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Sirhan Sirhan convicted of assassinating Robert F Kennedy

A stock image of a prison cell
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In order to avoid the death penalty, the defence had offered a guilty plea in exchange for life imprisonment.

But the judge wanted to avoid the similar suggestion of a cover up that surrounded the assassination of his presidential brother, JFK, and so ordered that the Palestinian immigrant be tried.

As expected, he was sentenced to death. Then, unexpectedly, and along with all other Californian death row prisoners, his sentence was commuted to what his defence had initially offered, life imprisonment...