ave been drinking. She next phoned her parents who lived in Ohio. She said she was crying and hysterical. After purportedly telling a few close friends what she had witnessed she was asked by a television crew if she would like to tell her story.
Later FBI agent Burris took Serrano to the Embassy Ballroom and told her, “On television, with Sandy Vanocur, you didn't say anything about seeing a girl and two men going up the fire stairs. You only said you saw a girl and a man coming down. And later you told the police you saw two men and a girl going up together and one of them was Sirhan Sirhan. That was the most significant thing you had to tell the police and yet you didn't say anything about this in your first interview, your interview on television.” Serrano said “I can't explain why.”
Investigators soon discovered there were many more flaws in Serrano's story. On June 8th 1968 the FBI questioned her parents, Manuel Serrano and Amparo Serrano, who said their daughter did not say anything about a girl saying “We shot Kennedy.” Her mother recalled she said, “Why would they do anything like this?” When asked why she did not mention the polka dot girl story to her mother Sandra Serrano gave the weak excuse that she had always had trouble talking to her mother.
Serrano had been given a polygraph test by Sergeant Hernandez on June 20th 1968. She soon dissembled. Asked if she sat down on the stairway at the time of the shooting she replied, “Yeah, I think I did…people messed me up…stupid people…just in all the commotion and everything…I was supposed to know more than I knew…I told [DA staffer John Ambrose] I heard the people say 'We shot him' or 'They shot him' or something. And I remember telling him that I had seen these people on the … on the stairway.”
Following the shooting, Serrano and DiPierro had been together at the police station waiting to be interviewed by police. When DiPierro was later interviewed by Sergeant Hernandez he admitted he probably got the idea of a girl in a polka dot dress from Serrano during the time he was with her in the police station. DiPierro said, “She stated that there was this girl that was wearing a polka dot dress came running down, I guess it was the hallway, saying that 'We shot him,' and … she … you know, we started asking each other questions about the girl, and evidently I went along with what she said as being a person that I imagine that I saw.”
Hernandez asked Serrano during her polygraph test if, sometime following the shooting, she heard"a kid" mention something about a white dress and polka dots. She replied "right." Asked if she got the idea of the polka dot girl from this report she answered"I don't know." Her responses to questions about the polka dot girl indicated deception. However, Serrano eventually admitted that her story was founded on a lot of guesswork, “[for] …. two reasons, so I didn't look like a fool, which I look like now. Another reason, because everybody figures … you know… I was sitting there [in the police station] hearing descriptions and descriptions of these people. Oh God, no, maybe that's what I'm supposed to see…more than I did. It messed me up, that's all, and I figured, well, they must know what they"re doing – I mean, they are police, after all. They have to know what they"re doing.” Serrano also told police, “…Somewhere I heard it [the girl in the polka dot dress]. I don't know why I said it, but it just fitted. Then it happened that it all fitted in, and I couldn't understand it, you know. Then, yeah, I really thought there was something behind it. I was scared.” Serrano also told police, “…You know when somebody sees something, keep them away from other people who have seen it. Because you don't know what happens….well, you see, another thing too, you know, that is that, that other newspapers came out with that somebody else had seen it, and then I – I kept thinking to myself, maybe, - you know, gee …”
Hernandez's methods of interrogation during the polygraph examination were indeed forceful and intimidating as conspiracy advocates noted. But it