In Menendez brothers case, DA asks court to deny their petition seeking a new trial

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said Friday he is asking a judge to deny the Menendez brothers' habeas petition requesting a vacating of their convictions and a new trial — one of three possible tracks to early release.

Lyle and Erik Menendez have been serving sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole for the August 1989 murder of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez. They fatally shot their parents at the family's Beverly Hills home, admitting to the killings over the course of two trials as they claimed self-defense and said they feared for their lives following years of physical and sexual abuse. 

In 1996, a jury convicted them of first-degree murder. They have spent over 35 years behind bars.  

The brothers will still face a resentencing hearing March 20 and 21, which will focus on whether they have rehabilitated while incarcerated. It does not deal with the facts of the case as the habeas petition does. In a last possible path to early release, they could be granted clemency, a decision made by the state governor. In November, Gov. Gavin Newsom said he would defer to Hochman's "review and analysis of the Menendez case prior to making any clemency decisions."

The habeas petition filed in May 2023 cited what their lawyers described as two new pieces of evidence backing the brothers' allegations of abuse, including a 1988 letter written by Erik Menendez which alludes to sexual abuse by his father and an allegation of sexual assault made by a former boy band member against the brothers' father, who was once a record executive. 

It seeks a vacating of their first-degree murder convictions, and if granted by a judge, could result in a new trial and possibly a lesser charge of manslaughter. With that conviction, the brothers would be eligible for parole since they have already served over 30 years in prison and manslaughter carries a much shorter sentence of up to 11 years with no other prior "strikes."

Hochman opposes petition, family "profoundly disappointed"

Hochman said the DA's office is asking the court to deny the habeas petition, saying the credibility of the alleged new evidence has been called into question since, he said, the brothers lied throughout the investigation. He also said that the question of whether they were sexually abused is not a determinant of whether they are guilty of murder, a point raised in a new court filing from the DA.

"The jury was not asked to decide if the Menendez brothers were sexually abused by their father and their mother failed to stop it, only if the Menendez brothers committed these murders willfully, deliberately and with premeditation or in self-defense," reads the DA's informal response to the habeas petition filed Friday. 

"The 'new evidence' submitted by Petitioners — an updated copy of a letter from Erik Menendez to his cousin Andy Cano and a declaration from Roy Rossello — provides no additional evidence at all concerning this key issue at trial about self-defense and Petitioners' mental state the night of August 20, 1989, when they executed and shotgunned their parents over 12 times to their deaths," the court filing continues. 

Several family members have pushed for the brothers' release from prison in recent months, speaking out publicly and meeting with the DA last month to discuss the case. On Friday, following Hochman's announcement, a family-led initiative called The Justice for Erik and Lyle Coalition released a statement slamming the prosecutor's decision. 

"District Attorney Nathan Hochman took us right back to 1996 today. He opened the wounds we have spent decades trying to heal," the statement reads. "We are profoundly disappointed by his remarks, in which he effectively tore up new evidence and discredited the trauma they experienced."

"Abuse does not exist in a vacuum. It leaves lasting scars, rewires the brain, and traps victims in cycles of fear and trauma," the statement continues. "Our hope now rests with Judge Jesic, that he will examine the evidence in their case without prejudice, carefully adhering to California law with modern understanding of trauma."

Hochman said the Menendez brothers lied on several occasions, with evidence suggesting they planned the killings. He said they asked friends to make false testimonies, including asking a girlfriend to say their father raped her, came up with alibies, drove down to San Diego to buy guns using a false ID and staged the scene.

"The shogun blast to the mother actually didn't kill her," Hochman said Friday. "She actually ended up lying on the ground, groaning and bleeding in pain, and at that point, when Lyle and Erik Menendez had run out of ammunition, they reload and Lyle puts the reloaded shotgun up to his mother's face and reloads the trigger." 

"That's staging it, at the time, like a gangland hit — which then becomes their deceit and lies in the ensuing months that occurred," Hochman said, describing changing stories about what happened that night and other discrepancies as a "continuum of lies." 

A 1988 letter and an assault allegation cited as new evidence

Among the new evidence is an affidavit from Roy Rosselló, former member of the boy band Menudo, saying he was sexually assaulted in the 1980s by Jose Menendez, who was a record executive at the label that signed the band, RCA Records. The other piece of new evidence is a letter allegedly written by Erik Menendez to his cousin, Andy Cano, in 1988. The letter alludes to abuse by his father, according to the brothers' appellate attorney, Cliff Gardner, who filed the habeas petition. 

"I've been trying to avoid dad. It's still happening, Andy, but it's worse for me now," the letter reads, in part. "…Every night I stay up thinking he might come in... He's warned me a hundred times about telling anyone, especially Lyle."  

Their lawyers have said the brothers asked them for the letter after learning about it through a Barbara Walters special in 2015. Lyle Menendez told CBS News' 48 Hours that his aunt uncovered the letter in the last few years.

"Just kind of out of the blue, one of, uh—my father's sister found a letter in storage," Menendez said.

Gardner said the new evidence backs his argument that the brothers should have been convicted of manslaughter, not murder, given the abuse allegations. 

"My hope in the case is that the judge will realize that this new evidence is indeed credible and persuasive, and he'll vacate the convictions," he told CBS News' 48 Hours.

But Hochman questioned the credibility of the letter given the past instances of lying by the brothers. He also said that both Andy Cano and Erik Menendez testified about discussing abuse allegations but their testimony made no mention of such communications in 1988. Instead, they only testified to speaking about such allegations six years earlier, when they were children, Hochman said.

The prosecutor said it "defies common sense" that they would not mention the discussion in the letter, which was just months before the killings. 

Lyle Menendez did not testify during the second trial, which also excluded certain evidence and witnesses relating to the allegations. That trial resulted in the first-degree murder convictions. 

He did testify in the first trial, which ended with a hung jury. 

The newly released statement from The Justice for Erik and Lyle Coalition mentions the difference between the two trials.

"The fact remains: the jury in their second trial never heard the full truth," the statement reads. "Key testimony was kept from them, and now, DA Hochman is attempting to erase this reality once again."

Other possible paths to early release

Last year, former District Attorney George Gascón recommended resentencing for the brothers. Since Hochman was elected in November, he has said prosecutors must still review thousands of pages of trial transcripts and prison records before he reaches his own decision. 

Currently, Lyle and Erik Menendez are scheduled to face a resentencing hearing on March 20 and 21. If Hochman recommends recommends resentencing during the hearing, the ultimate decision would then be handed off to a judge. 

If they are resentenced, they would be immediately eligible for parole since they committed the crimes when they were under the age of 26 and have already spent 15 years in prison, in accordance with California Penal Code § 3051.  

In January, the DA's office pushed back the resentencing hearing which had been scheduled for later that month to March due to the deadly LA wildfires, which caused work delays as prosecutors in the office were among thousands evacuated from their homes. 

"We'll be ready for that hearing," Hochman said last month of the March court dates. "We're working as hard as we can... So the wildfires set us back a little bit. But we're working very hard to make sure we get to the right result and then can defend it in court."

Towards the end of his term as DA, Gascón said he would ask a judge to resentence Lyle and Erik Menendez to 50 years to life.

"I believe they have paid their debt to society," Gascón said at the time.

He announced the decision in late October, less than two weeks after several relatives of the brothers gathered in Los Angeles for a news conference publicly showing support for their release from prison.

"I never thought this day would come. I am Kitty's sister," Joan VanderMolen, 92, told reporters outside a downtown LA courthouse. "For many years, I struggled with ... what happened to my sister's family. It was a nightmare none of us could've imagined. But as details of Lyle and Erik's abuse came to light, it became clear that their actions – while tragic – were the desperate response of two boys trying to survive the unspeakable cruelty of their father."  

Gascón also wrote to Gov. Gavin Newsom to advocate for clemency, citing the Menendez brothers' allegations of abuse and saying they have rehabilitated while behind bars, earning college diplomas and leading support groups for other survivors of abuse. 

However, Gov. Newsom has said he will defer to Hochman's review of the case before making any decisions on clemency.

Family members publicly advocating for the brothers' release met with Hochman in early January.

"This 35-year process has been incredibly traumatizing for us, as I'm sure you can all imagine," Anamaria Baralt, a cousin of theirs, said following the meeting last month. "We are very much hoping that we can find a path to manslaughter — that we can see the release of the brothers immediately."

Meanwhile, an uncle of theirs is at least one relative who has opposed the brothers being freed. An attorney for Milton Andersen issued a statement last year saying their "cold-blooded actions shattered their family and left a trail of grief that has persisted for decades."

Hochman has said he is leading the DA's office with what he calls a "hard middle" approach, advocating for increased penalties for some non-violent offenders while also being open to some rehabilitative measures. Last year, he said he would continue running the Resentencing Unit that Gascón started in April 2021, which oversaw the resentencing of at least 300 people.

"My plans would be to certainly continue the Resentencing Unit," Hochman said days after being elected. "Once I get into office, I'll be better able to understand all the aspects of it and whether or not any changes are required, whether or not it needs to be scaled up more to do more resentencings. But we will be looking at, again, the facts and the law of each of the cases that come down."