Word: sirhan
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Protesting "tyranny, sadism and so-called benevolent despotism," Sirhan Sirhan began a hunger strike at San Quentin. His specific grievance was his forced separation from other convicts on Death Row. The warden was unmoved. Under close medical observation, Robert Kennedy's convicted killer subsisted for more than two weeks on instant cocoa and coffee, plus his regular reading diet of Arab newspapers and Playboy...
...didn't "announce to the world," or anyone else, that I was going to take Sirhan's case, and I wasn't "chasing" it as you made it appear...
Close associates of Kennedy's meanwhile began to talk about the likely consequences of a death sentence. Civil libertarians might start a campaign to save Sirhan from the gas chamber. Some friends envisioned demonstrations in front of Ted's Senate office or Ethel's Hickory Hill home...
Fine Longhand. Last week the Senator made his move. Sirhan's jury had voted the death penalty on April 23, and Superior Court Judge Herbert V. Walker was considering a motion to reduce the sentence. Kennedy drafted a plea for mercy in his fine longhand. He sent copies to Ethel, Sisters Pat Lawford and Jean Smith, and his mother, Rose. They had discussed the matter before; all approved the text. Then Ted sent his original copy to Judge Walker. "My brother was a man of love and sentiment and compassion," he wrote. "He would not have wanted his death...
...dramatic intervention did not faze Walker. As expected, the judge denied both the motion for reducing the death sentence and a plea for a new trial. "It is the feeling of this court that the jury was right," he explained. "I find no reason to change my mind now." Sirhan smiled, shrugged his shoulders and was taken to San Quentin Prison's death row. There he will await the outcome of lengthy appeal proceedings. Defense Investigator Michael McCowan quoted Sirhan as saying: "Well, now the real battle begins...