Original subtitles

(dramatic music) - [Crowd] We want Kennedy!

We want Kennedy! We want Kennedy!

- Tonight, an assassin's bullet

changes the course of history.

- This was an exciting moment.

It was filled with joy

and everyone is excited about what's next.

(crowd screaming)

- [Reporter] Kennedy has been shot. Is that possible?

- And then for America, it's a nightmare repeating itself.

- [Bystander] Oh God! God!

Oh why?

- Five years after John F. Kennedy is killed by gunshot,

his brother Robert meets the same fate.

- It really left the nation reeling.

One of the leading candidates to be president was gone.

- Now we'll uncover the top theories

behind the second Kennedy assassination.

- It even sounds like a setup.

- Bobby has enemies, powerful enemies.

- The LAPD appeared to be engaging in a coverup.

- And we'll explore the latest clues

in a case still riddled with inconsistency.

- So the question is, does the official theory add up?

(dramatic music)

- Who was really behind the killing of Robert Kennedy,

and why?

(dramatic music)

(suspenseful music)

June 5th, 1968, the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

It's after midnight and Robert Kennedy has just won

the California Democratic presidential primary.

- He comes down to the ballroom to greet his supporters,

and it's packed, overflowing with people just so excited,

and he makes his way to the platform.

- This night is a big moment in Bobby Kennedy's career.

He is 42 years old.

His star is on the rise in the Democratic Party.

This night is bringing him one step closer

to the Democratic nomination.

- Robert Kennedy came from a political family.

His father was involved in politics

and had been a U.S. ambassador,

and then his brother

was a U.S. senator

and then became president,

and his brother Ted became a U.S. senator from Massachusetts.

- Bobby Kennedy got his law degree

and soon began making his name

as a hard-charging attorney.

He picks a job on a senate committee

and begins his long career

of making life uncomfortable for the mob.

- When JFK becomes president in 1961,

Bobby Kennedy becomes the attorney general

of the United States, which is the nation's top prosecutor,

and his office is investigating and prosecuting the mob

and corrupt union leaders as well.

- He's working with his brother,

and then it all ends in horror.

- [Newscaster] The sound of the muffled drums

sweeps in melancholy waves over the hushed throngs.

- [Laurence] In 1963, John F. Kennedy

is assassinated in Dallas,

and Vice President Lyndon

Johnson becomes president.

- Robert Kennedy remained in his position

as attorney general for approximately nine months

after the assassination.

- But Bobby resigns in September 1964

in order to run for state senator of New York,

and he wins the election in November 1964.

- As senator from New York,

he begins taking up liberal causes

like the betterment of life for minorities,

like protecting farm workers.

(gun banging)

- He became opposed to the war in Vietnam,

which was a pivotal issue in 1968.

- Bobby Kennedy is considering a run for president in 1968,

but he's still kind of reluctant

because he doesn't wanna go up against Lyndon Johnson.

- And so he waited, but then the Vietnam War

just became such an intense issue.

Johnson was not taking strong steps

to get America out of Vietnam,

and Bobby Kennedy saw an opening.

(crowd cheering)

- I am announcing today my candidacy

for the presidency of the United States.

(crowd cheering)

- Robert Kennedy announced that he's running

for the presidency on March 16th.

On March 31st, he arrives back in New York

after this really barnstorming tour

and he finds out that Johnson is not going to run,

and that changes everything.

- [Laurence] But at first, Bobby is a long shot

for the presidency.

- Bobby Kennedy has two possible rivals

for the Democratic nomination.

He's got Vice President Hubert Humphrey

and he's got the popularity of Senator Eugene McCarthy

to contend with.

- But as Robert Kennedy starts making speeches

around the country,

there is this rockstar type reaction to him

and people just wanting to grab him.

(crowd cheering)

I spoke to somebody once who talked to me

about just trying to keep him upright while going in cars

and people just grabbing at him and pulling at him.

And these crowds were mammoth.

(crowd cheering)

- [Crowd] We want Kennedy! We want Kennedy!

- Clinching the California primary

is getting him one step closer

to winning the nomination that summer.

- [Crowd] We want Kennedy!

- Thank you very- - We want Kennedy!

- Thank you very much.

- [Crowd] We want Kennedy!

- We can start to work together.

We are a great country and a selfless country

and a compassionate country.

(crowd cheering)

- As Robert Kennedy is looking out over the crowd,

he's talking to them in their language.

They're seeing what he calls a better America.

If only he can make it to Chicago

and win the Democratic nomination.

- My thanks to all of you,

and now it's on to Chicago and let's win there.

(crowd cheering)

- [Laurence] At 12:15 AM, Kennedy ends his speech

and heads for the press conference room.

- [Crowd] We want Kennedy!

- [Laurence] Instead of wading through the raucous crowd

in the ballroom, Kennedy takes a shortcut.

- He stepped off the back of the stage

and then walked down a hallway and into a narrow room

which has been become called the pantry.

(suspenseful music)

- And he starts greeting employees, talking to busboys.

- Out of nowhere in the crowd,

a short, dark-haired man steps forward.

Witnesses say they saw him raise his arm.

In his hand is a gun.

(gun banging)

(crowd screaming)

People aren't quite sure what's going on.

Perhaps it's fireworks.

But eventually people realize someone's shooting.

- People are collapsing from gunshot wounds.

And finally two bystanders pinned the man to the table

and they wrestled the gun from his hand.

- [Laurence] That's when it becomes clear

Robert Kennedy has been shot.

- [Bystander] Oh god! God!

- The ambulance arrives at 12:23.

(siren wailing) (people yelling)

- Emergency workers rush into the room,

put Kennedy on a stretcher, and rush him back out.

They realize that he's been shot several times,

including at least once in the head.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] Kennedy is soon undergoing emergency surgery.

- Kennedy has been shot three times.

One bullet goes into his brain,

another bullet goes into his back.

Third bullet goes into his shoulder

and exits and goes up into the ceiling.

A fourth bullet passes through his suit jacket

on a steep upward angle.

- The bullet that hits him in the head shatters,

and so surgeons spend hours trying to get the bullet debris

out of his skull.

Unfortunately, even after hours of work,

Robert Kennedy slips into a coma.

- [Laurence] On June 6th, 1968,

a little over 25 hours after the shooting,

Robert Kennedy is pronounced dead.

- Five other people wounded.

Paul Schrade, a top official in the United Auto Workers,

was hit with a bullet that knocked him down,

gave him a concussion.

Other people sustained minor bullet wounds.

- At the police station, officers have brought the man

that has been tackled and held

by the workers inside the kitchen.

It's the same small, dark-haired man

that people saw holding the gun.

- They couldn't get this crazy guy to speak,

they couldn't get him to tell him his name,

and they flashed a light in his eyes

to see if there was any problem.

And his eyes were real big

and they didn't react to the light,

and officers said he was under the influence of something.

- The police release his photo to the press,

and his brother recognizes him.

- His brother calls in and identifies him as Sirhan Sirhan,

a immigrant from Palestine.

- From this point forward, the LAPD builds a case

on Sirhan and no one else.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] More than 20 witnesses

identify Sirhan Sirhan as the shooter.

- The gun was recovered at the scene

and then brought back to the police station.

- Sirhan had an eight-shot revolver.

He had eight bullets and made good on all eight shots,

according to the LAPD.

(police siren)

- When police go down to Sirhan's home,

they search his room

and they find a bunch of notebooks

that have the strangest writing in the world in them.

There are some passages that say, "RFK must die."

It's crazy writing

from someone who is in some sort of trance.

- Police find in Sirhan's pocket that night

a newspaper clipping about the Six-Day War

and Kennedy's support for Israel.

- Sirhan's brother explains to police

that they are Christian Palestinians

and they've gotten caught in the battle

between Israel and Israel's Arab neighbors.

- Sirhan is distraught about his homeland

and he has fixated his anger on Kennedy.

Sirhan blames Kennedy for support of Israel

and his commitment if he's elected president

to send fighter jets to Israel.

- With all of the evidence that police have found,

they are confident that they have their man.

Sirhan had motive. He had means.

He was in the room.

People have identified him as having a gun.

And the case, according to them, is closed.

- [Laurence] On February 12th, 1969,

eight months after the shooting,

the trial of Sirhan Sirhan begins in L.A. Superior Court.

- The prosecutors lay out what they see as a slam dunk case.

They have the witnesses who place him at the scene.

They have his journal entries.

- An acquaintance of Sirhan even places him

in the Ambassador Hotel days before the fatal shooting.

Was he scouting locations?

(suspenseful music) (gun banging)

- There are also witnesses who saw him at a shooting range.

So he was somebody who knew his way around a gun.

So the crime scene analyst, Dewayne Wolfer of the LAPD,

testifies that all eight of the bullets

fired by Sirhan are accounted for.

- [Laurence] Sirhan Sirhan pleads not guilty

by reason of insanity.

- Sirhan denies remembering anything about the shooting,

but then when he's asked by the prosecutor on the stand,

"Did you shoot Robert F. Kennedy?" he says, "Yes, sir."

- Sirhan's own attorney even stands up in court

and says there is no doubt that Sirhan shot Robert Kennedy.

Sirhan's attorney is trying to keep Sirhan

out of the gas chamber

because at the time California has the death penalty

and he's trying to make sure that Sirhan only gets life.

- [Laurence] But on April 17, 1969,

Sirhan Sirhan is convicted of killing Robert Kennedy

and sentenced to death.

(somber music)

(door thudding)

- As far as the LAPD is concerned, the case is over.

- [Laurence] The case may be officially closed,

the verdict delivered,

but many say the trial left unanswered questions.

- Even as the trial is happening,

members of the media and local concerned citizens

are wondering if this all adds up.

People are troubled that Sirhan's defense

didn't challenge any of the physical evidence.

- Part of the problem is that the LAPD has promised

that they're going to have a transparent investigation,

but they don't actually release any of the investigation

to members of the media.

That's really concerning.

- The Kennedy Assassination Truth Committee

was a group of well-meaning critics of the case

who put together some evidence.

- They go back to the crime scene,

and one of the things they focus on is bullet holes.

- [Laurence] A few days after the guilty verdict,

this group publishes its findings

in an alternative newspaper

called the "Los Angeles Free Press."

- They present photographic evidence

that 10 bullets were fired, which doesn't add up

with the official investigation

that there were only eight shots.

(suspenseful music)

- [Laurence] In April of 1969,

Sirhan Sirhan is sentenced to death

for the murder of Robert F. Kennedy.

But journalists and independent investigators

challenge the lone gunman theory.

- Just days after the trial,

a newspaper,

the "Los Angeles Free Press,"

shows a photograph of a door jamb.

In that door jamb is what looks to be two bullet holes.

- Another photograph is published of an LAPD officer

pointing to a bullet hole

in another section of the kitchen a few feet away.

- [Laurence] Sirhan's gun held eight rounds,

seven bullets were recovered from the victim's bodies

and one bullet went into the ceiling.

But now there appear to be three additional bullets

buried in the walls.

(gun banging)

- With more than eight shots fired,

that means that there's a second person

who could have fired the fatal shots

that killed Bobby Kennedy.

(dramatic music)

(somber music)

- All of a sudden you have to question who Sirhan is

and what is he doing there,

and who might the second gun be and what is he doing there,

and who are the people behind this?

- A few months after the trial,

a documentary filmmaker named Ted Charach

begins his own investigation

into the death of

Robert Kennedy.

- He discovers that the medical examiner, Thomas Noguchi,

who performed the autopsy on Robert Kennedy

filed a 62-page report that was never entered into evidence

during the trial.

- For the first time, Noguchi introduces evidence

that has never been talked about.

- One gunshot wound was found behind right ear.

And after test firing, we came to conclusion

that the muzzle distance would be one inch

from the right ear edge and no more than three inches.

- Sirhan, who's approaching Kennedy from the front,

never gets within a couple of feet of Kennedy

because all these other guys tackled him

after the first two shots.

Sirhan's never close enough to put a shot

into the back of Kennedy's head.

- This new evidence from Ted Charach's film

is really explosive, its own news story,

and it provokes this really big media reaction.

- [Laurence] After Sirhan's trial,

his appellate lawyers hire an independent ballistics expert

to reanalyze the three intact bullets

recovered from Kennedy and two other victims.

- What he finds is that the bullet

that enters Kennedy's neck

and a bullet that hit a bystander don't match.

If those two bullets don't match,

that means there had to be another gun

and another gunman in the room.

(people yelling)

- But the district attorney just falls back on the fact

that a jury convicted Sirhan

while the police stood by their analysis

that the bullet in Kennedy came from Sirhan's gun.

- With the files locked away from the public,

no one can actually fact-check their work,

so there are now calls for release of these LAPD files.

- [Laurence] Almost two decades later, in 1986,

Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley announces that the files

will be released to the public at last.

- 50,000 police documents.

There's 1,000 photographs to go through

and there's hundreds of hours of audio and video materials.

- In 2004, an audio file is found in this treasure trove.

That audio file was made by a Polish journalist

the night of the shooting.

On this audio file, popping sounds are heard.

A audio engineer named Philip Van Praag

begins to remove some of the ambient noise from it

so he can actually count the number of shots that he hears.

(gun banging) (people screaming)

- He found 13 shots on the tape.

13 shots is about five shots more

than Sirhan's gun could have handled,

so that would again indicate

that a second person was firing inside that pantry.

- [Laurence] Based on this new evidence,

Sirhan's lawyers file papers in 2011

requesting a new trial.

- Finally, in 2013, a magistrate judge takes the case.

- He says there's no evidentiary support

that there's a second shooter,

and he questions how a second shooter could shoot

and then escape completely unnoticed.

- So the appeals are denied, but it doesn't end the question

of whether or not there was a second gun.

(somber music) (water dripping)

- [Laurence] In evidence never presented in court,

the medical examiner in Robert Kennedy's assassination

concludes the senator was killed by a gunshot

fired from an inch away and from behind.

Yet witnesses say the man who was convicted, Sirhan Sirhan,

was not behind Kennedy

and never got closer than two or three feet.

But who else was close enough to shoot Kennedy?

- In 1968, the Secret Service

did not provide protection

for presidential candidates,

so there wasn't massive security

like you see at political rallies now.

(crowd chattering) - Senator! Senator!

- Kennedy did have his own sort of informal security outfit.

- A retired football player by the name of Rosey Grier

and Olympic medalist Rafer Johnson,

they provided security for Bobby.

- As Kennedy heads into the kitchen,

he gets separated from Rafer Johnson.

- A security guard independent from RFK's informal outfit

ends up taking Kennedy's right elbow

and he escorts him through the pantry.

His name is Thane Eugene Cesar.

- He had been hired by the Ambassador Hotel

for the purpose of crowd control that night.

- This would put him in position

to be the perfect person to

shoot Robert Kennedy from behind.

(dramatic music)

- After the revelation of additional bullets,

people start looking into Thane Cesar

to see if he had a possible motive.

- [Laurence] Cesar is a 26-year-old

part-time security guard.

- Cesar had clearance to carry a weapon that night.

He had a .38.

- [Laurence] After the shooting,

Cesar is among those questioned by police.

- Cesar said that he saw an arm and a gun

which had started firing at Kennedy.

(gun banging)

- According to Cesar,

Kennedy collapses right in front of him.

(people screaming) - Oh god!

- Cesar says he reaches for his .38 but never fires it.

In fact, he says he fell over against an ice machine.

- [Laurence] After giving his statement to police,

Cesar is cleared.

- From the beginning, Cesar is treated as a witness

and not a suspect.

- Well, the police never asked for Cesar's .38

or test fired it.

There were no indications that a .38 had been used.

- But Donald Schulman of CBS News told police

that he saw one of the security guards return fire.

Cesar was the only security guard in the room with a gun.

- It turns out Gene Cesar had a .22 caliber pistol

that was very similar to Sirhan's .22 caliber pistol.

- [Laurence] With interest in the second gunman theory

growing, in 1971, the district attorney's office

summons Thane Eugene Cesar for another interview.

- Here's where it gets really interesting.

Cesar says he sold the gun to a friend

before the assassination,

but a reporter tracks this friend down

and finds out that Cesar sold the gun

a few months after the assassination.

This friend even produces a bill of sale

that has Cesar's signature on it.

- So not only was Cesar in the right place

at the right time to have shot Kennedy,

but he also had the right kind of gun.

- However, the DA takes no action.

- In 1973, documentary filmmaker Ted Charach

interviews Cesar, and Cesar reveals in this interview

something really interesting.

- He finds out that Cesar might also have a motive

for shooting Kennedy.

- [Cesar] I definitely wouldn't have voted for Bobby Kennedy

'cause he had the same ideas as John did,

and I think John sold the country down the road.

He gave it to the commies.

He literally gave it to the minority.

I'm not a Democrat. (laughs)

- He has these far-right leanings,

and the guy he was supporting in the 1968 election

was actually former Alabama governor George Wallace,

who's a known racist.

- And I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow,

and segregation forever.

- Cesar felt that Black people

were having too many people advocating for them

and that their equal rights were being shoved down

people's throats, and that there was going to be a time

where people pushed back against that.

- When Ted Charach's documentary "The Second Gun"

comes out in 1973, many people watch this documentary

and come away with the idea

that Cesar must have had something to do with it.

- [Laurence] In the years that follow,

Cesar gets more tight-lipped

and eventually moves to the Philippines

where he resides until his death in 2019.

- But while Cesar was well-positioned

to fire the fatal shots,

there was at least one other person in the pantry that night

who had no business being there.

(suspenseful music)

- In 1969, Sirhan Sirhan is convicted

of killing Robert Kennedy and locked behind bars,

but in the years that follow the evidence mounts

that there may have been holes in the investigation.

Then in 1986 the official police files are finally released,

including details of a forgotten eyewitness interview

from 1968, an interview which may shed light

on the identity of a new suspect.

- Sandy Serrano is a 21-year-old volunteer

working for the Robert Kennedy campaign.

That fateful night, she's sitting on the back stairs

of the Ambassador Hotel getting some fresh air.

- Around 11:30 or so,

Sandy Serrano is outside behind the Ambassador

and she says that she saw a woman in a polka dot dress

and a man who matches Sirhan's description

going into the pantry together.

- And then this woman in a polka dot dress comes out

after the shooting shouting,

"We shot him, we shot him. We shot Senator Kennedy."

(police siren)

- Even though the police have Sirhan in custody,

they start looking for this woman.

She could be an accomplice.

She could be a second shooter.

- [Laurence] At least 25 witnesses recall seeing a woman

in a polka dot dress at the hotel that night,

and several people saw her in the company of Sirhan Sirhan.

- One witness even remembers the woman helping Sirhan Sirhan

get into his position in the pantry

before the fatal shooting.

- The woman appears to have said something

in his ear and smiles.

- Outside the Ambassador,

a police sergeant bumps into this woman

who again says, "We shot Kennedy,"

and he helps put out a description of this woman.

- [Laurence] That same night,

police put out an all-points bulletin

for this mysterious woman.

- In the APB that's put out,

the woman is described as a white woman aged 23 to 27,

and she's wearing a white dress

with black polka dots and heels.

- Shortly after Sirhan is arrested,

police cancel the bulletin.

LAPD investigators are convinced that Serrano

and their own officer have misinterpreted

what this woman said.

(people yelling)

- They assume that what they actually heard

was, "They shot Senator Kennedy."

- But Sandy Serrano goes to the national media

and she refuses to change her story.

- This girl said, "We've shot him. We've shot him."

And I says, "Who did you shoot?"

And she says, "We shot Senator Kennedy."

I can remember what she had on and everything.

She had on a white dress with polka dots

and she has a funny nose.

- [Laurence] Two weeks later, with Sirhan behind bars,

police announce that Sandy Serrano has recanted her story.

- Police say that Sandy is changing her story

and maybe didn't quite remember what was said.

- And that's how it stands for about 20 years

until Sandy's original account is rediscovered

when the police released the files to the public.

- And people go and interview her

and she once again renews her claim that she saw this woman

and this woman said, "We killed Kennedy."

Serrano also gives a very detailed description

of how she was pressured by the police to change her story.

- When looking at the transcript

of that Sandy Serrano interview,

you can see that the detective is accusing her

of trying to bring down the investigation

of who killed Robert Kennedy.

(record button clicks)

- Sandy Serrano says after being browbeat by this detective,

she was willing to tell them whatever they wanted to hear

just for it to be over.

- But a lot of people criticize

the investigators' tactics here,

that they never told her that 25 other people

actually saw the same woman that she said she saw.

- For decades, the identity of the woman

in the polka dotted dress remained a mystery.

- [Laurence] Then in 2011, the woman comes up again,

mentioned in a parole hearing

by none other than Sirhan Sirhan.

- Sirhan does recall that he met this woman

he describes as pretty.

Sirhan does remember being

with the woman in the polka dot dress

and saying that she led him into the kitchen

and that then his mind started to play tricks on him.

- He says he has a flashback to the shooting range,

(bullets pop)

but then he doesn't have any recollection

of actually shooting Kennedy.

(gun banging)

- He also says he has no memory of the name of the woman

in the polka dotted dress and has no idea

why she was at the Ambassador Hotel that night.

- [Laurence] A year later, in 2012,

a new clue emerges when Paul Schrade,

a union leader and ally of Robert Kennedy

who was also shot that night, gets a cryptic letter.

- It comes with a photo from a person claiming

that their aunt was the woman in the polka dot dress.

- Paul Schrade gives the photo to a reporter, Brad Johnson,

and he begins taking the photo

to witnesses who were at the Ambassador Hotel that night.

They all tell Johnson

that it looks like the woman in the polka dot dress.

- [Laurence] In 2018, after a five-year investigation,

Brad Johnson and his co-author Tim Tate

identify the woman in the polka dot dress

for the first time.

- The woman is Elayn Neal,

and she is a white woman with a pug nose.

- The journalists begin digging

into Elayn Neal's background.

They find out she was about 19 when RFK was shot

and her first husband was away fighting in Vietnam.

Elayn's family reports

that she always seemed haunted by something.

She begins drinking heavily.

She ends up divorcing her soldier husband

and she does get remarried.

- [Laurence] Journalists start delving into the life

of Elayn's second husband, Jerry Capehart.

- Jerry Capehart was quite a character

and he had a couple of songwriting hits in the 1950s.

His son revealed that shortly before Jerry Capehart died,

he told him that in addition to being in the music business,

he'd also been in the CIA.

- [Laurence] She's been called the woman

in the polka dot dress,

but some say she may have been in the wrong place

at the wrong time.

Others say she was exactly where she was supposed to be

playing her role in the RFK assassination.

(gun banging) (people screaming)

- From a family photo, witnesses believe

that 19-year-old Elayn Neal is the woman

in the polka dot dress.

She later marries a man

who makes a startling deathbed confession.

The man once worked for the CIA

and his specialization was mind control experimentation.

The claim that Jerry Capehart, Elayn Neal's second husband,

worked in the CIA in mind control could provide a link

between Elayn and the RFK assassination.

It could even be a link to something much bigger

than Elayn and Sirhan.

(dramatic music) (words beeping)

At the time of the assassination,

the CIA is conducting illegal human experimentation

called MK-Ultra.

- The CIA began doing a lot of odd and nefarious experiments

trying to see if they could control people.

And so the CIA by the 1960s had gotten universities involved

in helping them with research, finding them subjects,

people to be hypnotized or drugged.

They actually took people off the street to do this.

Theoretically, they would wanna use this

to infiltrate other countries,

but there's talk that the CIA was using this

to create robot assassins.

- The Manuchurian Candidate theory

from the movie by the same name

is a theory that says a person can be programmed

to become an assassin and never even know that they did it.

(gun banging)

(dramatic music)

- Sirhan would've been a perfect candidate for MK-Ultra.

He's an impressionable young man

and it's possible that he's suffering from a brain injury.

Two years earlier, he'd fallen from a horse.

And who better to draw him into the program

than a pretty young woman.

- Elayn Neal might have been a perfect person

to recruit into this operation.

She's home alone.

She's young and impressionable.

Elayn's family thought

that maybe this would explain her odd behavior

after the assassination where she would disappear

for long periods of time.

- When the woman in the polka dot dress

whispered in his ear, that could have been

what triggered Sirhan's assassination programming.

- Sirhan had a totally glassed-over look on his face

like he wasn't totally in control of his mind.

That's something very unusual that are clues

to what might or might not be happening here.

- The question is, where's the evidence

that Sirhan was part of this mind control program?

His defense team wants answers.

- [Laurence] In 2008, with the mind control theory

gaining interest, Sirhan's lawyers arrange for him

to undergo a new psychological evaluation.

- Harvard Medical School professor Dan Brown,

a forensic psychiatrist,

is one of the world's leading experts on hypnosis,

and he spent more than 120 hours with Sirhan Sirhan.

- Dan Brown discovered that Sirhan

is about the most easy person in the world to hypnotize.

Brown's conclusion was that Sirhan

had been put under hypnosis.

He thinks he's an innocent man.

- [Laurence] But even if it is possible

that Sirhan was under some kind of CIA control,

what could possibly be the reason why?

- Leading up to this assassination,

there are many people in the CIA

who have it out for Robert Kennedy.

- Bobby Kennedy has made quite a few enemies in the CIA,

starting with his time as attorney general.

He doesn't believe that the CIA should be doing

some of the things they're doing around the world,

that they're abusing their power.

- Kennedy is upset that the CIA

is attempting to assassinate Fidel Castro in Cuba.

Kennedy even wonders if the CIA had something to do

with the assassination of his brother.

- Within the intelligence community,

there certainly is concern about Bobby Kennedy

and his potential rise to power.

The only thing worse than Bobby Kennedy as attorney general

would be Bobby Kennedy as president of the United States.

- As president, Robert Kennedy would be privy

to all of the CIA's secrets.

In fact, he could force them to shut down operations

and perhaps even shake up the entire agency.

- If Sirhan was really programmed to murder,

then his defense team argues he deserves a lighter sentence.

- [Laurence] In a 2011 hearing,

Sirhan's lawyers take a new tack.

- Sirhan's lawyers accused the CIA

of making him an unwitting foil

for their operation to kill Kennedy.

- The magistrate, however, rejects this theory.

He says there's inference,

but there's no actual proof of what happened.

(dramatic music)

But Robert Kennedy still has enemies,

not enemies just in the CIA,

but enemies who are willing to kill,

especially people who cross them.

- ...attorney's in no position to override-

- [Laurence] Before becoming attorney general

under his brother,

Robert Kennedy first makes a name for himself

as general counsel for a Senate committee

going after organized crime in the late 1950s.

- As the Senate committee's top lawyer,

Robert Kennedy personally questioned

the witnesses pretty aggressively,

and these hearings were televised.

- Kennedy put himself in the crosshairs

of some of the most merciless men in the United States.

And some people wonder,

did these men finally get their revenge?

(dramatic music)

- One of Kennedy's targets is Sam Momo Giancana.

He's the mob boss in Chicago.

- Giancana is known for being particularly merciless,

sometimes even hanging his victims by meat hooks.

And Robert Kennedy on national television

accuses him of murder to his face.

- Giancana responds by pleading the fifth

with a sinister smile.

- And this infuriates Giancana.

- When Robert Kennedy becomes attorney general

targeting those same Mafia guys

who he starts to eat for lunch and dinner, too.

Bobby Kennedy was the greatest crime fighter

this country has ever had.

- There's a member of the Giancana family

who has said that the Kennedys' attacks on the mob

were such that Giancana ordered a hit

on both John Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy.

And the mob would certainly have the means

and the opportunity and the motive to kill Robert Kennedy.

(dramatic music)

- Perhaps Sirhan is just the patsy.

So a Mafia hit man can take the fatal shot at Kennedy

and escape while Sirhan is being ganged up by the crowd.

- [Laurence] Kennedy also makes an enemy of Jimmy Hoffa,

the powerful head of the Teamsters Union.

- Bobby was convinced that Jimmy Hoffa

had connections to organized crime,

and Bobby truly believed

that it was a conspiracy of organized evil.

- The two of them going up against each other,

I mean, it really was intense and they hated each other.

- And Hoffa finally snaps

and he says to Kennedy, "You're sick.

"That's what's the matter with you, you're sick."

- In September of 1962,

Jimmy Hoffa is on trial for extortion.

- Hoffa gets a hung verdict,

but he's still livid about all of this,

and people say that he wants

to fire bomb Bobby Kennedy's house.

- After Sirhan's arrest,

the organized crime theory is quickly dismissed.

Some say that the legal blowback from killing Kennedy

is something that the mob would want to avoid.

- Some say that organized crime may have been in cahoots

with the CIA, and it wouldn't have been the first time

that they had worked together on an assassination plot.

- But still in the end, there's no evidence showing

the Mafia was directly involved,

and Sirhan Sirhan himself has never brought it up.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] Whoever is responsible

for Robert Kennedy's death, one thing is certain.

That his assassination robbed America

of one of her greatest statesmen.

(dramatic music)

- I think that one of the things

that we can admire about Bobby is that he had this awakening,

being committed to those who were poor,

to those who are not sharing in our democratic life,

and decided to try his best to get to know people

who are so different than him,

and I find that to be extremely inspirational.

And unfortunately,

that willingness to be close to people

is part of his demise.

- [Crowd] RFK! RFK!

- [Laurence] Today, more than five decades later,

only one person has been charged and convicted

in Robert Kennedy's assassination, Sirhan Sirhan.

- Sirhan Sirhan still sits in prison to this day.

He's exhausted all of his legal appeals,

yet he still comes up for parole

and he still insists

that he doesn't remember shooting Robert Kennedy.

(dramatic music)

- In August of 2021,

Sirhan appears before the parole board for the 16th time.

This time the board finds the 77-year-old Sirhan

no longer poses a threat to society.

They vote to release him on parole,

but the governor of California overrules the decision

and Sirhan returns to his prison cell.

His next parole hearing is in 2026.

I'm Laurence Fishburne.

Thank you for watching

"History's Greatest Mysteries."

(dramatic music)