LA district attorney does not support Menendez brothers' resentencing bid

The Los Angeles County District Attorney on Monday said he did not support resentencing Lyle and Erik Menendez, who are serving life in prison without the possibility of parole for the 1989 shotgun killing of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez. 

Former Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón petitioned the court to resentence the two men to 50 years to life on two counts of first-degree murder, one of several pathways to freedom the brothers are pursuing. Gascón was defeated by Nathan J. Hochman, who is now asking the court to withdraw that motion.

"Our position is that they shouldn't get out of jail now," Hochman said at a news conference Monday.

Hochman said the brothers do not meet the standards for resentencing because they have continued lying about acting in self-defense on the night of the murders and attempted to suborn perjury during their trial. The announcement comes after Hochman said last month that he doesn't believe the brothers should have their convictions vacated or be given a retrial in light of new evidence in the case.

"They do not meet the standards for rehabilitation. They have not exhibited the full insights and accepted complete responsibility for their actions," Hochman said.

The brother's family released a statement accusing Hochman of playing "political games" on Monday, Variety reported.

“They have apologized for their actions, which were the results of Jose’s sexual abuse and Kitty’s enablement,” the family said in the statement. “They have apologized for the horrific actions they took. They have apologized to us. And, they have demonstrated their atonement through actions that have helped improve countless lives. Yet, DA Hochman is effectively asking for them to publicly apologize to a checklist of actions they took in a state of shock and fear.”

What did the Menendez brothers do?

The brothers were convicted in 1996 of killing their father, wealthy music industry executive Jose Menendez, and mother, Kitty Menendez, in a retrial after their first murder trials ended with two hung juries. Defense lawyers initially argued Lyle, then 21, and Erik, then 18, had been physically and sexually abused, feared their parents might kill them to stop them from exposing the abuse and fatally shot them in self-defense.

During the second trial, a judge excluded substantial evidence of the alleged abuse, their attorneys and family members contend. Prosecutors argued the brothers fabricated the abuse and killed their parents to obtain their estimated $15 million fortune, claims fueled by a lavish spending spree the pair went on after the murders.

The case gained renewed attention following the release of a Netflix documentary and a dramatized scripted series, including from Kim Kardashian who joined the calls for their sentence to be reconsidered. 

Why LA district attorney does not support Menendez resentencing

Hochman compared the risk assessment of granting the Menendez brothers parole to that of another high profile convicted killer, Sirhan Sirhan, who assassinated Robert F. Kennedy on June 5, 1968, and was denied parole for a 16th time in 2023. Hochman said that like Sirhan, the Menendez brothers had risk assessment levels of 19, the lowest an inmate can have in the California prison system.

He acknowledged, as family members have touted, that the brothers have participated in prison programs, gained an education, committed few rule violations and have letters of support from living relatives of the victims who want to see them released. But Hochman said the key issue in both cases was the lack of "full insight into their crimes and completely accepting responsibility for their actions."

Hochman said that in the more than 80 page filing his team laid out over a dozen lies the men told and actions they took in the wake of their parents' murder, including blaming the killings on the mafia and trying to coerce friends into corroborating their story. He said that while they have admitted to some of these lies, the men continue to maintain that they killed their parents because they were afraid for their lives, a defense Hochman called "fabricated."

"They persist in these lies to this very day. So like with Sirhan Sirhan not being able to exhibit full insight into his actions, so too the Menendez brothers failed to exhibit full insight into their actions," he said.

Can the Menendez brothers ever be released?

The brothers are expected to return to court later this month for a two-day hearing and a judge will ultimately decide whether to commute their sentences. Under California law, if they were resentenced per Gascón's recommendation, they would be eligible for youth parole since they were under the age of 26 at the time of the crime and have already served 30 years in prison.

A parole board would then evaluate whether they have been rehabilitated and are safe to reenter society. Gov. Gavin Newsom would then have the final say, since California allows the governor to accept, modify or reverse the board’s decision.

Newsom could also grant clemency on his own. The brothers' attorneys filed a clemency request with his office and late last month he ordered the state's parole board to investigatewhether the men pose an "unreasonable" public safety risk if they are released from prison. Hochman said Monday that assessment could take up to 90 days and the court may want to see that report before it holds the resentencing hearing.

Hochman said that although his office's current position is that the brothers should remain in custody, they have laid out a path that would potentially allow them to spend the rest of their lives beyond the walls of a prison.

"It requires them to finally, after 30 plus years, fully acknowledge and completely accept responsibility for the entire breadth of the crimes and all the lies that they have told, including their defense at trial of self defense," he said.