Legacy of Secrecy (130 page)

betting couldn’t. Scheim also noted “Sirhan’s compulsive racetrack

gambling and his heavy losses, particularly in the months before the

assassination.”9 Dan Moldea quoted the LAPD as discovering that in the

months prior to Sirhan’s three-month disappearance, Sirhan “bet most

of his salary on the horses, [and] a school acquaintance . . . described

Sirhan as a heavy bettor, betting as much as sixty to eighty dollars on

one race.” Moldea points out that Sirhan “was making only $75 a week,”

though “the FBI . . . claimed that he made bets with a Pasadena book-

maker [and] that Sirhan and his mother often argued about his gambling

habit and the debts he accumulated.”10

In Sirhan’s private handwritten notebook, which police found after

Bobby’s murder, Sirhan had scribbled lots of seemingly random words

and phrases; some say he wrote them when he was practicing self-

hypnosis. On one notebook page, Sirhan wrote, “happiness,” then

repeated Donneroummas’s name three times, followed by “please . . .

please pay to 5 please pay to the order of Sirhan Sirhan the amount of

5. . . . ” Scheim writes that “several other notations containing the phrase

‘please pay to the order of Sirhan’ were found in Sirhan’s notebooks

[a dozen times]—and references to Robert Kennedy or to ‘kill’ always

appeared on these same pages.” Also after Bobby’s murder, envelopes

were found on which Sirhan had written, “RFK must be disposed of

like his brother was,” and another saying: “RFK must be be be disposed

of . . . properly Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy must soon die, die die. . . . ”

There are repeated references in the notebook to money, especially to

the amount of $100,000. All of that led Scheim to ask, “Did someone in

fact hire Sirhan to kill Robert Kennedy?”11

On February 15, 1968, Sirhan bought a gun for the first time in his life,

an Iver-Johnson .22-caliber revolver—the pistol he would fire at Bobby

Kennedy. One of Sirhan’s brothers was with him and accounts differ

among the seller, Sirhan, and the brother about who actually paid for the

pistol—but all agree that Sirhan handled the weapon during the trans-

action and Sirhan stated “the gun was for me.” Though bought from a

private individual for $25 on a street corner, it had a well-documented

trail from manufacturer to stores to the person who sold it to Sirhan.

Later, Sirhan was careful to point out that it was not one of the “cheap . . .

Saturday night specials. But . . . was of good quality.”12

As with James Earl Ray’s rifle, Sirhan’s handgun was not stolen or

undocumented, so there would be no later suspicion that it had any

criminal ties. At the time Sirhan obtained his pistol, the press was specu-

lating increasingly that Bobby might run for president, and Bobby was

already working behind the scenes to help with the
Ramparts
article

about Carlos Marcello. Bobby’s campaign officials announced his entry

into the race on March 16, 1968.

In early April 1968, Sirhan Sirhan and two other apparently Middle

Eastern men went to the “Lock, Stock, ’n Barrel Gun Shop,” where Sirhan

would eventually buy the .22 caliber bullets he fired at Bobby Ken-

nedy. But that would be over a month later. On this trip, as described by

the woman who co-owned the shop with her husband, “three males of

foreign extraction entered the store” and one of them asked, “‘Do you

have any .357 Magnum tank piercing ammo,’ or words to that effect.

[My husband] replied, ‘We don’t have any.’ The three then left.” After

Bobby’s assassination, the FBI showed her “a group of six photos [and]

I selected a photograph of Sirhan Bishara Sirhan and I am positive this

is a photo of the man who inquired about .357 Mag. tank piercing ammo

on or about April 3, 1968.” While she thought photos of Sirhan’s brothers

resembled the other two men, she was certain about Sirhan.13

Her husband remembered the incident similarly, saying that in April

1968, “three men entered the store [who] were short, dark, and for-

eign looking.” He said that “they were very interested in the handgun

display . . . they approached my wife and asked her a question and then

she turned to me for assistance. . . . One of them asked me if we had

any armor piercing ammunition in the store. I do carry such ammuni-

tion, which I sell to law enforcement officers. After observing that these

men were not law enforcement officers I said that we did not have such

ammunition in stock. The three men then left.” Unlike his wife, the man

was not able to identify Sirhan from photos. However, he said that “on

June 1, 1968,” when Sirhan returned to the store to buy the .22-caliber

bullets he would fire at Bobby, the man saw “three short, dark, foreign-

looking persons talking to [his clerk]. From their appearance I thought

they were the same three persons who had been in the store on the April

15th date inquiring about the armor piercing ammunition.” His wife

thought the date of Sirhan’s visit was a bit earlier, but their stories seem

to otherwise match and be quite credible—and there is no question that

their shop sold the .22-caliber ammunition used in Sirhan’s pistol.14

Why would Sirhan have wanted “armor piercing ammunition,” for a

type of pistol he apparently didn’t own? On April 10, 1968, Sirhan was

talking to “a Pasadena trash man, who made regular pickups at the

Sirhan family’s house,” according to Dan Moldea, citing LAPD records.

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LEGACY OF SECRECY

The presidential race came up, and the man told Sirhan he was going to

vote for “‘Kennedy.’ Sirhan replied, ‘Well, I don’t agree. I am planning

on shooting the son of a bitch.’” The trash man told police he thought

Sirhan was exaggerating, and that he “did not take him seriously.”15

There aren’t many, if any, ordinary uses for “armor piercing” bullets.

By the time of Sirhan’s threat, Bobby Kennedy was becoming known

for campaigning while riding in open cars, often standing to deliver his

talks, even if the car was moving. If Sirhan considered shooting Kennedy

from the crowds that surrounded Bobby while he stood in his car, Sirhan

could have used armor-piercing bullets. They would easily penetrate

the thin metal used for cars at the time, allowing his shots to find their

target even if Bobby fell, or was pulled, to the floorboard or seat.

In early April 1968, while Sirhan was visiting the gun store and ask-

ing about armor-piercing bullets, he had seemingly realized one of his

dreams: “to make a lot of money.” Sirhan finally received $1,705 (more

than $10,000 today) as his insurance settlement for his old horse-riding

injury. Before becoming involved in the events leading to Bobby’s assas-

sination, Sirhan had talked of returning to community college, though

he felt ashamed of his old pink DeSoto and longed for a Mustang that

would impress girls. Now he finally had enough to pay cash for a good

used Mustang and still have money left over to return to college in

style.

But for some reason, having that much money didn’t seem to matter

to Sirhan anymore. He gave his mother some of the money, and let her

hold much of it. He was soon gambling more than ever, and later in May,

the LAPD noted that he was going to the racetrack and betting “nearly

every day—and losing.” It was as if the insurance money Sirhan had

gotten wasn’t enough to settle some huge debt he owed and he was des-

perate for a big score to get him out from under his obligation.16 David

E. Scheim noted a much earlier case that might have foreshadowed

what happened to Sirhan: It involved a young man who bet heavily

on horses, got himself into debt, and was forced by mobsters to fire a

pistol from a crowd at a noted official while a mob hit man made sure

the target was killed.17

Sirhan was not known to use or sell drugs, but one of his scribbled

notebook pages contains the word “drugs” written four times, along

with “danger” twice, as well as his own name.18 In addition to the drug

conviction of his former boss, whom Sirhan still saw at the races, Larry

Hancock documented, based on LAPD files, that in the spring of 1968,

Sirhan was living with a brother who “was still on probation from a

conviction relating to the possession and sale of narcotics.” Sirhan’s

brother “had served 9 months in jail for the felony conviction,” and INS

“was still actively engaged in efforts to deport [him] over his narcotics

charge and conviction.”19

Through his brother Adel, police files show that Sirhan knew a bar

owner whom a “Federal Narcotics agent . . . stated [had been] arrested

August 15, 1967, for narcotics.” The man “admitted he knew Sirhan” and

“said that he and other friends would occasionally meet Sirhan at the

racetrack.”20 A man who “worked as an undercover agent for the Pasa-

dena Police Department” told the LAPD that one of Sirhan’s brothers

“was pushing heroin and pot.”21 Still another one of Sirhan’s brothers,

Saidallah, had been arrested for attempted murder in 1963.22

Aside from Sirhan, most of his other brothers had run-ins with the

law and contact with criminals. One brother’s coworker told the LAPD

that in mid- to late April 1968, Sirhan’s brother said “he was so lucky and

was showing me a wallet which appeared to have several $100 bills; in

fact, it was full of $100 bills. I would guess several thousand dollars.” But

then, just a couple of weeks later, around May 1, 1968, Sirhan’s brother

“said he could kill himself that he had $5,000 a year ago and then he

didn’t have any.”23

When he had lots of money, Sirhan’s brother boasted to his coworker

that “he had good information about horses and [asked] if I wanted any

tips. He said his brother [Sirhan] was a jockey, but didn’t say it was his

brother who gave him the tips.” Sirhan also boasted about having good

tips on horses, yet Sirhan usually lost at the track. We can’t help but won-

der if Sirhan became deeply in debt to a mob bookie before receiving his

insurance money, and was then given only one way to settle an amount

greater than he could possibly hope to earn legitimately.

Sirhan’s notebooks containing his odd writing were later found to

have “one hundred thousand dollars,” written several times, as if Sirhan

was focused on that sum as part of his self-hypnosis. These were the

same notebooks in which Sirhan wrote, “Please pay to the order” and,

“Robert F. Kennedy must be assassinated.” Getting lots of money for

killing Bobby Kennedy wouldn’t have done Sirhan much good while

he was in prison, but he appears to have gotten the impression, or been

told prior to the shooting, that his sentence for participating in Bobby’s

assassination would be minimal. Sirhan would later tell prosecution

psychiatrist Dr. Seymour Pollack that he thought “he would get only

two years in prison.”24

In addition to the possible promise of lots of money, Sirhan’s

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relationship with his large family, and especially with his mother, could

also have been used to pressure Sirhan, by using threats to kill or harm

them. As we’ll detail in Chapter 58 for the first time, less than a month

after Bobby’s death, someone made an unusual attempt to murder

one of Sirhan’s brothers. Sirhan’s situation is also reminiscent of Jack

Ruby’s remark about the lives of his relatives being threatened, since—

like Sirhan—Ruby also waded into a crowd to fire at his target with a

pistol.

As for Sirhan’s motivation for deciding in May 1968 to kill Bobby Ken-

nedy, facts show that it wasn’t the Arab/Israeli conflict, as Sirhan would

proclaim at length in court. Sirhan would later testify that he became

determined to kill Bobby because of Bobby’s support for Israel, as

depicted in a May TV documentary Sirhan had seen, and the follow-up

“promise” Bobby made, during remarks at a Portland, Oregon, syna-

gogue, to sell fifty jet fighters to Israel. However, Sirhan’s attorney Grant

Cooper provided that motivation to Sirhan to use at the trial.25

Dan Moldea also found that the timing doesn’t work for the claim. The

documentary Sirhan referred to was shown on May 20, and only implied

Bobby’s support for Israel, while Bobby gave the Portland speech in

which he mentioned the jet fighters on May 26, 1968. But Sirhan’s note-

books show that on May 18, 1968, Sirhan was already writing repeatedly

in his notebooks about killing Bobby, and had even specified his June 5,

1968, deadline for doing so.26

In contrast, Phillips Melanson found that Sirhan’s notebooks con-

tained “not a single reference to jets or bombers, not a single reference

to Zionism, Israel, Palestine, [or any of] the terms Sirhan would spout

at this trial as propelling him to murder.” Melanson also points out

that although Bobby’s most serious challenger, Vice President Hubert

Humphrey, also supported Israel, Humphrey is never mentioned in the

notebooks. While in 1968 Sirhan didn’t like Israel or Jews and was con-