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Proay 7 \-- i The fact that Thane Cesar drew his gun was well established in the original 1968 investigation (L.A.P.D. investigation June 11, 1968). Cesar's original statement- indicates he was escorting Kennedy at the time of the shooting. Cesar was knocked down, scrambled to his feet, and drew his gun, while attempting to regain his balance. Due to the large crowd, Cesar states that he reholstered his gun. In his documentary film, "The Secord Gun," Ted Charach quotes Thane Cesar as stating that he (Cesary had pulled his gun out, "I got knocked down." Charach contends that Cesar told him, (Charach) that he (Cesar) actually had pulled his weapon out before he was -knoecked down. Cesar had told all other investigating officers, including his 1968 interviews with the L.A.P.D., the F.B.I., the District Attorney investigators in 1971, and Special Counsel Kranz in 1975, that he was knocked down instantaneously at the time that Sirhan onrushed into Senator Kennedy, and that it was only when he (Cesar) rose from the ground that he was able to pull his gun out. When asked by Special Counsel Kranz as part of his opening interview question, "Why didn't you fire your gun? You were there to protect Senator Kennedy." Cesar replied simply and quickly, "I was a coward." Cesar elaborated that the moment he heard and saw the weapon fired, his instincts forced him to the ground. It should be emphasized that Cesar was not a welltrained or regular security guard, and was only on a moonlighting assignment for the Ace Security Guard Service. (Cesar's regular job at that time, in 1968, was on the assembly line at Lockheed Aircraft.) Cesar also stated to Kranz that he could have left the Ambassador as no one seemed interested in interviewing him following the snooting, and that he, Cesar, actually volunteered to L.A.P.D. officers the fact that he had been inside the pantry at the time of the shooting. Cesar was then taken down to the Rampart Division and interviewed by. L.A.P.D. officers. Cesar states, and the L.A.P.D. orally verifies, but have no documents to sub- Stantiate, the fact that the .38 caliber weapon Cesar had on his person that night as part of his Ace Guard Service assignment was examined by an unnamed L.A.P.D. officer, but was not seized or Subsequently test fired. Cesar stated to Kranz that the interviewing by the L.A.P.D..hours after the shooting and in sub- sequent weeks by investigating officers from the L.A.P.D., and F.B.I., centered around what he (Cesar) had observed in the pantry. No one asked him any questions concerning the possibility that he may have fired his .38 weapon. Additionally, no one asked Cesar about the Shulman statement that a “security guard had fired back." Additionally, even though the Boston Herald American newspaper in its June 5, 1968, edition had stated that a "guard had fired," and the fact that a Paris newspaper France Soir had noted in one of its June 5, 6, 1968, stories, "in turn, one of Kennedy's body guards Pulled his gun out and fired from the hip like in a western movie," Cesar was never questioned concerning these statements that ran in two newspapers, either by his friends or by investigating police officers. Cesar told Special Counsel Kranz that the first time he ever heard the accusation that he had fired a .38 caliber revolver was when he read the accusation in the Los Angeles Free Press one year later in 1969.