Menendez brothers could be released with these strategies from their lawyers
With the strategies that the brothers' defense plans to use, they could be released immediately.
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The defense team for brothers Lyle and Erik Menendez, who are serving a life sentence for the murder of their parents in a luxurious Beverly Hills mansion in 1989, said Wednesday that they are working on three alternatives to secure their release after 34 years behind bars.
Their attorney, Mark Geragos, will ask the court at a habeas corpus hearing on Nov. 25 to have the brothers sentenced for involuntary manslaughter, his press team said.
If the judge in charge of the case rules in their favor, the brothers could be released immediately, having served more than the maximum sentence for this charge in California, which is 11 years.
Another option for the Menendez family, whose case has been brought back into the public eye thanks to a documentary and the Netflix series “Monsters: The Story of Lyle and Erik Menendez,” is to obtain a new sentence.
To address this request, the court has set another hearing for December 11.
Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon supported the motion last week, saying he would ask the judge to reduce the sentences of the men currently serving life in prison without parole for murder.
Additionally, his defense has formally requested clemency before the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, for Lyle and Erik, who are 56 and 53 years old, respectively.
The petition was also endorsed by Gascon, who sent Newsom letters of recommendation on the matter.
“I strongly support clemency for Erik and Lyle Menendez, who are currently serving sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole,” Gascon said in a statement Wednesday.
“They have turned 34 years old, respectively, and have continued their studies and worked to create new support programs for the rehabilitation of their fellow prisoners.”
The 1989 murder of José and Mary Louise Menéndez was the subject of a media frenzy in the United States.
Lyle and Erik’s trial in 1993 was broadcast daily on television.
Prosecutors argued the men conspired to kill their parents and steal a $14 million inheritance.
The father, José Menendez, was a Cuban immigrant who amassed a fortune and was chief operating officer of the RCA record label.
The defense argued that the brothers were victims of continued sexual and physical abuse by their father, and the complicit silence of their mother, which is why they broke down after years of suffering.
The brothers, aged 18 and 21, were not convicted at first instance because the jury did not reach a unanimous verdict.
A second trial in which the judge refused to examine evidence of sexual assault resulted in his being sentenced to life in prison for premeditated murder in 1996.
