California Governor Gavin Newsom refuses to pardon Sirhan Sirhan

California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) on Thursday parole denied for Sirhan Sirhan, the 77-year-old man convicted in 1969 for the murder of Robert F. Kennedy.

“The assassination of Senator Kennedy is one of the most notorious crimes in American history,” Newsom said in a statement. “After decades in prison, he failed to address the flaws that led him to assassinate Senator Kennedy. Mr. Sirhan’s lack of insight may have prevented him from making the same dangerous decisions as you. I’ve done in the past.”

In one Opinion section published on Thursday afternoon inside LA timeNewsom further explained that he had carefully reviewed the case and examined the historical record, and determined that Sirhan had “failed to develop the accountability and insight necessary to support his release.” safe into the community.” Sirhan was “a powerful symbol of political violence”, Newsom wrote, and Kennedy’s assassination “not only changed the course of this nation and robbed the world of a promising young leader, it also left his 11 children fatherless, husbandless. The Kennedy family bears his loss every day.”

Kennedy was shot and killed in June 1968 at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, shortly after he was elected Democratic president in California. Sirhan, a Palestinian immigrant, claims he doesn’t remember opening fire. He was initially sentenced to death, but this was reduced to life in prison when California briefly banned the death penalty in 1972.

A two-person status parole board recommended in August that Sirhan was pardoned. While two of Kennedy’s children said they supported his release, six others said they were upset by the recommendation.