Lyle and Erik Menendez’s opportunity for freedom is once again suspended in precarity after the progressive Los Angeles County District Attorney who recommended they be resentenced was ousted by voters.
George Gascón, the so-called godfather of progressive prosecutors, announced last month that his office was recommending the two brothers, now in their 50s, should be eligible for parole after spending more than 30 years behind bars for gunning down their wealthy parents in 1989.
However on Tuesday, Gascón lost his reelection bid in a landslide to Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor, who said he wants to review the case with his own eyes before proceeding.
“Before I can make any decision about the Menendez brothers’ case, I will need to become thoroughly familiar with the relevant facts, the evidence and the law,” Hochman said in a statement on Wednesday, according to The Independent.
“I will have to review the confidential prison files for each brother, the transcripts from both trials, and speak to the prosecutors, law enforcement, defense counsel, and the victims’ family members,” he added.
Hochman, who successfully campaigned against Gascón’s unpopular criminal justice reforms, will take office on Dec. 2 — just nine days before the Menendez brothers’ scheduled hearing to consider Gascón’s request.
“If for some reason I need additional time, I will ask the court for that time,” Hochman said.
Gascón said last month that his office had been taking a renewed look at the brothers’ case “for over a year” in light of new evidence indicating they had been routinely sexually abused by their father while growing up.
The final decision will be left to a judge — but Gascón said the killer siblings had been on “a journey of redemption and rehabilitation” and had “paid their debt to society” for the time they’ve served and all they’ve done to help others while in prison.
If a judge agrees with Gascón’s recommendation, resentencing the Menendez brothers for murder would mean their new sentences would change from life without parole to 50 years to life — 25 years for each murder.
Since they were convicted under the age of 26, they would be immediately eligible for parole under California’s youthful offender law if resentenced.
The two brothers killed their parents, José and Kitty, with a shotgun while they were watching TV in August of 1989 at their Beverly Hills mansion
They were sentenced to life without parole in 1996 for the brutal killings following a highly publicized trial that made Erik and Lyle — who were then 21 and 18, respectively — household names.
The brothers’ attorneys argued at trial they had acted in self-defense following years of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of their father, with testimony supporting the accusations from other family members. Prosecutors argued they were after their parents’ $15 million fortune. The trial ended in a hung jury in 1994.
A second trial in 1995 ended with both brothers’ convictions on two counts of first-degree murder after a judge ruled the jury could not hear most of the testimony about the alleged sexual abuse.
The case has largely fallen out of the spotlight as the two brothers served time in prison, but a new Netflix series, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” brought renewed interest into the brothers and the murders.
