In the article he gave a link to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals denial of a new trial. There is a little tidbit in there worth reading.
The brothers knew that Jose had a will, but
questions remained at the time as to the location of the will
and whether Jose had written more than one.
Jose’s 1981 will, which left everything to Erik and Lyle,
was not immediately recovered. The brothers, however, had
reason to fear that Jose might have written a new will, one
that would leave them nothing. Erik testified that his mother
told him that Jose had disinherited Erik. The day after the
murders, Erik and Lyle spoke with Randolph Wright, an attorney and family friend, about probating Jose’s will. (During
this meeting, Erik again mentioned he thought the killings
were Mafia-related.)
Lyle told Wright that he thought Jose might have changed
his will and that the new will might be on the family computer. The other possible location of a new will was a family
safe. Lyle retrieved the safe, and it was brought to Wright’s
home, where it was kept in a spare bedroom. Erik spent two
nights in that bedroom with the safe, and when it was opened,
Lyle allowed no one but Erik to be present. After opening the
safe in private, Lyle told family and friends that he and Erik
had found nothing in the safe.
Some time later, three files on the computer, entitled
“Will,” “Erik,” and “Lyle,” were discovered. These files,
however, were mysteriously unrecoverable.
They were both over 18 and could have just left their father and made a life of their own however they did not want to leave all that money behind. Since the mom knew there was a new will that left the brother's nothing, she had to go too.
The ironic thing about this is that they apparently didn’t realize that even if there was a new will stored in the computer, it wouldn’t affect them or prevent them from inheriting. Only a signed and witnessed document would be valid.
There is a lot that makes me not believe them regarding the abuse.
(1. Why kill the mother? If anything, she died much worse than the father. If her only crime was she was the enabler. Maybe she was just as much of a victim, why does she suffer the worse death?
(2. They were adults who were able to sneak out
and buy guns in a different city, if their father was that overbearing they wouldn't have been able to go to another city and buy guns.
(3. They were both rich kids who were going around robbing other people's houses for fun. This tells me these two are probably sociopaths
(4. Lyle seems to be a fabulist. He has made up several tall tales. He claims he got some girl pregnant and his father forced her to get an abortion. The woman in question maintains this never happened.
I think part of the problem here is that many people don't want to believe that two perfectly normal parents can raise two sociopaths so it's easier to blame the victim, which is the parent in this case. The truth may be far more frightening for society.
Just curious but if I was sexually molested by my father does that give me the right to murder my mother? It seems the Menendez brothers' argument hinges on that question.
No. But it doesn’t hinge on that question, it hinges on their argument that they were acting in self defense when they killed both of them. That’s the only way they would have the “right” to kill either of them, and even then, it would still be manslaughter.
As a matter of law, proof of molestation alone is not evidence that the murder was done in self-defense.
The brothers' ability and willingness to murder both parents, not as an act of self-defense as neither was in eminent threat of violence from either parent, is evidence to me they are both narcissistic sociopaths. Prison is the best place for both for the next several decades. Their conniving and manipulation of the truth is similar to Charlie Manson's behavior. I
Maybe but who knows...it's rare but not unusual for children to falsely claim sexual abuse. And sexual abuse is not always a factor in parricide although it makes an easy explanation for the horror of parricide in what seems like 'normal' families.
We can guess and speculate but no outsider ever knows the finer details of internal goings-on in marriages/families other than the people involved.
I researched the Menendez case in the 1990s when I was following a parricide here in Australia involving two brothers where the parents were stabbed to death (father 28 times, mother 17 times) and one of the brothers by the other brother (17 times). Owing to our gun laws, murders here are more likely to be stabbings than shootings.
This family - nothing like the Menendez family - was a stable middle class intact family where sexual abuse, drugs, a nasty divorce, mental health issues were definitely not factors.
One night the family imploded for reasons that have never been clear.
The only person who 'knows' is the remaining son who went to jail for a few years before being released on appeal.
The investigations and legalities went on for years.
There was the initial trial where everyone felt sorry for the remaining son who got off on a manslaughter charge for stabbing his brother (released on a good behaviour bond).
After several years following pressure from relatives there was an inquest that found the remaining brother had a case to answer. Eventually, following two trials and a couple of appeals, he was found guilty and got two life sentences (subsequently released on appeal).
All this happened over nineteen years...
Like everyone, I wouldn't have a clue about the Menendez boys being sexually abused but - I doubt it. It makes a handy reason/excuse for the inexplicible.
Let’s hope your child never shoots you and then claims he did it because you raped him. He’d never even have to prove it happened, under your theory. It would just be 100% ok.
Well, if a child has a 100% “right”. to shoot a parent who is raping him, at what point would he have to prove it happened? Before or after he shoots him?
Would he have to prove it at all, or does he just have the right to shoot him because he knows it happened?
Do you mean he has a right to shoot him while the rape is happening?
I believe that under the law that would be self-defense, because he would be in imminent danger of being killed or suffering bodily harm.
Do you mean that if he shoots him, and he can then prove in court that he was raped before, he should receive no punishment?
Obviously it would be proven after, as with any self-defense case. The fact that a child trapped in a situation of ongoing sexual assaults by a parent has no legal recourse to self-defense unless they are able to physically overpower the parent during the act, which is obviously nigh impossible, is a flaw in the law. It does not remove the child's moral right to self-defense.
They were not trapped. They were both adults at the time of the killings. They could have moved out and gotten jobs to support themselves. They didn't because the wanted THE MONEY. They killed their mother supposedly because she didn't protect them--how much hatred do you have to have for someone to shoot her at point blank range in her face?
The brothers did try to claim self defense here. But- self defense has a very limited meaning in the law. One must believe one is about to be killed or seriously harmed. Being “trapped in a situation of ongoing assaults” doesn’t cut it, unfortunately. The court determined that they had presented no evidence in support, and so the claim did not go to the jury.
It’s true that a child might find it very difficult to overpower a parent as an assault was taking place. Still, if the child were to lie in wait and kill the parent, that would not be legal self defense, it would be murder. There are other options for a child in that situation, such as reporting the abuse to an authority.
Also, the brothers were not helpless children when the murder happened. They were 18 and 22 year old athletes, one of whom had left home for college and one who was about to. They had cars and even their own money for plane tickets. There is no evidence they were ever prevented from leaving home, or that they ever believed they could not.
As I said, I understand what the law says and I do not care. The law is wrong. This is not an issue limited only to the Menendez brothers, it affects every person who is physically much weaker than their abuser.
One cannot discount, in my opinion, Ryan Murphy’s choice of very attractive and buff actors to play the brothers, as well as his choice to explore the idea that the brothers may have been having hot shower sex with each other, an idea for which there is no evidence other than the hearsay speculation of Dominick Dunne within the series itself. (Dunne doesn’t fare well in the series, either; he is mocked for being closeted at a time when people were far less accepting, and for being unable to get over his daughter’s having had the misfortune to be murdered by someone who wasn’t even hot and thus deserving of sympathy.). So many speedos, so many shirtless shots. The reality of these two men is considerably less titillating, unless you’re into ridiculous hairpieces, dead-eyed stares, and incomprehensible callousness. But, Manson had his groupies, as did Ted Bundy. I cannot pretend to understand or explain the phenomenon.
Spoken like a typical male. Note that the first jury was split on sex lines; none of the women were for first degree murder and all of the men were.
If the parents were in fact abusive and the kids sexually abused (which seems likely they were, and there WERE witnesses in the first trial that supported this), then the parents got what they deserved in my book.
Your "preemptive strike" statement is weak. By that logic, if Israel fires on Iran it is a "preemptive strike" and therefore not acceptable. No. If abuse (or bombings in the case of Israel) had been ongoing, then it was NOT a preemptive strike.
Your definition of "imminent" danger does not jive with mine. In my opinion, if there was a reasonable belief that the abuse would continue, then I think the argument is valid.
And yes, why not consider this like "battered wife syndrome"? If sexual assault was involved (which again, it likely was), then why they hell would they not qualify for the same sort of sympathy.
In my mind, a punishment of life without parole is NOT an appropriate punishment if they were sexually abused.
Alan, I was not aware that you covered this story when you were at the LA Times. Great follow-up here from my fellow Northwestern alum. Happy to see you're teaching at Annenberg with our new B1G rivals - and writing for one of my favorite Substack journals here at Free Press!
Interesting piece. Would like to ask Alan what he thinks of his former Newspaper, the LAT, transitioning from a once credible paper to now a far left, untrustworthy, Al Jazeera style propaganda outlet.
George Gascon found new evidence conveniently to put him in the limelight ahead of the November election for LA County DA. Anything to misdirect voters away from his staggeringly abysmal tenure. Then again, he did the same thing as DA in SF, who why is anyone surprised.
They’ve offered several explanations. It was a mercy killing, to put her out of her misery. She knew about the abuse and didn’t do anything. She couldn’t have lived without the father. She was suicidal. They’ve said all of these things at one time or another.
I’m so glad you wrote this piece. I saw the Netflix documentary, which made me wonder. The murders make no sense. Why did the brothers not report the supposed abuse?
Not only did they brutally murder their parents, they then dragged their father’s name through the mud. Monsters
The situation is not at all analogous to that of an abused woman, though they have tried to argue that it is.
In the first place, they didn’t stay. One left for college and the other was about to. He testified that his father had told him he would have to stay home a couple of days a week. But since I am not aware of any college that allows a parent to pay for housing for only part of the week, I have to conclude that he would have had access to housing full-time should he have wished to avail himself of it.
Battered women stay because they have reached a mental state where they believe that they cannot leave, or that if they do they will be found and killed or hurt.
There is no evidence that the brothers believed any of that. Again, they didn’t stay. In fact, they left home quite frequently. Lyle, in particular, flew back and forth from Princeton to LA on a regular basis. While in Princeton, he lived in dorms and in a condo his father had purchased for him. Both traveled for tennis tournaments. While in LA, they came and went as they pleased in cars their parents purchased for them.
There is no evidence that their parents ever prevented them from leaving home or that they tracked them down and came after them or beat them when they did.
I am not an admirer of Ryan Murphy's productions, to put it mildly. But the last episode of 'Monsters' was absolutely devastating as to the Menendez brothers and the molestation allegations.
One never knows for sure, but the weight of fact to me is overwhelming to the effect that the defense was concocted after the fact by the defendants with the assistance of Leslie Abramson - a truly despicable lawyer and human being.
If the legal eagle Kim Kardashian has ventured the opinion that the convictions should be "reconsidered" and the champion of Law and Order (not the TV show) George Gascon has found "new evidence" (the tooth fairy must have left it under his pillow) then who am I to question that the boys are actually guilty of that for which they were convicted? Maybe the parents aren't dead either.
It’s not new evidence, because it’s not evidence in this case at all.
As a matter of law the fact that a member of Menudo claims that Jose Menendez molested him years before the murders is not “evidence” that the brothers believed that they were about to be killed or suffer serious bodily harm when they fired their weapons that night.
Nor is the fact that a letter has surfaced from Erik to a cousin, written many years before the murder, in which Erik says “it’s still happening” and states that he is afraid of his father coming into his room.
“It’s happening again” could also refer to physical abuse, or verbal abuse, or something else… and where was the letter during the trial, especially the first trial in which dozens of character witnesses for the brothers testified? Even if this cousin had lost the letter, he could’ve testified at trial to its existence, and probably to the contents of the letter itself. But apparently that did not happen.
Absolutely, all of this. I believe the cousin is dead now, and so we can’t know what the letter was referring to as “still happening,” or how the cousin responded. The letter actually makes sense to me as describing a pattern of Jose entering into Erik’s room to harangue and verbally abuse him; I believe there was plenty of testimony that this type of thing did indeed happen. I believe this could be very frightening, and that Erik might indeed have dreaded the nightly visits. It offers no proof of sexual abuse, though, and certainly not enough in my opinion to grant a new trial and permit the brothers to argue that they believed they were about to be killed when they entered the tv room that night.
They are where they belong.
In the article he gave a link to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals denial of a new trial. There is a little tidbit in there worth reading.
The brothers knew that Jose had a will, but
questions remained at the time as to the location of the will
and whether Jose had written more than one.
Jose’s 1981 will, which left everything to Erik and Lyle,
was not immediately recovered. The brothers, however, had
reason to fear that Jose might have written a new will, one
that would leave them nothing. Erik testified that his mother
told him that Jose had disinherited Erik. The day after the
murders, Erik and Lyle spoke with Randolph Wright, an attorney and family friend, about probating Jose’s will. (During
this meeting, Erik again mentioned he thought the killings
were Mafia-related.)
Lyle told Wright that he thought Jose might have changed
his will and that the new will might be on the family computer. The other possible location of a new will was a family
safe. Lyle retrieved the safe, and it was brought to Wright’s
home, where it was kept in a spare bedroom. Erik spent two
nights in that bedroom with the safe, and when it was opened,
Lyle allowed no one but Erik to be present. After opening the
safe in private, Lyle told family and friends that he and Erik
had found nothing in the safe.
Some time later, three files on the computer, entitled
“Will,” “Erik,” and “Lyle,” were discovered. These files,
however, were mysteriously unrecoverable.
They were both over 18 and could have just left their father and made a life of their own however they did not want to leave all that money behind. Since the mom knew there was a new will that left the brother's nothing, she had to go too.
The ironic thing about this is that they apparently didn’t realize that even if there was a new will stored in the computer, it wouldn’t affect them or prevent them from inheriting. Only a signed and witnessed document would be valid.
They remind me of that Jewish joke about a man who kills his parents then asks the court for mercy as an orphan
The definition of chutzpah.
That’s kind of exactly what they did.
There is a lot that makes me not believe them regarding the abuse.
(1. Why kill the mother? If anything, she died much worse than the father. If her only crime was she was the enabler. Maybe she was just as much of a victim, why does she suffer the worse death?
(2. They were adults who were able to sneak out
and buy guns in a different city, if their father was that overbearing they wouldn't have been able to go to another city and buy guns.
(3. They were both rich kids who were going around robbing other people's houses for fun. This tells me these two are probably sociopaths
(4. Lyle seems to be a fabulist. He has made up several tall tales. He claims he got some girl pregnant and his father forced her to get an abortion. The woman in question maintains this never happened.
I think part of the problem here is that many people don't want to believe that two perfectly normal parents can raise two sociopaths so it's easier to blame the victim, which is the parent in this case. The truth may be far more frightening for society.
Just curious but if I was sexually molested by my father does that give me the right to murder my mother? It seems the Menendez brothers' argument hinges on that question.
No. But it doesn’t hinge on that question, it hinges on their argument that they were acting in self defense when they killed both of them. That’s the only way they would have the “right” to kill either of them, and even then, it would still be manslaughter.
As a matter of law, proof of molestation alone is not evidence that the murder was done in self-defense.
The brothers' ability and willingness to murder both parents, not as an act of self-defense as neither was in eminent threat of violence from either parent, is evidence to me they are both narcissistic sociopaths. Prison is the best place for both for the next several decades. Their conniving and manipulation of the truth is similar to Charlie Manson's behavior. I
Yeah, this is the part that bothers me about this case and why I have a hard time believing their innocence.
Interesting.
Sexual abuse?
Maybe but who knows...it's rare but not unusual for children to falsely claim sexual abuse. And sexual abuse is not always a factor in parricide although it makes an easy explanation for the horror of parricide in what seems like 'normal' families.
We can guess and speculate but no outsider ever knows the finer details of internal goings-on in marriages/families other than the people involved.
I researched the Menendez case in the 1990s when I was following a parricide here in Australia involving two brothers where the parents were stabbed to death (father 28 times, mother 17 times) and one of the brothers by the other brother (17 times). Owing to our gun laws, murders here are more likely to be stabbings than shootings.
This family - nothing like the Menendez family - was a stable middle class intact family where sexual abuse, drugs, a nasty divorce, mental health issues were definitely not factors.
One night the family imploded for reasons that have never been clear.
The only person who 'knows' is the remaining son who went to jail for a few years before being released on appeal.
The investigations and legalities went on for years.
There was the initial trial where everyone felt sorry for the remaining son who got off on a manslaughter charge for stabbing his brother (released on a good behaviour bond).
After several years following pressure from relatives there was an inquest that found the remaining brother had a case to answer. Eventually, following two trials and a couple of appeals, he was found guilty and got two life sentences (subsequently released on appeal).
All this happened over nineteen years...
Like everyone, I wouldn't have a clue about the Menendez boys being sexually abused but - I doubt it. It makes a handy reason/excuse for the inexplicible.
Read Shakespeare. Families sometimes erupt.
A child being raped by a parent 100% has the right to shoot that fucker.
Only if they were in the middle of the act.
Let’s hope your child never shoots you and then claims he did it because you raped him. He’d never even have to prove it happened, under your theory. It would just be 100% ok.
I did not write that there is no need to prove anything, you are reading that into my comment.
Well, if a child has a 100% “right”. to shoot a parent who is raping him, at what point would he have to prove it happened? Before or after he shoots him?
Would he have to prove it at all, or does he just have the right to shoot him because he knows it happened?
Do you mean he has a right to shoot him while the rape is happening?
I believe that under the law that would be self-defense, because he would be in imminent danger of being killed or suffering bodily harm.
Do you mean that if he shoots him, and he can then prove in court that he was raped before, he should receive no punishment?
That is not how the law works.
Obviously it would be proven after, as with any self-defense case. The fact that a child trapped in a situation of ongoing sexual assaults by a parent has no legal recourse to self-defense unless they are able to physically overpower the parent during the act, which is obviously nigh impossible, is a flaw in the law. It does not remove the child's moral right to self-defense.
They were not trapped. They were both adults at the time of the killings. They could have moved out and gotten jobs to support themselves. They didn't because the wanted THE MONEY. They killed their mother supposedly because she didn't protect them--how much hatred do you have to have for someone to shoot her at point blank range in her face?
This is a general principle that extends far beyond the Menendez brothers.
The brothers did try to claim self defense here. But- self defense has a very limited meaning in the law. One must believe one is about to be killed or seriously harmed. Being “trapped in a situation of ongoing assaults” doesn’t cut it, unfortunately. The court determined that they had presented no evidence in support, and so the claim did not go to the jury.
It’s true that a child might find it very difficult to overpower a parent as an assault was taking place. Still, if the child were to lie in wait and kill the parent, that would not be legal self defense, it would be murder. There are other options for a child in that situation, such as reporting the abuse to an authority.
Also, the brothers were not helpless children when the murder happened. They were 18 and 22 year old athletes, one of whom had left home for college and one who was about to. They had cars and even their own money for plane tickets. There is no evidence they were ever prevented from leaving home, or that they ever believed they could not.
As I said, I understand what the law says and I do not care. The law is wrong. This is not an issue limited only to the Menendez brothers, it affects every person who is physically much weaker than their abuser.
One cannot discount, in my opinion, Ryan Murphy’s choice of very attractive and buff actors to play the brothers, as well as his choice to explore the idea that the brothers may have been having hot shower sex with each other, an idea for which there is no evidence other than the hearsay speculation of Dominick Dunne within the series itself. (Dunne doesn’t fare well in the series, either; he is mocked for being closeted at a time when people were far less accepting, and for being unable to get over his daughter’s having had the misfortune to be murdered by someone who wasn’t even hot and thus deserving of sympathy.). So many speedos, so many shirtless shots. The reality of these two men is considerably less titillating, unless you’re into ridiculous hairpieces, dead-eyed stares, and incomprehensible callousness. But, Manson had his groupies, as did Ted Bundy. I cannot pretend to understand or explain the phenomenon.
Spoken like a typical male. Note that the first jury was split on sex lines; none of the women were for first degree murder and all of the men were.
If the parents were in fact abusive and the kids sexually abused (which seems likely they were, and there WERE witnesses in the first trial that supported this), then the parents got what they deserved in my book.
Your "preemptive strike" statement is weak. By that logic, if Israel fires on Iran it is a "preemptive strike" and therefore not acceptable. No. If abuse (or bombings in the case of Israel) had been ongoing, then it was NOT a preemptive strike.
Your definition of "imminent" danger does not jive with mine. In my opinion, if there was a reasonable belief that the abuse would continue, then I think the argument is valid.
And yes, why not consider this like "battered wife syndrome"? If sexual assault was involved (which again, it likely was), then why they hell would they not qualify for the same sort of sympathy.
In my mind, a punishment of life without parole is NOT an appropriate punishment if they were sexually abused.
This is a very frustrating attitude. I am a woman and a very hard time believing their innocence.
Really? All parents who sexually abuse their children deserve to be murdered in cold blood without a trial?
Also, it’s not “his” definition of imminent. It’s the legal definition. And it doesn’t line up with yours.
It’s not his “preemptive” strike statement. It’s the appellate court’s.
The law is the law. You might not like it. You might not agree with it.
Alan, I was not aware that you covered this story when you were at the LA Times. Great follow-up here from my fellow Northwestern alum. Happy to see you're teaching at Annenberg with our new B1G rivals - and writing for one of my favorite Substack journals here at Free Press!
Interesting piece. Would like to ask Alan what he thinks of his former Newspaper, the LAT, transitioning from a once credible paper to now a far left, untrustworthy, Al Jazeera style propaganda outlet.
George Gascon found new evidence conveniently to put him in the limelight ahead of the November election for LA County DA. Anything to misdirect voters away from his staggeringly abysmal tenure. Then again, he did the same thing as DA in SF, who why is anyone surprised.
Cynicism is often not wrong!
Why do they get to murder their mother? Did she molest them too?
she just allowed it
They’ve offered several explanations. It was a mercy killing, to put her out of her misery. She knew about the abuse and didn’t do anything. She couldn’t have lived without the father. She was suicidal. They’ve said all of these things at one time or another.
I’m so glad you wrote this piece. I saw the Netflix documentary, which made me wonder. The murders make no sense. Why did the brothers not report the supposed abuse?
Not only did they brutally murder their parents, they then dragged their father’s name through the mud. Monsters
Why do women stay with abusive husbands? I've never understood that either, but they do. Many many many women do.
The situation is not at all analogous to that of an abused woman, though they have tried to argue that it is.
In the first place, they didn’t stay. One left for college and the other was about to. He testified that his father had told him he would have to stay home a couple of days a week. But since I am not aware of any college that allows a parent to pay for housing for only part of the week, I have to conclude that he would have had access to housing full-time should he have wished to avail himself of it.
Battered women stay because they have reached a mental state where they believe that they cannot leave, or that if they do they will be found and killed or hurt.
There is no evidence that the brothers believed any of that. Again, they didn’t stay. In fact, they left home quite frequently. Lyle, in particular, flew back and forth from Princeton to LA on a regular basis. While in Princeton, he lived in dorms and in a condo his father had purchased for him. Both traveled for tennis tournaments. While in LA, they came and went as they pleased in cars their parents purchased for them.
There is no evidence that their parents ever prevented them from leaving home or that they tracked them down and came after them or beat them when they did.
I am not an admirer of Ryan Murphy's productions, to put it mildly. But the last episode of 'Monsters' was absolutely devastating as to the Menendez brothers and the molestation allegations.
One never knows for sure, but the weight of fact to me is overwhelming to the effect that the defense was concocted after the fact by the defendants with the assistance of Leslie Abramson - a truly despicable lawyer and human being.
Yeah not a fan of Ryan Murphy but he did a phenomenonal job with this series.
If the legal eagle Kim Kardashian has ventured the opinion that the convictions should be "reconsidered" and the champion of Law and Order (not the TV show) George Gascon has found "new evidence" (the tooth fairy must have left it under his pillow) then who am I to question that the boys are actually guilty of that for which they were convicted? Maybe the parents aren't dead either.
It’s not new evidence, because it’s not evidence in this case at all.
As a matter of law the fact that a member of Menudo claims that Jose Menendez molested him years before the murders is not “evidence” that the brothers believed that they were about to be killed or suffer serious bodily harm when they fired their weapons that night.
Nor is the fact that a letter has surfaced from Erik to a cousin, written many years before the murder, in which Erik says “it’s still happening” and states that he is afraid of his father coming into his room.
“It’s happening again” could also refer to physical abuse, or verbal abuse, or something else… and where was the letter during the trial, especially the first trial in which dozens of character witnesses for the brothers testified? Even if this cousin had lost the letter, he could’ve testified at trial to its existence, and probably to the contents of the letter itself. But apparently that did not happen.
Absolutely, all of this. I believe the cousin is dead now, and so we can’t know what the letter was referring to as “still happening,” or how the cousin responded. The letter actually makes sense to me as describing a pattern of Jose entering into Erik’s room to harangue and verbally abuse him; I believe there was plenty of testimony that this type of thing did indeed happen. I believe this could be very frightening, and that Erik might indeed have dreaded the nightly visits. It offers no proof of sexual abuse, though, and certainly not enough in my opinion to grant a new trial and permit the brothers to argue that they believed they were about to be killed when they entered the tv room that night.