Remember the evidence.
Now that TikTok, Netflix, Ryan Murphy, Kim Kardashian, and public sentiment are working to free the Menendez Brothers — convicted in 1996 for brutally murdering their parents — it’s also critical to remember why they were sentenced to life without parole.
The crime itself is not, and never has been, in dispute.
On the night of August 20, 1989, as their parents José and Kitty were watching TV in their Beverly Hills mansion, Lyle and Erik Menendez each took a 12-gauge shotgun and fired multiple rounds into their parents.
Lyle was 21 years old; Erik was 18.
The mitigating factor, at their first trial and revisited now, was the alleged, and credibly claimed, years of sickening sexual abuse José visited upon both his sons.
On August 20, 1989, as their parents José and Kitty were watching TV in their Beverly Hills mansion, Lyle and Erik Menendez each took a 12-gauge shotgun and fired into their parents.
The mitigating factor, at their first trial and revisited now, was the alleged, and credibly claimed, years of sickening sexual abuse José visited upon both his sons.
But does that justify premeditated murder? Does that mean we, or the legal system, should now believe every claim of these men — not ‘boys’, as they were successfully reframed at not one, but two trials — who are proven liars?
The facts of this crime, which Lyle and Erik have never disputed, are as follows:
Two days before slaughtering José and Kitty, the brothers traveled to San Diego, where they used a fake ID to purchase the murder weapons.
On the night in question, they entered the family den and shot Kitty and José 16 times.
As recently as 2017, Erik and Lyle were claiming that José had provoked a big fight, causing the brothers to fear for their lives.
Not so. The evidence shows clear premeditation and the brothers’ deliberate actions, immediately after the slayings, to create an alibi and dispose of all incriminating evidence.
Consider the lone voice of reason in the new, otherwise wildly sympathetic Netflix documentary ‘The Menendez Brothers’ — a companion piece to Ryan Murphy’s latest blockbuster hit ‘Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story’.
Pamela Bozanich, prosecutor in the case, tells us that the back of José’s skull was blown off. As cops worked the crime scene, Bozanich says, ‘his brain fell out onto the floor’.
Kitty had attempted to flee. Surviving a shot to her torso, neither Lyle nor Erik paused.
Instead, Lyle went outside, reloaded, then returned, placed the muzzle against Kitty’s cheek and pulled the trigger, leaving her unrecognizable.
As Lyle himself testified, ‘I just reached over and shot her close.’
The brothers also shot José and Kitty in the knees, to make it look like a mob hit.
Then they drove to a local movie theater and bought tickets. This would be their alibi — they were at the movies — and returned home to hide all the spent shell casings and dispose of the murder weapons, which were never recovered.
Only once the scene was cleared of evidence did Lyle call 911.
‘Someone killed my parents!’ he wailed.
But does that justify premeditated murder? Does that mean we, or the legal system, should now believe every claim of these men who are proven liars? (Pictured: Lyle (left) and Erik with their parents José and Kitty.)
When the cops arrived, they found the brothers in hysterics — ‘overacting,’ Bozanich says — and treated them as victims, not suspects, even though parricides are most commonly committed by young, white males with no prior history of violence.
Investigators didn’t even test Lyle and Erik’s hands for gunshot residue, which the brothers later admitted was still all over their hands.
Erik and Lyle were both interviewed for this new Netflix doc, speaking over the phone from prison.
‘It’s pretty incredible that we weren’t arrested that night,’ Erik says. ‘We should have been.’
In the immediate aftermath, as Beverly Hills police searched for the killer (or killers), the brothers eagerly spent their $14 million inheritance. Among their purchases: A new Porsche Carrera, a Jeep Wrangler, 3 Rolexes, two restaurants, and a $50,000-a-year tennis coach.
All that, Lyle now claims, was a bit of retail therapy – in the literal sense.
‘Everything,’ he says in the doc, ‘was to cover up this horrible pain of not wanting to be alive.’
Months after the murders, while talking with his therapist Dr. Jerome Oziel – an admittedly comprised character who later gave up his license after breaching professional ethics – Erik confessed.
Oziel testified that Erik went into great detail: His father, he said, was a ‘dominating’, ‘impossible to please’ perfectionist. Kitty, he said, was collateral damage.
‘The mother was included in the plan because she would have been a witness,’ Oziel said at trial.
Oziel said the brothers also rationalized her murder as something of a favor — that her life without José would have been so depressing that killing her was a form of ‘euthanasia’.
Oziel, who had begun recording his sessions with Erik, asked Lyle to come in.
Again: Confessing to the murder of their parents? Not an issue. Admitting serial sexual abuse as a mitigating factor? Never came up.
Lyle, incredibly, now gripes to Netflix that Oziel’s betrayal particularly stung — that he thought ‘a normal therapist’ would ‘work through this’ — their confessed parricide — in ‘a confidential way’.
Now: Were Lyle and Erik molested by their father? Most likely.
Since their conviction in 1996, new evidence has emerged: A letter Erik wrote to his cousin months before the murders, heavily implying that he was being sexually abused by José — ‘I’ve been trying to avoid dad… I never know when it’s going to happen… Every night I stay up thinking he might come in’ — adds credence to their claims.
As do the allegations of Roy Rosselló, former member of Puerto Rican boy-band Menudo, who says José drugged and raped him when he was a teenager.
It seems notable, however, that the brothers’ attorney Leslie Abramson, whose so-called ‘abuse excuse’ defense in the first trial resulted in a hung jury, refused to be interviewed by Netflix.
In a statement, she said: ‘I’d like to leave the past in the past.’
That, to my mind, is quite damning. If the world is finally coming around to a defense that had, at the time, been considered laughable — well, why not take your victory lap?
The brothers’ attorney Leslie Abramson (right), whose so-called ‘abuse excuse’ defense in the first trial resulted in a hung jury, refused to be interviewed by Netflix.
Do we allow Gen-Z to relitigate long-settled felonies on TikTok? Does Kim Kardashian – playing lawyer in her wigs and Skims thongs – adjudicate?
Especially as we are on the verge of a historic outcome: The Menendez brothers might very well be freed.
What does that mean going forward?
Do we allow Gen-Z to relitigate long-settled felonies on TikTok? Does Kim Kardashian – playing lawyer in her wigs and Skims thongs – adjudicate? Do Netflix documentaries dictate the scales of justice?
And does child abuse now mean that any and all kinds of vigilante justice are forgiven? That premeditated homicide is now justifiable?
Note prosecutor Bozanich, who readily admits that José was a ‘monster’ and that his death ‘was an actual plus for mankind’.
‘The only reason we’re doing this special,’ she says, ‘is because of the TikTok movement… If that’s how we’re going to try cases now, why don’t we just have a poll? Everybody gets to vote on TikTok!… Your beliefs are not facts. They’re just beliefs.’
Keep that in mind as celebrities, Menendez relatives, and Gen-Z protesters gather at a press conference in L.A. today, demanding ‘justice’ for these cold-blooded killers.
Should they prevail, Lyle and Erik Menendez will no doubt get a jubilant People magazine cover, a multimillion-dollar book deal, a reality show, and re-entrance into polite society.
Is that true justice?
