What Was in Sirhan's Mind?

Starting to examine a jury panel of 25 members at the trial of Sirhan Sirhan last week, Attorney Grant Cooper unveiled the defense strategy. "There will be no denial of the fact," he told the first panel member, Aerospace Corp. Employee George Doudle, "that our client, Sirhan Sirhan, fired the shot that killed Senator Kennedy." The admission may have seemed startling, especially since Sirhan has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder. Cooper made the statement to etch in the minds of the potential jurors a major issue in the case.

He told Doudle that Sirhan would admit only the "mechanical act" of pulling the trigger. The jury, said Cooper, would be called on to consider "not only the act but the intent" before deciding whether Sirhan is guilty as charged. Then he asked: "Now that you have been told the defendant committed the act, would that prejudice you so that you couldn't try him for intent?" Doudle said that it would, and was excused as a juror.

Exposing Skepticism. Cooper asked other panel members whether they had heard of a legal argument called "diminished responsibility," which will obviously be the crux of Sirhan's defense. The argument is an old one. But California is one of only a dozen or so states that permit a lawyer to try to prove diminished responsibility by presenting psychiatric evidence. Cooper's claim would not be that Sirhan was insane at the time of the shooting. Rather, as Cooper indicated, the defense would try to prove that because of mental or emotional illness, Sirhan lacked the malice or "specific intent" required for a first-degree conviction. Unlike a plea of insanity--which can lead to acquittal--the strategy has been used mainly to avoid execution. Thus, the defense in the Sirhan case may be willing to settle for a second-degree murder or manslaughter verdict, since neither of these charges carries the death penalty.

Since psychiatric testimony will be essential to the case, Cooper tried to expose any skepticism about this kind of evidence among potential jurors. Cooper asked a widow, Mrs. Rosa Molina, whether she shared the opinion of some that "all psychiatrists and psychologists are crazy." No, she replied. Did she have any prejudices against the Rorschach test, hypnosis, lie detectors or Sodium Pentothol (truth drug)? Again Mrs. Molina answered no, and she was one of those persons who by week's end had been tentatively accepted as jurors.

As for Sirhan, one of the few outward clues to his state of mind came when an assistant district attorney, David Fitts, pointed out to one venireman that Sirhan had smiled at him. Could the prospective juror bring in a death sentence against a man who smiled at him? Looking up, Sirhan made his first remark of the trial. "I smile at you too, Mr. Fitts," he said.

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