that I would
one day be involved as a lawyer in what I had seen on TV, I would have
thought they were mad. You see, I had no idea at the time that I was
going to be a lawyer. When I had later read more and more about the
JFK and Martin Luther King assassinations, and this case, I became
more and more concerned about the existence of evidence pointing
toward multiple gunmen, a conspiracy, a police cover-up and the rest.
And recently when I was contacted and asked if I would agree to
represent Mr. Sirhan, I said "Yes".
"I have handled criminal cases for
a number of years and also cases involving the government. I have done
a number of lawsuits against federal intelligence agencies, e.g. the
FBI, the CIA, etc. But this is a very complex case. I'm not the only
lawyer working on this case, I have another who works with me."
Why is this case so important for
the American public?
"It's all a question of whether
the government is telling us the truth or not. It's just as much a
question of whether the political process is being manipulated by
powerful agencies within the government, who intend to rob the
American people of their right to choose a president. There is strong
evidence that JFK intended to withdraw troops from Vietnam if he was
re-elected to office in 1964. That would certainly have affected the
Pentagon and the CIA's pet project, which would have poured millions
into the coffers of the military industry complex. The evidence is not
only strong but definite, that RFK intended to withdraw troops from
Vietnam if he won the 1968 presidential election. It was certain that
he would win the nomination of presidential candidate for the
Democratic Party. The polls showed clearly that RFK was way ahead of
his opponent, Richard Nixon. If he had not been murdered, we would
have had President Robert F. Kennedy and the Vietnam war would have
immediately ended by peaceful means.... and the history of the USA
would have been quite different. JFK and his brother were much removed
from the politics of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, who dedicated
themselves to a policy of confrontation with the Soviet Union, the
Arms Race, the profits for the arms industry, etc. It is not
unthinkable that powerful forces in the USA felt threatened by the
thought of a President Robert F. Kennedy. That explains who could have
had a motive to kill him, in order to prevent his election. If RFK was
really the victim of a conspiracy, organised by the intelligence
agencies of the US government or by the power of the military industry
complex, then the democratic process was manipulated by dark forces
within the government; what do we have then? Do we have a democratic
society, or something different? Everyone knows that military coups
are nothing out of the ordinary in Latin-American countries. They
shouldn't happen in the USA. If it could happen here, we have a right
to know. We would have to accept that the government tries everything
in it's power to prevent us from knowing. There's a disturbing story
linked to that. Scott Enyart, then a teenager, was in the Ambassador
Hotel with fake press identification and a camera. He was in the
pantry during the RFK assassination, which he photographed. He
testified that he had seen several armed men who had fired during the
assassination and that he had photographed them. Shortly after the
assassination he was taken in by the LAPD. His film was confiscated.
He was released, but without the photographs taken in the pantry. Why
those? Would one not expect the LAPD to proudly show this proof at the
trial, showing Sirhan Sirhan firing a gun? One has to expect, though,
that the LAPD would withhold evidence from us, if the evidence
supported a theory that was different from their own..."
"Scott Enyard never got his film
back. When the LAPD were finally forced to release their files to the
public, not only was the majority of the lesser evidence missing, but
also Scott Enyard's film, among other things. That was never
publicised. LAPD ordered the stuff to be burned. For the LAPD to be
involved in the destruction of evidence in a case of this magnitude is
absolutely scandalous! Their usual excuse, that the photographs were
duplicates - this behaviour is inexcusable. The burning of these
photographs is the same as the destruction of material by those
involved in Watergate or the Iran-Contra affair, to prevent Congress
from getting hold of it. These photographs could have shown a series
of events far removed from what the LAPD would like the general public
to believe happened."
And Dr. Bryan?
"A question: is it possible to
program a murderer as is shown in the film "The Manchurian
Candidate"? The official answer is "No, you can't
hypnotically program someone to do something which the moral beliefs
of the concerned person would prevent." But some experts have
contradicted this. If the hypnotised person can be made to imagine
certain events, which would result in an action which, under normal
circumstances, the moral beliefs of the person would prevent, then
this person can be convinced to carry out an otherwise unthinkable
action. The person need only strongly believe that the circumstances
are justified. If someone, for example, is led to believe, through
hypnosis, that a person is sitting in front of them with a gun and is
going to shoot them, then it is theoretically possible to convince
them to shoot the other person... The evidence supporting this theory
is impressive. Phil Melanson wrote in his book ("The
RFK Assassination")... It appears that the CIA carried out
experiments in the Fifties, and also in the Sixties, to test the
possibility of hypnotically programming murders. And that it had
succeeded during the course of it's experiments in determining that
people could be hypnotically induced to perform reprehensible acts
without having any memory that they had committed these acts. If
that's the case then it would have been possible for someone to
program someone like Sirhan Sirhan or anybody else who is a suitable
subject to walk into a pantry, pull out a gun and begin pulling the
trigger. From the very beginning there had been powerful suggestions,
advanced from a number of quarters, that Sirhan may had been in some
sort of trance-like state. When driving to the police station, in
Sirhan Sirhan's company, Sirhan Sirhan was observed by Jesse Unruh, a
powerful Californian politician, who said that Sirhan Sirhan appeared
to be in some sort of a trance. Once in police custody, he was placed
under hypnosis later on by defense psychiatrist Dr. Diamond. And he
behaved in a way to cause Dr. Diamond to conclude, that Sirhan Sirhan
had been hypnotised."
Teeter brings out paper.
What is it?
"A page from Sirhan Sirhan's
diary, in which he or someone else has covered an entire page with
"R-F-K MUST DIE!" Some people have taken this to be
automatic writing, which shows that he was in a hypnotic trance. It
would be best if you asked him yourself..."
"Sirhan Sirhan testified that he
had no memory of the shooting. The last thing he remembered was
sitting at the bar and being asked by a pretty girl: "Pour me a
cup of coffee with plenty of milk and sugar!" And than he saw
this shiny coffee urn. The next thing he remembered was being hit by
someone and forced against the steam table in the pantry. Therefore,
he maintains that he has absolutely no memory of any occurrence
directly connected to the shooting. Some people have put forward the
theory that this is due to his hypnotised state; this caused whole
sections of his memory to be deleted and other memories to be put in,
in which nothing occurred, more or less. Proof that Sirhan Sirhan was
not self-hypnotised comes from the actual process of forgetting . The
experts I have asked all state that in self-hypnosis, one always
remembers at least the actual act of hypnotising oneself. Only when
one is hypnotised by another person to carry out a specific action
does the phenomena of memory gaps occur.
Everyone who I have asked has said that
a suitable person can be programmed to carry out a criminal act and
afterwards have no memory of the act, nor memory of the programmer nor
the actual programming. That is alarming. We would prefer to believe
that creating robotic murderers through hypnotic techniques is
impossible. But this is exactly what appears to have happened in
Sirhan Sirhan's case. The true culprits are those who hold this
knowledge and who have used it. There is no question that the CIA
possessed this information and were in a position to use it. At the
time they were mixed up in the Vietnam War, which they didn't want to
see ended. If you are searching for the guilty party, then the CIA
must be near the top of the list. My job is to get Sirhan a re-trial,
not to find out who is really guilty of the crime. I am trying to
prove that his rights were infringed. And they were, of that I am
convinced. I've mentioned some of the main reasons for that."
What's the main argument for
reopening the case?
"We found out in the mid-Eighties,
when the LAPD files were released after years of resistance, that an
enormous amount of evidence which could be used in a defence case had
been destroyed and had never been offered to the defence. I'm talking
(now) about the destroyed photographs, the evidence from the crime
scene itself, which was destroyed or altered. We discovered recently,
as I mentioned earlier, that it is highly probable that the bullet,
which Dr. Noguchi removed from RFK's body, was taken and replaced with
a bullet that matched Sirhan's alleged weapon, so that Sirhan could be
identified as the gunman. I would also say that the main points for a
re-trial are: the case against him was fabricated, incorrect and a
case in which Sirhan was wilfully framed. Evidence of Sirhan's
innocence, and also evidence that other armed people were at the scene
of the crime, was methodically and systematically withheld from the
defence - another newly uncovered piece of evidence which supports his
innocence. And finally the argument that Sirhan's right to fair trial
was ignored as much by the defence itself as by the methods with which
the police and the prosecution manipulated his lawyers and led them to
believe that his guilt was undisputed. The delay in releasing the
autopsy notes is a staggering event. That was never clarified. It
would be interesting to hear what excuses they'd make about
that."
When will the case be reopened?
"In order to get a re-trial, we
need to submit a petition to the Supreme Court. Due to the amount of
evidence, the court will have to rule that Sirhan's trial broke the
basic rights of fair trial. If we lose, we will submit a similar
petition to the Supreme Appeal Court of California and if necessary,
to the Supreme Court of California. Again, if we lose we will apply to
the US District Courts in LA. We hope, one way or another, to find one
or more judges who have the courage to start a new trial for Sirhan
Sirhan. Wenn das stattfindet, dann allerdings hat die Oeffentlichkeit
die Chance, im Gerichtssaal selbst von den Beweisen zu erfahren und
noch vieles mehr. We look forward to this day! This evidence has never
been published."
"The jury which sentenced Sirhan
Sirhan was never told what I am telling you here. None of it. Nothing.
The jury was never told that the bullet presented at the trail and
listed as entry "PEOPLES 47" - supposedly the back bullet -
was not the bullet with the characteristic bulge that originated from
RFK's back. The jury was never told that the police destroyed 1000
pictures in the LA County USC Medical Centre hospital's incinerator.
They were never told anything about the arrest of Scott Eynard as they
seized his film or about what he saw. The jury was never told that the
autopsy report showed that the shots which killed RFK were fired from
a distance of not more than 2 inches from his body (***). Neither were
they told that according to several witnesses, Sirhan Sirhan was a
fair distance from the Senator. Such significant evidence was never
heard by the jury. There were never any expert witnesses who supported
the theory that Sirhan Sirhan had been hypnotically programmed. The
only defence brought against Sirhan Sirhan that he had no control over
himself was because of alcohol abuse."
"This made his trail so unfair.
Many pieces of evidence were even withheld from the defence. Whatever
they had as evidence... We are concerned with the then manipulation of
witness statements by the LAPD. There are indications that witness
were beaten through the use of certain interview techniques, the
alteration of their statements or somehow through the production of
statements to suit the police. No doubt you have heard the Serrano
tape. It is remarkable how it was finished and eventually broke.
Writing about the case, Deputy Sheriff Houten proudly wrote in his
book that the key to the case was the breaking of Sandra Serrano by
Sergeant Enrique Hernandes. Serrano made a statement that contained
very strong references to a conspiracy. She describes... (description
of Serrano case follows ***). This could also have occurred with other
witnesses, but all of the book have been destroyed. Only the Serrano
book survives. Others may have been able to stand by their
stories."
"A witness places Sirhan or
somebody who looked like him in a weapons shop with others of Middle
Eastern appearance before the assassination. One of the men was
wearing clothing that looked similar to that of a member of hospital
staff. The witness was never invited to the trial. However, she was
interviewed by Mr Hernandez. The witness Mrs Donna Herrick - the store
owner - never changed her story when put under pressure. With great
surprise, she said that she had planned to be quoted in Houton's book
as a woman who "could be broken as she admitted that she had not
seen these men". This, according to her today, is completely
untrue. She never said this in the interview and stands by her
original statement. But where is this book? It is missing and
unavailable."
Why has the Serrano tape survived?
"It is possible that it was a
mistake. However, many have wondered how much is really missing: the
pictures, tape recordings, pieces of evidence from the crime scene,
the door*** -all pieces of evidence that should have been kept for
historical reasons. There was another weapon that was fired - ***a
test shooting during the preparation for the trial***. Although Mr
Wolfer (the weapons expert for the prosecution) testified to the
contrary, this weapon appears to have been destroyed shortly after the
test shooting. Astonishing! A second weapon destroyed! We do not know
if this weapon was used in the shooting - there are no indications of
such - but a weapon that was used for test purposes should not be
destroyed. Pictures from the crime scene should not really be
destroyed! Some pieces of evidence disappeared deliberately from right
under the noses of the investigation authorities. A security guard by
the name of Thane Cesar was armed with a weapon and accompanied RFK
into the pantry. He held Kennedy's arm. He stood on the place, where
according to the autopsy, the shot originated. And this man had a
weapon. One would expect that he [the gunman] would have been arrested
and his weapon examined. But he was neither arrested nor questioned as
a suspect nor - and this is particularly interesting - his weapon was
never examined. Weeks after the assassination the FBI wanted to obtain
his weapon for inspection. He told them that he had only carried a .38
and not a .22 and that he did not have this weapon anymore as he had
sold it to somebody in the mid West (???). When the alleged buyer was
questioned he said that the weapon had been stolen."
"The weapon that belonged to the
security guard who actually lead RFK by the right arm into the pantry
and who was standing on the spot where the shoots that killed RFK
could have been, or probably were fired from, was never examined. This
is quite astonishing! This seems to be nothing short of incompetence
or pure stupidity. - it has a clear handprint (??). One must ask if a
police authority can be so stupid to accidentally destroy photographs
and material from the crime scene and not make to secure a weapon from
the scene. They did arrest the photographer Scott Eynard though! One
must surely think that if they are interested in Eynard's photographs
that they would have confiscated Cesar's weapon. This would have been
the least one would expect from any serious investigators. However it
was not in the least bit of interest - the weapon could have left the
room with Thane Cesar! But not the photographs. That would have been
something!"
"The following hypotheses are
possible: there were forces at work within the LAPD that, at the time
of the murder, were already prepared to assume the role of a cover-up
department. This is a possible theory. Some of these theories closely
match the evidence. However, here it is my job to prepare a new trial
for Sirhan Sirhan and therefore, to find legal arguments for which
there is overwhelming support in the records. When the prosecution
uses false evidence, an approximate wound to the throat is presented
that isn't one, then it is a deceptive trial. When the prosecution
destroys evidence which shows armed men, then it is a deceptive trial.
They make the fairness of the trial impossible. When the prosecution
withholds evidence until the last minute so that it cannot be
appropriated, understood and recognised - material which shows that
the person who shot RFK did not stand where Sirhan Sirhan stood - the
process is unfair. There are a number of points here. The disturbing
thing about it all however is how could this happen in LA?"
"You ask about parallels between
this case and the murder of JFK. I have already named one: the
military-industrial complex and the Vietnam war. There was a huge
fight in the sixties surrounding this war. It began with a handful of
demonstrators. In the end a massive movement grew out of it much like
the Green Party in Germany. In 1968 the movement was so powerful that
President Johnson - who was completely identifiable with the expansion
of the war - was forced to announce that he would no longer stand for
president. This was a powerful victory for the freedom movement. It
was absolutely certain that regardless of which democratic candidate
won a nomination, the Vietnam war would be ended. If it wasn't RFK
then it would be McGovern, but most probably Kennedy. It did not
matter, there would be a democratic "anti-war" candidate
with an excellent chance to beat Nixon and become president. However,
there was a group of people who were not so keen to see this
happen."
Do you think you have a chance of
being successful?
"There are powerful forces against
the chances of success (in this matter). What for example, is with the
attempts to move the LA County Grand Jury to reinvestigate the case? A
particularly difficult and noble undertaking that should be made. But
try and guess who the attorney for the LA County Grand Jury is? The LA
County District attorney! He and he alone has access to the Grand Jury
and can give them legal advice. One would think that the District
Attorney's Office would be ashamed if it were to tell the Grand Jury
how to conduct an investigation into the District Attorney's Office.
One would like to assume that they tell them to seek another attorney
who advises them to investigate their office. But they are not doing
this. The District Attorney's Office has abused its privilege in the
Grand Jury to, in my opinion, manipulate their case. This is only an
example of the difficulties. The petition signed by Oliver Stone was a
request for the Grand Jury to take the case on. To date they have not
done so and the District Attorney acts as their advising lawyer -
there must be a link here!"
The point which concerns me and the
court here was never before discussed by the court.
"You asked about the difficulties.
In general, the whole area of law is very conservative. Attorneys who
are involved with cases of public interest must perform a never-ending
task. I don't think that it would be easy to convince a judge to pass
a new sentence which says that this particular case was legally mis-handled.
If such a sentence was to be passed it would be an big surprise to the
LAPD and the District Attorney. The concluding results of such a
sentence - a new trail for Sirhan Sirhan - would reveal the truth in a
complete and public discussion, but this time on the screens of the
nation, whereas before television did not exist in the courts. If
there was a new trial today then the whole world would be able to see
what happened here! The whole world would learn that Sirhan never
stood where it would have been possible for him to have shot RFK. The
whole world would learn what happened with Scott Enyard! And the facts
about the other weapons and shots. The whole world would learn all of
this!"
How does the U.S. media treat the
case today?
"In general this case is
ignored..., because many reporters are ignorant of the facts. And this
leads to more unsettling questions and conclusions. Many in the media
would prefer not to stir things up and ask questions. They do not want
to destroy the public's trust in the Government as this causes a lot
of problems for us all. The European media is much more open and
objective. I do not want biased reporting. I only hope for a fair
recollection of the facts. In the duration of this case this has never
happened. When Oliver Stone made the film "JFK" and the
public saw it, they began to think about the real possibility of a CIA
cover-up. Which I also believe to really be what happened. This
however is not what the US Government is telling us happened. They
cling to the fiction that Lee Harvey Oswald killed Kennedy on his own.
The majority of the people do not believe this, but the Government
clings to this stupid, sick fairytale version of the story like a
pitbull. Because when just for a moment they backdown and admit to a
cover-up, the people will also want to know who was responsible and
why they [the Government] have lied to us for so long. And this is
exactly the same for RFK. The Government is afraid to admit a cover-up
because otherwise people will want to know why they have lied for so
many years, who they are protecting and whose orders they have been
listening to. And then people will suddenly start to wake up and ask
questions about the basic nature of our existence. They would ask:
hold on a moment, in school we are taught that we live in a democracy
and now we suddenly discover that events in our lives are being
manipulated by dark and secret forces ***. And then fantastic lies
will be created that obscure the truth."
Are there really no journalists who
are interested in this?
"There have been some programmes.
In general, the District Attroney's Office deals contemptuosly with
enquiries. Oh once again talk of conspiracy theories. This is how the
federal Governement dealt with the JFK case. Sensationalism in order
to sell their books. They just dismissed the critics. *** But who
controls the media in the USA? The big corporations. It is
understandable that they do not want to be asked unsettling questions.
For example, one of the big TV institutions is NBC which is connected
to General Electric who build atomic power plants and warheads. One
can predict that such a TV instution does not, for example, want a
serious discussion amongst economists about the arms race because the
truth would create a public climate that could damage investments
which the corporations in the nuclear weapons industry are involved
in. This could be one explanation for the media's bias. I believe that
both murder cases are completely linked with the fate of the
military-industrial complex. This was the biggest winner for bothe
Kennedy murders. Both of them allowed the Vietnam war to start. And
this was particularly profitable for the weapons industry and high
ranking CIA and Pentagon officials who were connected to the Vietnam
war."
"Our hope is that the truth will
come to light. The trial was a suppression of the truth. The LAPD has
spent years sabotaging public access to the truth. That's very
disturbing for everyone who believes in the democratic system. I just
want to see the truth come out. As an attorney I want a trail to be
carried out fairly and not corrupted. I believe that it has been
systematically corrupted through the suppression and destruction of
evidence and through the denial of Sirhan Sirhan's right to a fair
trial because of the incompetence of his attorneys. I believe that
evidence discovered recently really proves his innocence. Sirhan
Sirhan has the right to see this evidence and the public has the right
to learn about it. This trail has by far nothing to do with
reality."
An Interview with
Bill Klaber
©Paul
Nellen, Hamburg Germany, 1994
Bill Klaber is the author of
"The RFK Tapes", a one hour program for a small private New
York State radio station. In 1993, the program was broadcast by more
than 160 radio stations across the U.S.
"The murder of RFK is peculiar for
a number of reasons. On the surface it seems like a very open and shut
case: a man is shot and another man is caught at the scene of the
crime with a gun in hand. Very simple, it appears. But underneath
those facts lay a lot of other facts which are disturbing and strange.
One of the strange facts is that the police took the files of the RFK-assassination
and held them secret for 20 years. That always bothered me. I always
wondered why. And so I began to look into the reasons why the files
were kept secret for 20 years. And I found a number of very disturbing
things about the assassination."
"These are people who have been
involved in the case in one way or another. Some of them since the
assassination. Some of those people who were there in the night of the
assassination. And when I made the program, I travelled around the
country and I talked with people who were there, people who
investigated the crime and people who have done investigative work
since that time and recorded their recollections."
"I'm just a volunteer. This is a
very small radio station up here in the mountains. And I do a little
work over in the radio station. But when we went ahead to do this
program, it was picked up by other 160 radio stations around the
country. So we're very gratified in that."
"It was all my own money. It's my
project completely."
"When you look at the evidence,
there are a number of very disturbing things. One: it appears to be an
almost virtual certainty that more than 8 shots were fired in the
hotel pantry where RFK was murdered. There is a lot of evidence to
this effect. If that's the case, if more than 8 shots were fired, than
someone other than Sirhan had to be firing a gun as well, because
Sirhan's gun holds only 8 bullets. So when you start with the fact
that more than 8 shoots were fired, and then you look in the autopsy,
which appears to show that the bullet wounds in RFK come from a
completely different direction than from where Sirhan was standing,
then you have a very deep mystery."
"I don't believe the Sirhan
Sirhan's case should be reopened in the sense that I don't trust and
believe any government investigation would come to any conclusions
different from the ones they have already arrived at. By the very
nature, government investigations tend to be very clumsy and stupid. I
believe there is a truth underneath this assassination which should be
exposed by the American media which have done a very miserable job so
far in this case."
"I believe that in America there
are still certain things that you can't talk about in magazines, on TV
and on network news. And the assassination of the Kennedy's is one of
those things. The record of the media - New York Times, CBS,
Washington Post, the major networks - is atrocious in regards of the
assassination. They have led no major investigations for all the staff
and the people they have, they have done nothing in 25 years, in 30
years since the murder of John Kennedy to uncover the truth in these
cases. All the work that has been done in both the RFK assassination
and the JFK assassination has been done by private citizens."
"I think what is significant here
is that 25 years after the crime, a private citizen with no
connections to major news organizations or access to major resources
is able to travel around the country and uncovered a severe evidence
of wrong-doing on a part of LAPD in the assassination of a major
presidential candidate in this country. And in the 25 years no major
news organisation or investigative body in this country has done so.
To me that says a lot about what's going on in this country and how
honest our news is and how honest our public authorities are."
"As I said, "The RFK
Tapes", the program was picked up by 160 radio stations across
the country which was a major victory for us, because we are a small
radio station and our program was not sponsored by the NPR network.
But it was picked up by 160 radio stations. In addition TIME MAGAZINE
run a full-page review of the program (see below). This was the first
time a major American publication or TV news network or anything has
admitted that there were serious problems within the RFK
assassination. After the TIME MAGAZINE article came out and the
program was aired across the country, I received numerous phone calls
and request for interviews. But the majority of those came from
outside the country: from Japan, Saudi Arabia, Western Europe. More
people were interested in other places in the world than in the US in
this program."
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