RFK's Assassination

Summary

Podcast Summary: United States of Kennedy – "RFK's Assassination"
Date: January 26, 2026
Host: George Civeris (Julia Claire absent)
Guest: Zach Stewart Pontier (filmmaker, podcaster, creator of The RFK Tapes)

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Episode Overview

In this episode, George Civeris examines the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy (RFK) in 1968, focusing specifically on the myriad conspiracy theories that have surrounded the event ever since. Guest Zach Stewart Pontier joins to share insights from his in-depth research and podcast series, The RFK Tapes, re-examining the official narrative, the alternative theories, and the cultural impact of the murder.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. RFK’s Background and Political Context

• George gives a brisk run-through of RFK’s biography and political rise, from working with Joseph McCarthy to managing his brother JFK’s campaigns, serving as Attorney General, battling organized crime, targeting Castro, and a late-but-committed entry into civil rights.
• “Bobby was a late convert to the civil rights movement... he infamously authorized wiretapping of Martin Luther King Jr.” (02:28–03:36)
• RFK’s shift from tough AG to a figure of compassion and unity following JFK’s assassination frames his appeal during the 1968 campaign.

2. The Assassination Night: Official Narrative

• George and Zach discuss the events of June 5, 1968. RFK is shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles just after winning the California primary.
• Sirhan Sirhan, a young Palestinian immigrant, is captured and convicted – this forms the widely-accepted version of what happened.
• “One of the most famous things... RFK on his back in the kitchen of the hotel...” (08:06–08:45, Zach)
• The chaos and celebration of that night shift instantly to tragedy.

3. Sirhan Sirhan: The Man, The Mystery

• Sirhan Sirhan’s background is explored: failed jockey, struggling immigrant, vague motives, and, critically, little recall of the event itself.
• “He doesn’t seem to be able to remember the crime.” (10:44, Zach)
• Noted oddness: Months of hypnotic interrogation recorded in tapes, with Sirhan apparently unable to recall the act.
• “He’s getting very upset... the hypnotist has this booming voice... Sirhan, reach for the gun, you’re killing Kennedy. Why are you doing it? And he’s hyperventilating...” (12:01, Zach)

4. Immediate Aftermath: The Race to Closure

• Pressure on authorities to quickly resolve the case owing to messiness around the JFK assassination.
• Early complications: Sandra Serrano claims a “woman in a polka-dot dress” said, “We did it, we killed Kennedy.” (13:18–14:32, Zach)
• Efforts to dismiss this testimony as mistaken or coerced retraction – highlights early suspicion about a lone gunman.

5. Sirhan in Later Years

• Sirhan sometimes claimed responsibility, later retracted, and eventually came to believe he’d been “programmed.”
• “There was a time when he went on TV and took credit for it... Then he backed off of that... [later] he believes that he was taken somewhere and trained to do this.” (20:05, Zach)
• Sirhan remains in prison at over 80, denied parole as recently as 2022.

6. Why Zach Stewart Pontier Got Pulled Into the Case

• Zach’s fascination traced back to a documentary he heard as a kid and, later, access to extensive archives: “When I saw the list of all the tapes they had, I just started to get incredibly excited...” (21:41, Zach)
• Introduction of key figures: Bill Klaber (investigative journalist deeply invested in alternative theories), Paul Schrade (RFK supporter and shooting victim), and Allard Lowenstein (congressman/friend who spotlighted discrepancies).

7. The Bullet Count and Ballistic Mysteries

• The central pillar of alternative theories: too many wounds for an 8-shot revolver.
  • “The gist of it... Kennedy’s hit three times and there’s six other victims. So... there’s nine people. And his gun only holds eight bullets...” (26:16, Zach)
• Possible second shooter: security guard Thane Cesar, who had a .22-caliber gun and animosity towards RFK’s civil rights stances.
• The “woman in the polka-dot dress” as possible handler, and the alleged usage of hypnotic “programming” in the murder.

8. Problems with the Alternative Theories

• George and Zach flag how alternative narratives are as patchy as the official one:
  • “If you were confident in your hypno programming, why would you need a second shooter?” (25:17, George)
  • Theorist assertion vs. logistical likelihood: “Wouldn’t you give them the same gun? ... You also need a corrupt police force to cover it up. It’s just so complicated.” (38:00–38:20, Zach)
• Both reflect on how human fallibility and chaotic events breed confusion.

9. RFK Jr. and Schrade’s Later Involvement

• R.F.K. Jr. and Paul Schrade formally pressed for reexamination of the case, focusing on Cesar as the likely second shooter, but nothing substantial changed. George notes RFK Jr.'s later notoriety for conspiracy thinking as possibly undermining the push. (40:18–41:03)

10. Handling Conspiracies in a Changed Media Climate

• Zach describes original enthusiasm morphing into caution as “conspiracies became more front-facing and peddled from official channels” in the Trump era. (41:57–43:33, Zach)
• Grapples with responsibility: “It felt reckless a little to be just spinning things up without answers.” (42:19, Zach)

11. Reflections on Motivation, Uncertainty, and Legacy

• Both George and Zach reflect on how everyone involved—investigators, victims, and conspiracy theorists alike—were likely motivated by sincere beliefs and trauma.
• Key takeaway: “I think questioning things is important. I never blame anyone for asking questions.” (30:08, Zach)
• Enduring ambiguities: emotional motives, unreliable witnesses, chaotic evidence. “The Kennedy story—no matter how overexposed—remains weirdly unknowable.” (36:24, George)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “He doesn’t seem to be able to remember the crime.” – Zach Stewart Pontier (10:44)
• “I know a land from a groove, but I know that an eight-shot revolver can’t fire nine bullets.” (26:43, unidentified famous line)
• “When I saw the list of all the tapes they had, I just started to get incredibly excited...” – Zach (21:41)
• “I used to say to Bill, like, I would not be the one... that pitched this idea... We need three things. They’re simple things. We could do them all. We need a girl. She should be wearing some sort of dress, like maybe polka dot...” – Zach (29:24)
• “The Kennedys are so, despite being so overexposed, weirdly unknowable.” – George (36:24)
• “I think questioning things is important. I never blame anyone for asking questions.” – Zach (30:08)
• “It felt reckless a little to be just spinning things up without answers.” – Zach (42:19)
• “Sometimes pure motives can be combined with misguided beliefs, whereas the opposite is also true...” – George (45:23)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• RFK’s background and lead-up to assassination: 02:28–06:17
• Official account and depiction in film: 06:17–09:28
• Sirhan Sirhan’s story, hypnosis, and memory loss: 09:28–12:22
• Sandra Serrano’s polka-dot dress account: 13:18–15:08
• Sirhan’s public statements and evolving beliefs: 20:05–21:01
• Alternative theories, hypno-programming, second shooter, Thane Cesar: 24:30–29:05
• Confounding details and problems with all theories: 37:26–38:20
• Paul Schrade and RFK Jr. team up for reinvestigation: 40:18–41:03
• Media/Conspiracy climate shifts post-2016: 41:57–43:33
• Final reflections on uncertainty and motivation: 44:31–45:43

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Tone & Style

The tone is open-minded, wry, and careful—both host and guest balance skepticism towards official and alternative explanations, expressing empathy for investigators and amateur sleuths alike while emphasizing the complexity and irresolvability of the case. The conversation is thoughtful, sometimes humorous, and always aware of the larger context of American history and the Kennedy family's unique place within it.

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For listeners: This episode offers a nuanced, engaging look at RFK’s assassination—interweaving historical recap, details from primary sources, and a candid conversation about the limits of both the official record and alternative theories. Whether you’re a conspiracy theory skeptic or enthusiast, you’ll find plenty to consider about memory, power, belief, and the American need for meaning in its tragedies.

Transcript

[Podcast Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast, guaranteed human.

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[Julia Claire]

What if mind control is real?

[Podcast Announcer]

If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

[Julia Claire]

Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings.

[Julia Claire]

Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

[Robert Smith]

I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

[Julia Claire]

Can you get someone to join your cult?

[Mind Games Narrator]

NLP was used on me to access.

[Julia Claire]

My subconscious mind games. A new podcast exploring nlp, AKA Neuro linguistic programming. Is it a self help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[John Paulk]

I'm John Polk. For years I was the poster boy of the conversion therapy movement, the ex gay who married an ex lesbian and traveled the world telling my story of how I changed my sexuality from gay to straight. You might have heard my story, but you've never heard the real story.

[George Severis]

John has never been anything but gay, but he really tried hard not to be.

[John Paulk]

Listen to Atonement. The John Paulk story on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Mama quiero life un nuevo yo domin.

[George Severis]

Quiero uno con Verizon nos lle.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Vamos cuatro iPhone 17 sin intercambio tados vamos estrenar iPhone.

[Julia Claire]

Hi Termino consiente tu familia converai cuatro iPhone 17s hi nosa requer.

[George Severis]

I'm George Severis and this is United States of Kennedy, a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week we go into one aspect of a Kennedy story and today we are Talking about the 1968 RFK assassination and specifically about the variety of conspiracy theories that have formed around it. Julia is out this week, but she will be back in business soon, so it's just me today. All right, let's get into it. So RFK Robert Francis Kennedy was the seventh child of Joseph and Rose Kennedy. He was their third son behind Joseph Jr. Who died in World War II, and JFK, who was of course killed in 1968. He is also of course RFK Jr's father. A bit of background on Bobby's political career up until 1968. His first job was with Kennedy family friend Senator Joseph McCarthy. Yes, that Joseph McCarthy. He worked for six months on McCarthy's permanent subcommittee on Investigations to root out so called commies in the US government. RFK did quit, but remained close with McCarthy, who was actually the godfather of RFK's first child. Bobby then successfully managed JFK's campaigns for both the House and the Senate. He spent much of the mid-50s through the early 60s, including as JFK's attorney general on a crusade to root out organized crime in America, which we explored on this podcast in our episode on RFK versus Jimmy Hoffa. RFK also became obsessed with toppling Castro in Cuba. He oversaw the clandestine Operation Mongoose which made at least eight failed attempts on Castro's life. And back home in terms of domestic matters, Bobby was a late convert to the civil rights movement. In 1963, under pressure from J. Edgar Hoover, he infamously authorized wiretapping of Martin Luther King Jr. And other civil rights leaders. This brings us to 1968. So as a candidate in the Democratic primary for President, Bobby put out a very different image to the American people than that of the aggressive, dogged Attorney General taking on the bad guys. After his brother's assassination, the story goes, he developed a newfound compassion for the plights of others, including Americans of color and poor Americans. He also joined his primary challenger, Eugene McCarthy in expressing his disapproval for the Vietnam War. One of his most memorable moments came in a seemingly unscripted speech he gave after the assassination of Martin Luther King. So I'm going to quote from that now. RFK says what we need in the United States is not division. What we need in the United States is not hatred. What we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness, but is love and wisdom and compassion towards one another and a feeling of justice towards those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black. So it is in this context that RFK started winning over hearts and minds and won the California primary. On June 5, 1968. After giving his victory speech at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, he was led back through the kitchen and while celebrating and shaking supporters hands, he was shot and killed. A young man named Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of his murder and he is still alive in California prison today. But like all things Kennedy, the official narrative of these events has not been accepted by all, and conspiracy theories abound. Our guest today is Zach Stewart Pontier, a filmmaker, journalist and podcaster known for projects like HBO's the Jinx and the podcast series Crime Town. In 2018, he released a series called the RFK Tapes, which explored the RFK assassination through rare recordings and new to try to understand what really happened on June 5, 1968. Zach, welcome to United States of Kennedy.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Thank you so much for having me.

[George Severis]

So, first off, because of a variety of scheduling issues and the kind of nonlinear nature of the show, we interestingly have not done an episode on the RFK assassination yet, but we have done a movie club episode on the forgotten 2006 film Bobby. Have you seen that movie?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

It's been a bit, and I didn't go back and rewatch it since working on the story. So my memory of it is that of a college kid who didn't understand anything, anything about completely the history of it. My memory is that it all takes place in the Ambassador Hotel. That's right, the night of the assassination. And it's star studded like a gajillion. Cameos of people are coming in and out and they're like, oh, that's a famous person. That's a famous person.

[George Severis]

Yeah, exactly. It's classic Oscar hopeful that landed with a thud and did not actually do what it needed to do either in the box office or with critics. But I bring it up because to me, it's actually kind of a great place to start in terms of the conventional historical narrative about what happened that night. I mean, it is a movie that is very much meant to be wistful and hopeful and nostalgic about that time. It is very kind of uncritical about Bobby himself. He is someone who is a great unifier. He wins the California primary, he gives this inspirational speech, and then a variety of people that are staying at this hotel are all inspired by him for a variety of reasons. There's a war veteran and the people who are inspired by his recent evolution on, quote, unquote, race issues. And then would you believe that this crazy person comes and assassinates him and it is this wound in American history. So with that in mind, before we get into any of the weeds of the various theories around the assassination, I wonder if you could just tell us what is the official conventional historical narrative. If you were to ask the average person that has read US mandated AP history books, you know, what would they tell you happened on June 5, 1968.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I think one of the most famous things that is lodged in people's memory is RFK on his back in the kitchen of the hotel and the busboy standing next to him with the rosary. I mean, this is the whole story that he had won this thing. He. You know, his brother had been murdered five years earlier. He had this sort of rise, and he was going to get the nomination. California was the last domino, and it was all going to fall. And in this moment of passion, he leaves. And Sirhan Sirhan, a young man, pulls out a gun, shoots him, and he dies on the floor. Sirhan Sirhan is captured and taken away. And that's the story.

[George Severis]

And the scene is this very. I mean, again, I'm really. I'm going off of the movie here, which is funny because it's a movie no one else has seen except me and a few other people. But it is this chaotic scene where he's. From what I understand, he was gonna go in a different direction after the speech, but instead because of. Because he needed to talk to the press. And the best way to where he was going was through the kitchen. Kind of last minute, he was taken through the kitchen. And it is chaotic, both in the sense that everyone is crowding him, but also in a positive way. It's like a celebratory vibe. You know, he is shaking hands. People want to meet him. It's kind of crazy that he's in the kitchen with the hotel workers. So it's even before any shots are fired. It's kind of a chaotic atmosphere.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

It's a crazy scene. It's jubilant. The ballroom at the hotel is packed full of people. There's tons of press. There's so many different angles of this speech. There's so many different angles of him walking out. You can hear him say, oh, this way. Okay. And you can kind of see. And they lead him away and then pop, pop, pop. There's no actual footage of the murder itself, but there's pop, pop, pop. And then everybody's screaming. All of a sudden, people are running and screaming and stampeding. And the scene takes a dramatic turn.

[George Severis]

And so a young man shoots him. And then a variety of people inside the crowd try to basically tackle people.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Obviously, famously, Rosie Greer.

[George Severis]

Yeah, yeah. And the writer George Plimpton was also kind of involved somehow.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, George Clinton was there. Author George Plimpton says he. This is from a LAAP article. Author George Plimpton says he lacked the courage to look at dying Senator rfk. But instead lunged against the senator's assailant, a man he described as composed and peaceful. And this would come into the way Sirhan Sirhan behaves. Raises a lot of questions.

[George Severis]

Right? Of course, that's a great lead into the obvious next question, which is, who is Sirhan Sirhan? He's a young man. He's a Palestinian Christian, from what I remember. What did we know, you know, in the days after this? What did the LAPD find out about him?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

They pieced together a picture of a guy who has recently given up on his dream of being a jockey, struggling as an immigrant in California to fit in. They figure out how he got the gun, they figure out a lot about him, and it becomes a political case. Then because the story becomes so big, it gets co opted by various people. And was it Kennedy's thoughts on the Middle east that did it, and was it Kennedy's changing thoughts on Vietnam? There were all these ideas of why this young man wanted to kill Kennedy. And most importantly, he doesn't seem to be able to remember the crime.

[Progressive Insurance Advertiser]

Right.

[George Severis]

He doesn't remember the actual events when interviewed.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, the last thing he remembers is getting a cup of coffee. And one of the things that drew me to this case was they bring in a hypnotist and they hypnotize him and they tape record all of this. And it's wild. I mean, it's wild to think that in 1968 hypnosis would be like a, a real part of an investigation. And they spent hours and hours hypnotizing him, trying to get him to remember. He never can.

[George Severis]

And what is he saying under hypnosis? I mean, I'm remembering when I listened to the podcast, him yelling like, no, no, no or yes or Robert is going to die, or, you know, he's getting very.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

He's getting very upset. Like he, you can see and the hypnotist has this booming voice and he's like trying to take him through. You're there in the Ambassador kitchen. You're reaching. Reach for the gun, Sirhan. Reach for the gun. You'. It, you're killing Kennedy. Why are you doing it? And he's hyperventilating and like he can't explain it.

[George Severis]

So in terms of the actual case, obviously, regardless of what you believe about alternative theories or conspiracy theories, I know that's a loaded term. There was a reason why the LAPD wanted to perform competence, for lack of a better term, because the JFK assassination had happened five years before. It was famously messy and chaotic, and the primary suspect was Immediately murdered on camera. The number of conspiracy. Conspiracy theories that had already started to spring up were unmanageable. There was a sort of distrust in the police, in the CIA, in the general system that was investigating this incredibly, historically important murder of a US President. And so it seems like part of the aftermath of the RFK assassination was like, we have to wrap this up as soon as possible, and we found a suspect. We have to act extremely certain about what the official narrative is, and we have to close the case. So what was the timeline like right after?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I don't know what the timeline was exactly. There were wrinkles right away that happens. Hours after the shooting, Sandra Serrano is on TV and says, I saw a woman in a polka dot dress run out of the kitchen and say, we did it. We did it. We killed Kennedy. So that sort of blows up the lone gunman theory right there. If there's somebody else running out saying, we did it, then obviously he's not surrounded by himself. He then corroborates. They ask him about a woman in a polka dot dress, and he. He can't quite say a polka dot dress, but he does remember seeing a woman who wanted to give him a cup of coffee and maybe pinched him on the neck. So this idea pretty quickly springs up that they have to find this woman in the polka dot dress, and they look for her. The cops are on the COVID of the newspaper holding up a polka dot dress. They take Sandra Serrano to figure out how big the polka dots were, and then they decide it's not relevant, and they take her into a witness interrogation room and they beat it out. Not beat it out, but they grind her down until she says that she didn't see a girl in the polka dot dress. So they're trying to get their story straight, but it's a little unruly. There's also too many bullets. I don't know if you want to talk about that.

[George Severis]

Well, yeah, no, we'll get to that. But speaking of the woman in the polka dot dress, everything sort of has like a. You know, there's always some accusation that seems like, oh, this must be true. This must be, you know, we're blowing the thing wide open. And then there's some very obvious antidote to that. And for this one, one of the things we read was that the witnesses said that she was saying, we shot him, but then, in fact, she could have been saying, we got him, meaning the. The assassin. Like, we got him. As in, like, the crowd pinned down the person who had shot RFK So both of those are equally likely in absence of more detailed evidence.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I totally agree. Yeah, a lot of this turns into a mirror of like what you're looking for.

[George Severis]

We'll be back with more United States of Kennedy after this break.

[Mind Games Narrator]

What if mind control is real?

[Podcast Announcer]

If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

[Mind Games Narrator]

Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

[John Paulk]

I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Can you get someone to join your cult?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

NLP was used on me to access my subconscious.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Nlp, AKA Neuro linguistic programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain.

[George Severis]

It's about engineering consciousness.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Mind Games is the story of nlp, its crazy cast of disciples and the fake doctor who invented it at a new age commune. The and sold it to guys in suits. He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all, NLP might actually work.

[Julia Claire]

This is wild.

[Mind Games Narrator]

Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[John Paulk]

I'm John Paulk. For years I was the poster boy of the conversion therapy movement. The ex gay who married an ex lover lesbian and traveled the world telling my story of how I changed my sexuality from gay to straight. Once upon a time I was on 60 Minutes, Oprah, the front cover of Newsweek, and you might have heard my story, but you've never heard the real story. So join me as I peel back the layers and expose what happened to me in the midst of conversion therapy to shine a light on what the X Game movement does to people and the pain it continues to cause.

[George Severis]

I had lost £150 because if I.

[John Paulk]

Couldn'T control my sexuality, I was going.

[George Severis]

To control my weight.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

It sounded like, and this is the word I used, a cult.

[John Paulk]

And as I look too at the harm I did from within it. Listen to Atonement, the John Paulk story on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Podcast Announcer]

On June 11, 1998, a deputy from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department went missing. It's an all out manhunt for John Ajay.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Every search and rescue team in LA county has been called in to help.

[Podcast Announcer]

Within days, tips started flooding into the sheriff's department.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

The rumor around the drug scene was that a deputy was taken care of.

[Podcast Announcer]

Is this the story of a man who just got lost in the desert? Or of a cover up inside the nation's largest sheriff's department?

[Robert Smith]

A homicide captain saying, detective, do not find out if this guy's guilty or innocent. Who does that?

[Podcast Announcer]

Valley of Shadows, a new series from Pushkin Industries about crime and corruption in California's high desert. Do you have any advice for us while looking into this disappearance?

[George Severis]

I wouldn't do it alone.

[Podcast Announcer]

Listen to Valley of shadows on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Jacob Goldstein]

The Volkswagen Beetle started out as Hitler's dream car. It wound up as a beloved hippie icon and the best selling car of all time.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

How did that happen?

[Jacob Goldstein]

I'm Jacob Goldstein.

[Robert Smith]

And I'm Robert Smith. On business history, we tell the surprising stories behind the inventions and entrepreneurs that shaped our.

[Jacob Goldstein]

And the story of the Beatle is truly surprising. It has so much in it. It has Nazis, it has the German economic miracle.

[Robert Smith]

And it features one of the most famous ads of all time, an ad that really redefined what advertising was in the United States.

[Jacob Goldstein]

The calculation was that there was some number of Americans who were ready for something different, who were ready for something that was counter to the culture, if you will.

[Robert Smith]

Perfect timing.

[Jacob Goldstein]

In the decade of the 1970s, 60s.

[Robert Smith]

Listen to Business History on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts and watch episodes on YouTube.

[George Severis]

And we're back with United States of Kennedy. So in terms of Sirhan Sirhan, obviously there is some mystery at the core of who he is. I mean, he doesn't remember what happened. His political motivations are maybe a bit vague and people, I think, projected a lot onto him because of his ethnic and religious identities. What has he actually said? He's still alive today. What has he said publicly specifically during that time? But even since then, he's had many different phases.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I would say. There was a time when he went on TV and took credit for it, said that he had done it for political reasons and that he, he would do it again, basically. Then he backed off of that. And he was young. I mean, I can't imagine what it was like to be in jail for this long. And he's had many different lawyers over the years and he's come up for parole many different times later in life. By all accounts, he's become like very, I think, peaceful. He buys into the conspiracy. I mean, he believes that he was taken somewhere and trained to do this. And yeah, he has a lot of people that around him. That also believe that and he was up for parole and he got the California Parole Board and I think in 2022 said that he should get parole and Newsom blocked it. I, I believe they should let him out. I, I, that's what I believe.

[George Severis]

Well, he's, I mean he's 80 years old right now. He's been in prison since his 20s. So you're, we're sort of dancing around some of the kind of more colorful alternative theories and I want to get into the details. But, but before we do, I actually would love to know, I know you've talked about this a lot, but what got you interested in this case?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

So it was the first podcast I ever heard was a tape that a 30 minute documentary or an hour documentary that Bill Kleber made in the 80s. And it just was really, I was really struck by just the case and I think the movie JFK had just come out and I was kind of like interested in the whole story of the Kennedys and this case as a kid.

[George Severis]

Kid.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

And then I got into podcasts later and in life I did a podcast called Crime Town for Gimlet. And then after that we were thinking about what we would do next and I had remembered Bill's RFK tapes piece and we contacted the California State Archives and when I saw the list of all the tapes they had, I just started to get incredibly excited and we decided to make the podcast. But the thing about the story that hooked me was Allard Lowenstein, who was a congressman at the time and a good friend of RFK and just a really inspirational dude, and had spoken on the phone from the hotel with Kennedy before he went downstairs and was one of the first people to start to get suspicious because of the amount of bullets that were later found. It didn't add up to Allard Lowenstein. And Howard Lowenstein started to spin up publicity and got people to relook at it. And at the time the police were holding a lot back and he got a lot of information out. They reached, they do a lot of tests and then Howard Lowenstein is murdered.

[George Severis]

When Was he murdered?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, 78 or 80, I think.

[George Severis]

And for anyone who either might not know or might have listened to the podcast in 2018 and doesn't remember who is Bill Kleber? How did he get involved in all of it?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Bill Klaver was a member of a very select community of researchers, conspiracy researchers I would call them, that fought really hard to get all of the evidentiary and investigative files to the California State Archives. And it was a big deal. He had known Paul Schrade, who had been wounded in the kitchen. And Paul Schrade kind of was the grandfather of this movement. And Bill was the closest that I got to that. He was the one who had picked up the flame. He was republishing his book about the assassination, and he had done this audio piece, and he became my co host, my guide through the story. And the podcast is he's telling me the story of the conspiracy of rfk, and we're investing investigating it together.

[George Severis]

And the listener really kind of relates to you because you are getting caught up in it at one minute and then being like, oh, my God, is this guy completely full of shit the next minute? Because someone like Bill has an incredibly strong belief that his version of events is the true version of events. And so that inevitably caused him to have a few blind spots or he'll be especially credulous when something pops up that supports his theories.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I would agree with all that.

[George Severis]

Yeah.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

He's also a wonderful man, and he. He's very smart. And it's an identity, and it's a belief that when questioned, it's hard to describe, but I have beliefs like that. You know what I mean? So, you know, the last time I talked to Bill, which wasn't that long ago, he said, let's go over the bullets one more time. I said, bill, you know, so, all.

[George Severis]

Right, all right, let's get into the bullet. Let's get into, like, the specifics, you know, now that we know what most people believe, obviously, Sir Hunter was tried and imprisoned as though he was acting alone. That is the official narrative. You know, doesn't hurt anyone to sort of entertain alternative theories on a podcast. So what are the building blocks of this alternative theory?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

The Manchurian Candidate, the CIA testing of. Can you create an assassin who would be like a robot, for which there's lots of evidence they were trying to do that.

[George Severis]

And this is hypno programming, correct? Is the. Is the term. Does the hypno programming theory coexist with the theory that there are two shooters? Meaning it was Sirhan Sirhan hypno programmed, or is this whole thing related to a different, more legitimate shooter being the one to actually shoot Bobby?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

See, this is sort of the problem. Like, if you were confident in your hypno programming, why would you need a second shooter? Yeah, they both exist in the same thing. And I would say, like, the conspiracy community has gray areas where you'd be at an awesome dinner and we'd all be talking when this guy believes something different about the theory than this woman. And you're sort of like, okay, well we can all agree there's too many bullets, right? You know, like, okay, you know, so I don't think there's one, one theory, but the second shooter is the predominant theory that there was a second shooter standing behind Bobby Kennedy.

[George Severis]

So whether or not anyone was hypno programmed, the basic tenets of the conspiracy theory is that the original account says that there were seven or eight shots heard, but in fact there were 13 shots heard, which is impossible because the gun that Sirhan Sirhan had only had eight bullets in it. Is that correct?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

You're close. It's less about how many shots were heard and more about the wounds of the people. So Kennedy said three times. The gist of it, the theory and I, this is the, the conspiracy people you're going to get letters are going to come after you because they're going to be like he said this and it's not that. And they're absolutely right. It's not what I'm saying. But just for the sake of argument, he's hit three times and there's six other victims. So how is that? There's nine people.

[George Severis]

I see.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

And his gun only holds eight bullets. And so there was a famous line, was like I don't know a land from a groove, but I know that an eight shot revolver can't fire nine bullets.

[George Severis]

Right. And then also he was shot from close range. But Sirhan Sirhan was never that close to him.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yes. Yeah. So now you get into witness eyewitness testimony which I as any detective will tell you is murky. But yes, it was as if the gun was pressed on Robert Kennedy's neck. And many people say he never got that close. And the other thing was that Kennedy's hit here and here and people can't see, but I'm pointing like up my armpit as if somebody was standing behind and shot three times. And everybody said Sirhan was in front of him.

[George Severis]

Right.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

So then there's a question of like, did he go like this and like cower? Did he turn his body away?

[George Severis]

And.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

And then the firing started. And so this is what happened, the everybody. And, and so when you compare the witness statements, nothing really lines up to the forensic autopsy.

[George Severis]

Did the people in charge of the case at all entertain any feedback like this?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I would say that they know everybody that was in that kitchen. And there was one other person that had a gun and they did try to get that gun to test it. That was Thane Caesar, he was the number one suspect for the second gunman. He was a security guard that was hired, and I think he had a.22. 2.

[George Severis]

He had a.22. And people know he was there. Were there any eyewitnesses that saw him pull out the gun? No, no, no. And his. From what I understand, and correct me if I'm wrong, his motivations were sort of racist.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, he didn't like. He didn't like Kennedy and he was racist. And that.

[George Severis]

Yes, he didn't like any. He didn't. He didn't like his turn towards civil rights. And it would have been purely a political motive.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

There was a tremendous amount of animosity in la, in the police community, for Kennedy, and Thane Caesar was connected to that. On. And so that was a theory that the woman in the polka dot dress was the handler, and she took Sirhan and she got him a cup of coffee and then did the thing that whatever was supposed to have him go into his hypno program stance and he shoots and everybody looks at him. And then the real assassin just goes, pop, pop, pop, and walks away. And then that's that.

[George Severis]

I mean, just off the bat, it's like a. The thinking you need both a hypno assassin and a real assassin and is still sort of confounding to me. I think then having the woman in the polka dot dress allegedly go out and be openly celebrating that they killed Kennedy is also kind of a strange phenomenon.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I used to say to Bill, like, I would not be the one, the guy in the CIA meeting that pitched this idea. I would be so afraid. Well, okay, simple. But just bear with me for a second. We need three things. They're simple things. We could do them all. We need a girl. She should be wearing some sort of dress, like maybe polka dot. You're just like, this is the plan. This is the master plan. You're gonna kill in front of the world in the kitchen with these people that it seemed like everything would go wrong.

[George Severis]

Yeah, kill him in front of the whole world. Have the. The woman in charge be clearly visible and, you know, shouting, stick out. But yes, like, because she's wearing something that is very much, like, identifiable, then she basically admits it loudly to everyone. What just happened, it was hard to.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Make sense of it. I. I think the thing that is confounding is how are there more people wounded than bullets? And how is it that Kennedy is shot in places where people don't remember him getting there? And, yeah, I think that that is very confounding. And that's what Allard Lowenstein hooked into and said, we need to question this. And I think questioning things is important. I never blame anyone for asking questions. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[George Severis]

Can you say a little bit more about Lowenstein? So what was the timeline of him trying to blow the whistle up to him dying?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Okay, so Allard Lowenstein was. He was a Democratic politician focused on civil rights in the late 60s. And all the way through his whole life, he loved speaking to students. He was an incredible guy. He taught at Yale, I believe. And he was good friends with Kennedy, though he had backed McCarthy in the primary. And so him and RFK had this sort of, like, dance going on of RFK saying, join my campaign. That's not going to work out. And the California primary solidifies that. He calls Lowenstein that night and says, see? You got to come work on my campaign. And Howard's like, fine. Then he goes down in the kitchen and gets killed. Got it.

[George Severis]

Okay.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

So Lowenstein starts looking into it in the early 70s, and in 75, they have a breakthrough that's the first time that anyone cares, and they start looking into the case and. And they retest the guns and all this stuff. And in 1980, then he starts a more of a public campaign. Lowenstein goes on tv, and he's talking to this, and he's debating it, and then he's murdered in 1980.

[George Severis]

And what are the.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I mean, Dennis Sweeney came into his office. Dennis Sweeney was a troubled young man who Lowenstein had helped. And there's some. Maybe Lowenstein might have been gay and might have had an affair with him.

[Robert Smith]

We don't.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

We don't know. They had a connection for sure. And Lowenstein was trying to help this troubled man, and he came into his office in midtown and pulled out a gun in China.

[George Severis]

And then was there ever an inquiry into whether this is all related to the RK stuff?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

And some people think that it is, but I think Dennis Sweeney was a troubled person.

[George Severis]

Got it.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Dennis Sweeney got out.

[George Severis]

Okay. Interesting.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, you could have. He's your guest next week.

[George Severis]

We're going to take a short break. Stay with us. And we're back with United States of Kennedy. So you're getting interested in all this stuff around, I don't know, 2016, 2017, right before the podcast, you get access to all these files. I feel like there's a productive ambiguity with the podcast. I mean, it's not sort of preachy one way or another. And I think you do a good job of kind of letting the audience decide what they believe based on the evidence that's presented. But I'm wondering if you can think back to that time. Like, were there any specific tapes or files or pieces of research that really got you, that really, you know, made you have like a even brief aha moment?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah. Well, my friend's mom was there that night and I got in touch with her and she knew one of the cops who had arrested Sirhan Sirhan and had walked out with him. And I got to speak to him on the phone and he told me that when they came in the next day, they said a security guard fired his gun. And that was Caesar. That was the word on the street. And I don't think he knew what he was saying to me. And I was like, oh my gosh. I think that's the farthest I went towards believing that. Wow, you know, that this, this might really be a conspiracy, that there might be something wrong with the official. What I loved about this story though is there's just so many interesting. It touched so many interesting. And it was all on tape. So, like it really came to life for me listening. I felt like I was on the hunt. I mean, I would stay up late listening to these interrogation tapes with all the different, various witnesses.

[George Severis]

Are there any others that you can remember?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Sandra Serrano, the woman who saw the polka dot dress, that the tapes of her being berated by the witnesses is incredible. And there were breakthroughs going on. There were audio breakthroughs, which I thought was amazing, you know, and I had high hopes. Hopes. You know, Bill told me that we were going to go meet an audio forensic detective and he was going to show us that there were more than eight shots on a tape. And that got me very excited.

[George Severis]

And then that, if I remember correctly, that detective then proved that there were 13 shots. But then you called up a friend of yours that is sort of like an audio nerd and he said that he in fact only hear seven or eight.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it was interesting by then I was like, in the beginning I was just bright eyed, bushy tailed. Like, this is so interesting. I can't believe I'm getting to meet all these people. Like, I got to meet Paul Schrade. He got shot in the head, you know, like in the kitchen, like. And he was an incredible guy, like. And he went to Sirhan Sirhan's parole hearing and said, give this man parole, and shook his hand. I mean, very strong, courageous guy. And I loved it. And so gradually I went from that to like, now I know the story, now I'VE heard it all. I've read the statements, I've seen all the things. And now I'm like, like I don't know that I'm going to come to the same conclusion that everybody did. So I was dealing with a conspiracy research crowd and then I was also dealing with people that believed that it was definitely they had a hatred for Sirhan Sirhan and they knew it had to be that way. And it was like both people had similar investigative tactics. Like the stuff that matched their view of the case, that they like to talk about, the stuff that didn't, that gets swept away. And like you can trust some witness statements, but not all witness statements. It was just, they were both trying to carve it so tightly and I, and I felt like I was, I felt like I was coming down more in the middle between the two sides. But I know that many, many people don't think that.

[George Severis]

Yeah, I mean this is something we run into like over and over with Kennedy conspiracy stuff. It's just like the Kennedys are so, despite being so overexposed, weirdly unknowable. It's always unclear how insidious some of the inter family dynamics are. And then they are also always adjacent to larger structures in the Democratic party, larger structures in the organized crime and the mafia, larger structures. You know, cases like this are also prone to any sort of mismanagement in anything from the police force or the government. So it's not surprising that all of this stuff is like catnip for anyone who wants to believe that there are, you know, quote unquote, things are not telling us.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah, yeah. So we talked to somebody who said there were 13, 13 shots. And then some of you said, I heard there were only seven. That's how many I found. And I didn't know what to think and so I sent it to my friend and he said he could find seven. So he's not an audio forensic detective, but he didn't have an ulterior motive. When I sent it to him, he was actually disappointed to tell me that he only found eight. And I was like, yeah, dude, whatever.

[George Severis]

I mean, also, obviously I'm not a forensic expert, but presumably bullets do ricochet. There are, there are things that can happen that could justify, you know, the nine bullet holes versus however many bullets.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

When I spoke to a detective friend of mine and he said, look, crime scene, like you can't trust that he could have had his, he could have like bang, bang, and then got knocked back. And people when a gun's going off, they all look away, like nobody's looking at the thing. Like so.

[George Severis]

And people's memories, especially during a literal traumatic event, are famously unreliable.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

So you can't. You have to throw it all out and just say, like, what's the most reasonable explanation? And once you've got a second gunman with a guy gun, that's not the same. But it's like, that was. I was like, if you were going to plan this, wouldn't you give them the same gun? Yeah. Like, if you got two gunmen with two guns, then you also need a corrupt police force to cover it up. It's just so complicated.

[George Severis]

Yeah. I mean, it sounds to me like if the polka dot dress hypno assassin and second assassin theory is correct, that opens up more questions than it answers, to state the obvious. But I want to talk a little bit about Paul Schrade. You mentioned Paul Schrade. And I want to just talk a little bit more about who he was and. And how had this change of heart. And I also, you know, because we want to always bring it back to the Kennedys. I want to talk about his relationship with RFK Jr. And how the two of them came together to propose the questions that they had about the case. Because RFK Jr. Who is obviously RFK's son and was very young when this happened, and this was like a central trauma in his life, obviously. So it is in many ways we are still, you know, living in the aftermath of these events. So Schrade was in the kitchen and was shot in the head.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

They were. It was part of the Hugo Chavez labor movement, and trade was part of the union and very supportive of that movement, as was rfk. And so they were friends. And so when he was in California, RFK and trade would organize and meet together. And. And so Shrade was on. He's on the stage with him, and he walks with him when he gets off. And so he's one of the people hit by another bullet. And he. He believed that it was a lone gunman. And then Allard Lowenstein came to see him. And Allard Lowenstein needed Schrade because Schrade was a victim in the case. And so he had certain rights. And so Lowenstein, who was just a lawyer and a very smart lawyer, looked at the case and said, I don't have rights here. I need to find somebody else who was a victim. Looked around and found Paul Schrade. I don't know if they knew each other before then, but he then went and showed Trade all the evidence that this was all done by people who loved Robert Kennedy wanting to do this right thing, and they came to shred and shrade, put his name on this case, and was how, because he had certain rights as a victim, they were able to get the bullets retested and the guns retested and that kind of thing. I don't know how he got to RFK.

[George Severis]

Yeah. In 2012, RFK Jr. And Paul Schrade sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder outlining the case against C. Cesar. And it seems like it didn't quite go anywhere. And Cesar, in fact, died in 2019. So it is now sort of a mood point. But, you know, it doesn't really help the case of that side to have RFK Jr on your side, who is kind of famously prone to conspiracy theories.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

So that's a more new thing, though. At the time, I don't think that's what he was known.

[George Severis]

I guess that's true. I guess that's true. 2012. Yeah. Should be noted that Cesar was interviewed and even consented to a polygraph and passed it. So I think it was looked into. And then, you know, whether the process was shady or not, they decided that there's. There's no there there.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

And when we were working on the podcast, there were. Were rumors that RFK Jr might go to the Philippines where Caesar was living and confront him. Yeah, I felt like I understood why RFK Jr was thought what he thought, and I think he was really helpful for a lot of the researchers and getting new things looked at and more information. Information out there. I've seen some of the stuff he's put together, and I. I don't know that he's so in touch with the science of facts and how they relate to reality in every aspect of his life.

[George Severis]

Yeah, I think. I think that is something we keep running into here as well. I mean, I don't want to keep you for too long, but I am wondering, you know, the. It's. It's now 2026. The podcast has been out for quite a while, and the response was, in my memory, very positive. But a lot of extremely opinionated people must have gotten in touch with you since it came out. Like, what have those intervening years years been like?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Well, there was a lot of pressure about, like, what side I was gonna come out on. Even all the way up until when we published the episode. I was getting calls and getting lobbied to change it, and my son had just been born. Trump had just been elected. The first time my idea of conspiracies was changing. I had a lot of fun when we started. I was like, this is incredible, this is crazy. And like, enjoyed the research and enjoyed putting this together. And as conspiracies became more front facing and became peddled more from official channels, it felt reckless a little to be just spinning things up without answers. And so I felt like I needed to say, I don't feel this way about every story, but I felt at the end of people going on this journey with me, I felt I needed to say, when I talk about this, this is what I think and I hope I left room for other people to come up with their own I ideas. I tried to. Bill was very upset with me. Many people in the conspiracy community were very upset with me. And that's just what happens when you publish hard stories. I think I didn't blame them. I understood their perspective. I also got a tremendous, a lot of nice notes about it. Bill did another show about the conspiracy to murder Martin Luther King Jr. Which I listened to and found equally fascinating. I think along the way I didn't want to be looking into so many conspiracy. I ended up doing a history show for Spotify pretty soon after this. And I sort of was like, oh, I really like telling stories of history. Maybe they don't all have to be conspiracies.

[George Severis]

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right about the turn that happened post first Trump election where thinking about conspiracies to me used to be sort of an interesting way to think about the human psyche, to think about human fallibility. It didn't feel so high stakes that you are, you know, quote unquote, platform forming, someone who is puncturing shared reality. And it felt just like a conversation starter in some way. And I think that now that there are actual harmful conspiracy theorists in the White House, you know, in charge of major organizations, it feels, as you're saying, much more reckless to treat it with a light hand and just have fun with it, which is sort of a bummer because it actually limits the amount of things we can talk about and have fun with. Which, you know, I think there should space for like slightly more playful sort of conversations without everything being so, you know, Are you a crazy conspiracy theorist?

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

I agree, I agree. I think the work we probably both like to do is like in communication with where the present society is. Right. So you're kind of like reacting and lending your voice to different aspects of it and choosing at times to lend your voice to different aspects. I still make true crimes stuff, you know, and I've gotten criticism for having too Much fun with that. Glorifying gangsters and things like that. I always strive for more nuance, especially when you're telling stories of crime. But anything. I think you have to put the decisions people make in context. That's why I'm so. I think it's so important that when Lowenstein took this on, he was doing it for his friend who got murdered. When Trade took this on, he was doing it for his friend. You know, even Bill, when he took this on, he saw an injustice in the world that he wanted to see stop. You know, I think people get into this for the right reasons, and I. I think that's cool. Yeah.

[George Severis]

No, completely. It's interesting. Sometimes pure motives can be combined with misguided beliefs, whereas the opposite is also true. You know, someone in, I don't know, in the LAPD who just wants to, I don't know, get awarded for finding the. The right suspect or something and does not care about, quote, unquote, justice can actually be factually correct.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Yeah.

[George Severis]

You know what I mean? Right? That's exactly.

[Robert Smith]

Great point.

[George Severis]

Well, I think we can leave it there. Zach, this has been very fun and, you know, I hope it was enjoyable for you to revisit this stuff eight years later. I know it's been a while, but it's very interesting and we're big fans of your work here, so we really appreciate it.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Oh, that's so nice.

[George Severis]

So that's it for this week's episode. Subscribe and follow United States of Kennedy for all things Kennedy every week.

[Julia Claire]

United States of Kennedy is hosted by me, Julia, Claire and George Severis.

[George Severis]

Original music by Joshua Tupac.

[Julia Claire]

Editing by Graham Gibson.

[George Severis]

Mixing and mastering by Doug Boehm.

[Julia Claire]

Research by Dave Bruce and Austin Thompson.

[George Severis]

Our producer is Carmen Laurent.

[Julia Claire]

Our executive producer is Jenna Cagle.

[George Severis]

Created by Lyra Smith.

[Julia Claire]

United States of Kennedy is a production of iHeart podcast.

[Podcast Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Zach Stewart Pontier]

Guaranteed human.