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Attorneys argue for Sirhan Sirhan's release, retrial
By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
November 28th, 2011
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)
November 28th, 2011
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)
The convicted assassin of Robert F. Kennedy, Sirhan Sirhan should be
freed from prison or granted a new trial based on "formidable evidence"
asserting his innocence and "horrendous violations" of his rights. Those
are the recommendations of defense attorneys who filed court papers in
federal court this week.
Three bullets struck Kennedy's body while a fourth bullet passed harmlessly through his coat. The most seriously wounded of the six victims, Kennedy died the following day. The other five people survived their wounds.
Sirhan's say that an expert analysis of recently uncovered evidence reveals that two guns were fired in the assassination -- and that Sirhan's revolver was not the gun that shot Kennedy.
Attorneys William F. Pepper and Laurie D. Dusek allege that fraud was committed in Sirhan's trial in 1969 when the court allowed a substitute bullet to be admitted as evidence for a real bullet removed from Kennedy's neck.
The attorneys also say that Sirhan was hypno-programmed to be a diversion for the real assassin. They allege that Sirhan would be easily blamed for the assassination because as he is an Arab. Sirhan, now 67 years old is a Christian Palestinian born in Jerusalem whose parents brought him and his siblings to America in the 1950s.
Sirhan "was an involuntary participant in the crimes being committed because he was subjected to sophisticated hypno programming and memory implantation techniques which rendered him unable to consciously control his thoughts and actions at the time the crimes were being committed," court papers said.
The papers say the state "refuses to acknowledge that hypno programming/mind control is not fiction but reality and has been used for years by the U.S. military, Central Intelligence Agency and other covert organizations.
"Though the practices of hypno programming/mind control are hardly new, the public has been shielded from the darker side of the practice. The average person is unaware that hypnosis can and is used to induct antisocial conduct in humans," the court filings say.
Attorneys Pepper and Dusek represented Sirhan earlier this year in an unsuccessful request for parole. Sirhan remains incarcerated at the Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga, California, 200 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles, where he is serving a life sentence.
According to the attorneys, an analysis of a recently uncovered audiotape of the assassination shows that in addition to the eight gunshots fired by Sirhan's gun, five other shots were fired by a second gun from the opposite direction.
The sound recording "clearly showed that 13 shots were fired in the pantry, and Sirhan's gun had only eight shots, so it definitely means there was a second shooter," Pepper told CNN.
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