High life
Protection racket
Taki
Somehow Lawford knew this and played it to the hilt. Christina too. In no time I found myself in the doghouse because of Lawford's indiscretions, and confronted him with them. (We shared a flat at the Sherry Netherland Hotel at the time.) Lawford became abusive and almost vio- lent, and his agent had to separate us. I couldn't well move out and leave my bride behind, so I stayed. Which is the one thing Peter did not want. There were still enough Kennedys and their groupies dropping in on him, and Taki was in the way. So the wife and I moved out, and it was the last I ever saw of him. That was 1965. Twenty years later he's once again in the news over here — and I gather over there, also — and it all has to do with the Kennedys, Marilyn Monroe, and some murky details concern- ing her death. Needless to say, if any other family had been involved with Marilyn Monroe, the Nixons, say, we would never have had Watergate. In fact, I am ready to bet my last drachma that Richard Nixon would have been disqualified from running for dog-catcher, let alone the Presidency of the United States. But as we all know the Kennedys are not the Nixons. They enjoy privileges that ordinary mortals cannot aspire to. Like the protection of the press, the intelligentsia, and now it seems even the television networks; well, the president of ABC News, Roone Arledge, to be exact. Arledge is known for his venture- some television journalism, as he is known for his close friendship with the Kennedys. He has just cancelled a programme that insiders say proved almost beyond reason- able doubt that Bobby Kennedy was in Los Angeles the night MM died, and furth- ermore that he had a lot to do with her death. The programme also includes on-air interviews with people who say they bug- ged Marilyn's house in order to trap Kennedy, and they did it on the orders of Jimmy Hoffa, the gangster leader of the Teamsters Union that Bobby had sworn to send to jail.
And there is more. Marilyn was known as an inveterate scribbler, someone who kept diaries of everything and everybody she came into contact with. Nothing was found after her death. Worse, there is a policeman who swears that Kennedy and his friends tried to shut up La Monroe by offering her pills and other sedatives that fateful night. Finally, there are hints that Bobby and JFK had contact with Sam Giancanna, a well known Mafia leader. For me the hints are good enough. I knew Sam Giancanna as Sam Moody, had been introduced to him by Peter Lawford, and had heard the actor and the mobster talk fondly of the Kennedys and reminisce about past shenanigans with the 'first' family. Shenanigans, I may add, that can- not be repeated in a glossy weekly like the Spectator.
But to get back to Arledge. An ABC newsman described his (Arledge's) refusal to run the programme as unfortunate: `He's in bed with the Kennedys,' was the way he put it. Little did the newsman know how close to the truth he was. The hack forgot to mention that Jeff Ruhe, an Arledge top assistant, is married to Court- ney Kennedy, the fifth of Bobby's 11 children, and David Burke, vice-president of ABC News, is a former aide to the senator from Massachusetts.
What is it about the Kennedys that makes them forbidden ground for televi- sion, press, and even police investigation? As far as I'm concerned it is fear of reprisals. They are still enormously power- ful and well connected, and people who have crossed them have not exactly pros- pered. I have no details, but will recount only a rather sordid story that involved a Kennedy member. A girl I knew was beaten up badly enough to have to stay in bed for two weeks. She had apparently been out with this character, shared his
drugs but refused to share his bed. He went berserk and she went to hospital. When I saw her I begged her to give me an affidavit so I could write the story. She paled when she heard me. `They'll kill you and me,' was the only thing she said when she realised what I was after. The girl has since returned to England. And I will let you draw your own conclusions.
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