Robert F Kennedy feared mafia would blind his kids in acid attack

London, Jan 24 (ANI): Robert F Kennedy, the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy, feared that his children would be blinded by the mafia in an acid attack as a revenge for investigating them, his widow has revealed in a new film.

Speaking out for the first time in 30 years, Ethel Kennedy said that her late husband was anxious they would be targeted as retaliation for his probe into mafia racketeering, the Daily Mail reported.

He saw a report about an American journalist who had been blinded in an acid attack by the mob and feared they would do the same to him.

The disclosure will add to conspiracy theories that the mafia may have been responsible for Kennedy's death.

He was shot dead by Sirhan Sirhan in 1968 but speculation has raged that his crusade against the mob whilst serving as U.S. Attorney General may have be the root of his demise.

The widow made the revelation to promote 'Ethel', a new film about her life directed by her daughter Rory, the youngest of her eleven children.

The 83-year-old said that her last husband was scared after New York Post journalist Victor Riesel was blinded in an acid attack because of articles he had written about the mob.

"We were told they were going to do the same with our children," she said.

Her eldest daughter Kathleen, one of several family members interviewed for the film, added: "We couldn't leave school with the other kids at the end of the day. We had to wait in the principal's office to be picked up."

The conspiracy theories relating to the mob and the Kennedy family usually involve New Orleans mafia don Carlos Marcello, who was deported to Guatemala by Kennedy in 1961 after he was appointed Attorney General by his brother John.

Afterwards Marcello is said to have threatened the President with the traditional Sicilian curse 'Take the stone from my shoe'.

And when John died, Marcello's associate Jimmy Hoffa is supposed to have said: "This means Bobby is out as Attorney General."

The film about Ethel also gives a rare glimpse into life inside Camelot and amusing details, such as how Kennedy slid down the White House bannister when his brother became president.

She reveals that it was very hard for her husband to seek office for the first time and that he had to 'struggle for everything' before becoming a senator in New York in 1964.

There is also colour about her own life including how she held wild parties which President Kennedy asked her to tone down, and that she was once charged with horse theft after she rescued a neighbour's malnourished stallions. (ANI)