◆ SpookStack

The District Attorney's Office did not call Schulman as either a witness before the Grand Jury or before the trial since he could not positively identify defendant Sirhan as having fired a weapon striking either Senator Kennedy or any of the injured victims. Schulman states that he stood in back of Paul Schrade and did see the arm with the gun lunging toward the Senator, coming in the direction of Senator Kennedy, thus accounting for the viewpoint in which he saw the gun approaching Kennedy in the direction of Kennedy, Scnrade, and himself. He states that he saw the security guard, presumably Thane Cesar, with his gun out and pointed toward the ground, only after Kennedy was lying on the ground injured. He remembers the security guard as being in back of Robert Kennedy. Actually, there had been two security guards who dispiayed guns in the pantry. The first was Thane Eugene Cesar who states he fell to the floor at the time of the shooting and drew his .38 Caliber revolver only after regaining his balance. The shooting by this time had ceased. The only other person displaying a gun inside the pantry (besides Sirhan) was Ace Security Guard Jack Merritt. Merritt entered the pantry after the shooting. Merritt states that he was in the hall outside the Embassy Room when informed of the shooting. When he entered the pantry, a group of men were holding Sirhan on a metal table and Senator Kennedy was lying on the floor. Special Counsel Kranz interviewed Thane Cesar in late November 1975, in the office of Cesar's' attorney John McNicholas in Los Angeles. Cesar stated to Kranz that he never fired his .38 weapon on the evening in question. Additionally, Cesar told Kranz that he, Cesar, volunteered to Los Angeles Police Officers to be taken to the Rampart Station for questioning since he had "all but been ignored during the chaos following the shooting of Senator Kennedy." At the Rampart Station, Cesar states his .38 caliber revolver was examined but not test fired by the L.A.P. -D-, nor was it seized or hneld as evidence. Cesar e@laborated that he had been Waiting in the hall passage way separating the pantry from the Embassy Room with Jess Unruh and Milton Berle preceding the entrance of Senator Kennedy into the Embassy Ballroom. Cesar States that since he did not fire his gun in 1968, he was never | questioned regarding this action either by L.A.P.D. or F.B.I. officials in the weeks following the shooting of Senator Kennedy. Cesar was in full uniform of the Ace Guard Service which required - 38 ealibers in holsters, and Cesar had been checked out earlier in tne evening by his superiors and determined to be carrying the regulation .38 caliber weapon. An accusation had been made in the Isaac-Charach complaint that Thane Cesar was associated with right-wing movements and expressed rightwing views and hated the Kennedy family. This was denied by Cesar in his 1971 interview and again in his interview with Kranz. Cesar is a registered Democrat who did not agree with Kennedy's political position and voted for Presidential candidate George Wallace in 1968. However he did not campaign for Wallace, or work for the American Independent Party. He eontributed $3.90 to a friend who was active in the Wallace campaign. Additonal investi- gation of Cesar in the past few years subsequent to the 1971 investigation shows that he has not been engaged in any political activities. oO