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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/Sirhan-Sirhan-murdered-a-Kennedy-He-could-spend-16520899.php">sfchronicle.com</a>
<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Sirhan Sirhan murdered a Kennedy. He could spend less time in prison than this California man</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">Thandisizwe Chimurenga - October 11, 2021<br></div>
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On June 5, 1968, Sirhan Sirhan approached Democratic presidential
candidate Robert Kennedy, brother of former president John F. Kennedy,
just after midnight at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. He then
pulled a gun and shot Kennedy in the head and upper body at close range.</p><p>On
March 30, 1981, John Hinkley Jr. walked up to then-President Ronald
Reagan outside of a Washington, D.C., hotel with gun in hand. He fired
multiple shots, striking Reagan in the chest, Secret Service agent
Timothy McCarthy in the side, District of Columbia police Officer Thomas
Delahanty in the neck and White House Press Secretary James Brady in
the head, leaving him partially paralyzed.</p><div id="gmail-paywall">
<p>Hinkley spent 35 years in a mental hospital before being granted conditional release. On Sept. 27, he was <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/john-hinckley-who-tried-assassinate-reagan-be-freed-oversight-n1280178">freed from court supervision entirely</a> at the age of 66. Sirhan, meanwhile, was deemed eligible for parole on Aug. 27, after 53 years of imprisonment.</p>
<p>In light of the prospect of two would-be presidential
assassins walking the Earth as free men, it’s worth inquiring why
similar consideration isn’t being given to Ruchell Magee, a Black man
who has been imprisoned in California for more than 50 years.</p>
<p>Magee has neither committed nor been convicted of murder.
He was first eligible for parole in 1981, but has been denied release
ever since. He is 82 and housed at the California Medical Facility in
Vacaville. At his most recent parole hearing in July, Magee was denied
parole for another three years. He will be 85 at his next scheduled
hearing.</p>
<p>Magee is no threat to society. He has housing, financial
and emotional support networks in place to help him readjust to life on
the outside, and yet he remains behind bars.</p>
<p>Why?</p>
<hr>
<p>Magee came to California in late 1962, a refugee from the
Jim Crow justice system of Louisiana. Within six months he would be
sentenced to life in prison for a $10 robbery where no bodily harm
occurred. Magee maintained his innocence, arguing that he was illegally
imprisoned over a disagreement gone wrong.</p>
<p>Although Magee never went past seventh grade in school,
he studied law in prison and learned to file legal documents in an
attempt to have his conviction reversed. Instead, he was retried and
convicted a second time.</p>
<p>Magee spent the next few years attempting to legally free
himself from what he believed to be a corrupt justice system. His
knowledge of the law and his behavior in court (he frequently disrupted
proceedings to level charges of racism) made him a thorn in the side of
the court.</p>
<p>Those same qualities, however, endeared him to other prisoners who could not afford legal counsel.</p>
<p>This is how Magee wound up on the witness stand of a
Marin County courthouse on Aug. 7, 1970. He was testifying in support of
a fellow San Quentin Prison inmate when 17-year-old Jonathan Jackson
entered the courtroom with a satchel full of guns. Jackson took several
hostages, including the judge and prosecutor. His goal was to free his
brother George and two other inmates — collectively known as the
“Soledad Brothers” — who were charged with killing a prison guard.</p>
<p>Magee, meanwhile, after eight years of legally trying to
overturn his unjust conviction, seized on the moment to free himself. He
joined with Jackson in the armed escape and fled the courthouse. Prison
guards on the scene opened fire at Jackson’s getaway vehicle. The sole
survivors of this volley were the prosecutor, who was left paralyzed,
and Magee.</p>
<p>Magee was charged along with activist Angela Davis with
conspiracy, kidnapping and murder. Worldwide support aided Davis’
acquittal on all charges. Murder charges were eventually dropped against
Magee, but he was convicted of kidnapping and sentenced to life in
prison.</p>
<p>And he’s still there.</p>
<hr>
<p>The longer a person lives, the more medical care they
need. This is as true for prisoners as anyone else. In Magee’s case, his
care will come from an overburdened and understaffed prison medical
system. According to the Public Policy Institute, older prisoners may be
a contributing reason for California’s astounding prison health care
costs, currently the highest in the nation, at more than <a href="https://www.ppic.org/publication/californias-prison-population/">three times the national average.</a></p>
<p>The recidivism rate for prisoners in the U.S. decreases
as prisoners get older. It is estimated to be at 5% for persons 50 to 64
and less than 1% by the age of 65, according to Prison Legal News.</p>
<p>Sirhan Sirhan isn’t the only older murderer to be
recently granted parole in California. Just weeks ago, David Weidert,
who served 40 years for burying a developmentally disabled man alive,
was <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/08/10/parole-allowed-for-man-who-buried-california-victim-alive">approved for parole.</a>
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<p>If these men are considered safe for release, what threat does Magee’s continued incarceration protect us from?</p>
<p>Years ago, Magee took the name Cinque, after the captured
African leader of the 1839 rebellion on the slave ship Amistad that
killed the ship’s captain. U.S. courts ruled that Cinque and his fellow
captives had a right to rebel and fight for their freedom — and the
group was freed to return to Africa. Former U.S. President John Quincy
Adams supported this result.</p>
<p>Two of Robert Kennedy’s sons, meanwhile, support Sirhan Sirhan’s bid for freedom.</p>
<p>Magee does not have the support of former presidents or
their families. His only chance at freedom lies with the common sense of
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who can release Magee whenever he
chooses.</p>
<p>Magee poses no threat to the citizens of California. And
his freedom should be given no less consideration than that of the
perpetrators of two of America’s most infamous acts of violence.</p>
<p><em>
</em></p><p><em>Thandisizwe Chimurenga is a Los Angeles-based freelance journalist and author.</em></p><em>
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