The family of Erik and Lyle Menendez will meet with the Los Angeles County district attorney on Friday in a continued push for a reduced sentence for the brothers, who are serving life without parole for the heavily publicized 1989 murders of their parents.
Over 20 relatives are expected to sit down with District Attorney Nathan Hochman to show their “support for a resentencing process that reflects Erik and Lyle’s abuse, trauma, and demonstrated rehabilitation over the last 35 years,” the family-led Justice for Erik and Lyle Coalition said in a statement.
Erik and Lyle were sentenced in 1996, after two trials, for the shooting deaths of Jose and Kitty Menendez at the family’s Beverly Hills home on Aug. 20, 1989. The brothers’ first separate trials ended with hung juries after they could not deliver a unanimous verdict, but they were convicted of first-degree murder during a joint retrial.
The brothers said they shot their parents after years of horrific sexual abuse at the hands of their father — an allegation disputed by prosecutors, who argued the claims were false. Prosecutors said Erik and Lyle committed the murders for financial gain.
The trials of the Menendez brothers became media sensations and were broadcast live across the country. The killings of their parents have since been the subject of multiple dramatizations and true crime documentaries, most recently a high profile series and a film that were both on Netflix.
The coalition said they hope the meeting with Hochman can provide “an open and fair discussion.”
“Despite the abuse they endured as children and the unfairness of their current sentence, Erik and Lyle Menendez have spent the last three decades taking responsibility for their actions and contributing positively to their community through leadership and rehabilitation,” the statement read.
“During our meeting with DA Hochman, we look forward to sharing our perspective on Erik and Lyle’s immense personal growth over the last 35 years and the ways in which we plan to support them in their next chapters,” the coalition said. “We hope that this meeting will put us a step closer to spending next Christmas reunited as a family.”
