Following a blow by Los Angeles’ new district attorney last week, Gov. Gavin Newsom has now planted himself firmly in the good graces of the Menendez brothers, their family and legion of supporters, signaling on Wednesday that he’s potentially leaning toward offering clemency to the incarcerated convicted killers, should all other avenues fail, by calling for the California Parole Board to conduct a risk assessment investigation of the men as they seek freedom.
Erik and Lyle Menendez have been imprisoned for 35 years while serving life sentences for the 1989 murders of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez, at their Beverly Hills home. Their potential release has garnered huge public interest thanks to a hit Netflix series and new, compelling evidence that emerged in a 2023 documentary. The latter suggested they were not lying in their mid-90s trials when they claimed self-defense in the double murders after a lifetime of sexual, physical and emotional abuse by their parents.
The risk assessment isn’t concerned with these details of their case but would seek to conclude whether the brothers — model prisoners who have focused on helping other inmates heal trauma, by all accounts who have watched them over four decades — now pose an unreasonable risk to public safety if they are released.
“The Menendez brothers have been going through a rollercoaster ride since the D.A.’s office recommended they be resentenced last October,” Robert Rand, author of the definitive book on the case, The Menendez Murders, told The Hollywood Reporter Wednesday afternoon. “Now, it looks like Gov. Newsom supports them being set free — possibly as soon as later this year — through either clemency or resentencing.”
Newsom, who has previously noted the huge interest in the case following the runaway success of Ryan Murphy’s controversial Netflix series, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, had initially deferred to incoming L.A. District Attorney Nathan Hochman when the notion of commuting the brothers’ sentences emerged last year. But now this seems to have shifted after Hochman, months into his key role in the case but still mum on whether he supports the release of the brothers, declared last week that they should not have a new trial when he filed an informal response urging the Los Angeles County Superior Court to reject a habeas corpus petition they’d filed in 2023, essentially shutting down that avenue for the brothers.
At a Friday press conference, Hochman discussed the decision and cast doubt on the evidence of abuse, saying that it’s not even relevant in a murder case. This drew the ire of the Menendez family, who released a statement condemning the justice system as failing Erik and Lyle at their original trials and now, decades later, repeating the same mistakes.
“Abuse does not exist in a vacuum. It leaves lasting scars, rewires the brain, and traps victims in cycles of fear and trauma,” the family said in a statement. “To say it played no role in Erik and Lyle’s action is to ignore decades of psychological research and basic human understanding.”
The brothers have claimed that when they killed their parents with a shotgun, they’d feared their parents were about to kill them — to prevent disclosure of their father’s long-term molestation of Erik. They were first tried separately and then together after jurors were split on the verdicts; the second trial, which forbid any mention of the abuse they claim was inflicted throughout their childhoods, ended in guilty verdicts for both; they were handed life sentences times two with no parole.
In the letter on Wednesday to defense attorney Mark Geragos, Newsom’s office stated that his number one concern when evaluating commutation applications is the safety of the public. This includes risk level, victims and survivor impact, self-development and conduct since the crime was committed. The use of available rehabilitation programs and addressing any needs around treatment are considered, as are mitigated risk factors for reoffending, the letter explained.
“My office conducts dozens and dozens of these clemency reviews on a consistent basis,” Newsom told listeners on his podcast as he warned that the outcome is not yet determined. “But this process simply provides more transparency, which I think is important in this case.”
Once the Board has completed its investigation, it will be sent to the brothers’ legal team and to D.A. Hochman, whose first few months in the role saw him mired in the Menendez case. Ousted progressive D.A. George Cascon, his predecessor, had opened the door to a potential resentencing for Erik and Lyle when he asked a judge to review their case, given the new evidence. This includes a letter Erik wrote before the killings about his father’s abuse to a cousin and a new alleged victim, a former member of the boy band Menudo, coming forward to say Jose Menendez had raped him when he was a child.
On March 20, Erik and Lyle Menendez will appear in Superior Court for the resentencing hearing that the former D.A. kicked off on his way out the door. Their attorneys are seeking a resentencing of 50 years to life, which would make the brothers immediately eligible for release on parole. But none of the discussion at the hearing will involve the new evidence that has emerged in the past few years. Rather, it will largely deal with who the men are that would be released back into society.
Now that the habeas petition has essentially been nixed, all eyes will be on this resentencing hearing. Should it fail to result in a reduced sentence for Erik and Lyle, clemency from the governor will be their last shot at freedom. Newsom, who is term-limited and not seeking reelection as governor, has said he expects the report stemming from the investigation ordered Wednesday to be on his desk in 90 days.
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