LOS ANGELES — As Robert F. Kennedy was leaving the Ambassador Hotel on June 5, 1968, following his victory in that year’s California Democratic presidential primary, a part-time Los Angeles Times photographer, working on his own time in hopes of catching a shot for his wall, followed.

In the pandemonium of the hotel’s pantry following Kennedy’s shooting by Sirhan B. Sirhan, as the crowd parted from the fallen candidate, Yaro snapped the enduring black-and-white image of a distraught busboy trying to console a mortally wounded hero.

Yaro, who shot news photos for the Times for more than 40 years and along the way tutored the actor who played the news photographer on the TV series “Lou Grant,” died Wednesday at his home in Northridge of natural causes. He was 81.

Although Yaro’s career became defined by the Kennedy photo, he was known to colleagues as a hard-driving but dapper news hound.