Sirhan Sirhan, convicted of killing Robert F. Kennedy, denied parole by California board
Sirhan Sirhan was again denied parole Wednesday, 55 years after he shot and killed presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy in Los Angeles.
The latest denial by a California board in San Diego came after Sirhan was found suitable for parole by a two-person parole panel in 2021 but that decision was reversed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
In an op-ed published in The Times in January 2022, Newsom wrote that Sirhan, who fatally shot Kennedy and wounded five others at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on June 5, 1968, remained a threat to the public.
The governor’s office did not respond Wednesday to a request for comment.
Sirhan remains incarcerated at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego.
Sirhan’s attorney, Angela Berry, said Wednesday’s denial by the two-person parole board was influenced by Newsom’s opposition to the 78-year-old’s release.
Sirhan has been imprisoned for more than half a century since being convicted of shooting and killing Kennedy at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.
The decision “suggests that they kowtowed to the political whims of the governor,” Berry said in an interview with The Times.
“It didn’t go as planned,” Berry said.
At Wednesday’s hearing, several people spoke against Sirhan’s release, including members of the Kennedy family and its attorney, Berry said.
“We didn’t have the presence of Paul Schrade this year. [He] was the last surviving victim who was in favor of parole,” Berry said.
Juan Romero has spent half a century trying to move on.
Schrade, who died in November, had repeatedly advocated for Sirhan’s release and believed that more than one gunman was involved in the shooting.
Schrade’s sister, Louise “Weezie” Stone Duff, did speak Wednesday in favor of Sirhan’s release, Berry said.
Berry said she was unsure of what steps will be taken next on Sirhan’s behalf.
An appeal of Newsom’s parole denial is making its way through the court, and Berry said she is reluctant to file another appeal of Wednesday’s denial.
“The argument would be ... [Sirhan] was found suitable, and there’s been nothing in the intervening year and a half that would suggest that he has taken a downward spiral to make him unsuitable,” Berry said.
“Yet they came to a contrary decision that is not supported by the record,” Berry added.
We’ll never know to what extent Sirhan changed America by killing the Democrats’ leading presidential contender, but we can speculate, columnist George Skelton writes.
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