Robert Kennedy Assasin To Appear Before Parole Board

Sirhan Sirhan, the convicted assassin of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, will go before a state parole board panel Wednesday

Sirhan, 66, is scheduled to appear Wednesday afternoon at Pleasant Valley State Prison before a two-member panel from the Board of Parole Hearings, which will rule on whether he is suitable for parole.

Sirhan was last denied parole five years ago at what was his 12th parole hearing.

Kennedy, a 42-year-old U.S. senator from New York, was fatally shot at close range in the kitchen of the since demolished Ambassador Hotel on June 5, 1968, after he declared victory in the California primary in his bid for the Democratic nomination for president.

Five other people were shot, but survived.

Sirhan, a Jordanian immigrant, was convicted in April 1969 of one count of first-degree murder and five counts of assault with attempt to commit murder.

Sirhan was initially sentenced to death, but the sentence was commuted to life in prison after the California Supreme Court declared the death penalty law in effect at the time in 1972 as unconstitutional.

Sirhan has claimed amnesia brought on by the consumption of too much alcohol and has said he did not commit the crime.

In 1975, Sirhan was granted a parole date for September 1984, but a parole board panel rescinded that decision in May 1982 amid public outcry and opposition from officials from the District Attorney’s Office and area legislators.