Menendez brothers’ bid for freedom stalled by fight over parole board document
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Erik and Lyle Menendez’s long-awaited bid for freedom will be delayed a little longer.
A resentencing hearing that was supposed to begin Thursday and could have given the brothers a shot at parole for the first time in more than 35 years was delayed after a fight over access to a parole document ordered by Gov. Gavin Newsom paralyzed proceedings, and set up a showdown that could end with Los Angeles County prosecutors thrown off the case.
Late Wednesday, L.A. County prosecutors filed a motion seeking a continuance because they did not have adequate time to review a “comprehensive risk assessment” document compiled by the state parole board. Newsom earlier this year asked the board to conduct the review as he considered granting the brothers clemency in the 1989 killings of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez.
The brothers were convicted of murder with special circumstances and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after a 1995 trial.
An L.A. County judge has denied Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman’s bid to revoke a petition to resentence the Menendez brothers, setting the stage for a hearing that could offer the brothers a path to freedom.
The resentencing hearing became a possibility last year after then-L.A. County Dist. Atty. George Gascón asked a judge to make the brothers eligible for parole under California law, reducing their sentences because the killings happened when they were under the age of 26. Gascón cited the brothers’ work creating rehabilitation programs in prison, their low-risk assessments by prison officials and potential new evidence about their father’s alleged abusive behavior as reasons they should be set free.
Current Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman strongly opposes their release and has focused his arguments on what he sees as the brothers’ refusal to take ownership of the grisly killings.
The district attorney’s office filed a motion asking to delay the hearing so it could review the latest risk assessment of the brothers conducted by the state parole board. Hochman said Thursday that his office only received the report on Tuesday, but would not comment on its contents. He said he wanted to ensure L.A. County Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic had all the material he needed to make an accurate ruling.
But Newsom’s office said Thursday that the report is not complete and would not be available until June.
“Our office notified Judge Jesic of the status of this report, which is not a stand-alone risk assessment, and offered to share it with the court should he request it,” Newsom’s office said, describing the document as essentially a first draft.
The brothers’ attorney, Mark Geragos, initially dismissed the continuance motion as a Hail Mary from Hochman, one week after he lost a bid to have Gascón’s resentencing petition thrown out. But as the day wore on, Geragos began to voice frustration that he had not been provided a copy. Eventually, the attorney expressed concern that he could not question his witnesses accurately without reviewing the report and the case was continued to next month.
“I will tell you that we were given the option as a family if we wanted to testify today,” said Anamaria Baralt, a cousin of the brothers. “But the idea of testifying when one side has information that the other side does not, and to be facing cross-examination from a team that has information that we do not, whether it’s good or bad or neutral, did not seem fair to us at all.”
A hearing to determine whether the risk assessment report is relevant to a resentencing hearing was scheduled for May 9. Geragos also plans to argue a motion that day to have L.A. County prosecutors removed from the case. While he didn’t offer specific grounds for the disqualification motion in court, Geragos and many members of the Menendez family who want the brothers freed have repeatedly accused Hochman of bias in the case and of being hostile and abusive during private meetings. Hochman disputes those claims.
“This is a D.A. who made up his mind and did no hard work in terms of his position,” Geragos said, adding that Hochman “has taken a position at all times that is not supported by the law.”
Hochman held a press conference outside the courthouse Thursday morning, just minutes before Jesic took the bench. Inside the courtroom, Geragos displayed video of Hochman’s remarks and contended the D.A. implied there was something negative in the parole report.
Geragos also questioned if the report was even admissible, since it was generated for the purposes of a parole hearing. In a resentencing hearing, Jesic would only decide if the brothers are eligible for parole, not if they would actually be granted release. On Thursday afternoon, Geragos said Newsom’s staff insisted to him by phone that the document was not meant to be used in a resentencing hearing. The governor’s office did not respond to requests for additional comment.
On Aug. 20, 1989, Erik and Lyle Menendez entered the family’s Beverly Hills home armed with shotguns they had bought with cash and opened fire while their parents were watching a movie. Jose Menendez was shot five times in the kneecaps and head. Kitty Menendez was crawling away, covered in blood, when one of the brothers hit her with a final, fatal shotgun blast.
Erik, then 18, confessed to the killings in a conversation with his therapist. While the brothers claimed Jose sexually abused them and was a threat to their lives, prosecutors contended they killed their parents to get early access to their multimillion-dollar inheritance.
A push to free the brothers gained steam last year after the release of a popular Netflix documentary about the case, which included the unearthing of additional documentation of Jose’s alleged sexual abuse. In a motion for a new trial, defense attorneys pointed to a letter Erik sent to one of his cousins detailing his father’s behavior, which was delivered eight months before the murders. The motion also contained a declaration from a member of the boy band Menudo who alleged Jose raped him when he was a teenager in 1984.
L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman moved Monday to rescind a request by his predecessor to resentence brothers Erik and Lyle Menendez for the murders of their parents, raising questions about the validity of their self-defense claims.
Nearly two dozen of the brothers’ loved ones have formed the Justice for Erik and Lyle Coalition, a family-led group advocating for their freedom. The lone Menendez family member who opposed the brothers’ release died this year.
On Thursday morning, the extended Menendez family got out of three black SUVs and walked toward the courthouse surrounded by news crews holding cameras inches from their faces. A throng of reporters later swarmed Geragos and Hochman when they arrived at the court complex.
Geragos is expected to call several relatives as witnesses whenever the actual resentencing hearing takes place, as well as a former inmate who was mentored by the brothers. A correctional supervisor who thinks so highly of one of the brothers that he wouldn’t mind if they were neighbors is also supposed to take the stand, Geragos said in open court last week.
It is unclear if the brothers will testify at a resentencing hearing. Hochman said Thursday he was unsure if the district attorney’s office will call any witnesses.
Hochman, who accused Gascón of seeking resentencing in a desperate bid to boost his reelection campaign, last month announced his opposition to the brothers’ release. Hochman said Thursday that his office’s position on the brothers eligibility for resentencing is better described as “not yet,” rather than “no.”
“We have identified a pathway for the Menendez brothers to come forward, acknowledge all the lies they have told over the past 30 years. ... They can then say to the court we have come clean, we have been rehabilitated, we no longer constitute a danger to society,” he said.
Hochman and his prosecutors have argued that Gascón’s analysis of the case was paper-thin, questioned the validity of their self-defense claims and repeatedly insisted the brothers had lied about the circumstances of the shooting. Hochman has also said the brothers have not shown proper “insight” into their crimes.
Two prosecutors who recommended the Menendez brothers be resentenced allege they were demoted by new L.A. County D.A. Nathan Hochman and then defamed by one of his allies.
At a hearing last week seeking to revoke Gascón’s petition, Jesic agreed with a defense argument that “insight” was not relevant to a resentencing petition. That standard applies only in a parole hearing, the judge said.
Hochman said Thursday he disagreed with part of that interpretation, arguing that parole and resentencing standards overlap. By continuing to “minimize their crimes,” Hochman said, the Menendez brothers have demonstrated they have not undergone rehabilitation, as it is defined by the state Supreme Court.
If the brothers are eventually resentenced, they could be on track for a parole hearing.
If Jesic rejects their petition, the brothers still have two routes to release: a motion for a new trial citing the additional sex abuse evidence and the clemency petition before Newsom.
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