The Los Angeles prosecutor announces that the Menendez brothers are contesting the verdict
The Los Angeles police officer says he has reached a decision on whether his office will seek a reduced sentence for the Mendez brothers.
Erik and Joseph “Lyle” Menendez ambushed their parents at gunpoint in the living room of their Beverly Hills mansion in 1989.
Their first case ended in a trial. Both were convicted after their second trial and sentenced to life in prison without parole.
However, under the new California law, district attorneys have the authority to request new sentences that were handed down before they took office.
LETTER DURING THE MENENDEZ BROTHERS' FREEDOM BID CALLED IN QUESTION
Erik Menendez (C) and his brother Lyle (L) are shown on Aug. 12, 1991 in Beverly Hills. (MIKE NELSON/AFP via Getty Images)
The brothers and their supporters, including a dozen relatives, including my mother's sister Joan Andersen VanderMolen, filed a petition with Los Angeles County Attorney George Gascon earlier this year, claiming that new evidence shows that the brothers were sexually abused and molested by their father.
The new evidence includes allegations made public last year that their father sexually assaulted Roy Rossello, a former member of the boy band Menudo, in the 1980s, and a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin, Andy Cano, which surfaced in 2015, years ago. after the last death.
Erik Menendez, left, and Lyle Menendez are serving life in prison after being convicted of murdering their parents. (California Department of Corrections via Associated Press)
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The date on which the letter was written has been denied by critics who may be released by the brothers. The defense attorney said he sent it to his cousin eight months before the murder, when the brothers were 21 and 18 years old.
Gascon is up for re-election in less than two weeks and faces a strong challenge from independent Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor. Critics say his involvement in this high-profile case is politically motivated. But there is also public support for the brothers' release after a series of recent documentaries have drawn attention to their case, including on FOX Nation.
WATCH ON FOX NATION: MENENDEZ BROTHERS: ACHIEVEMENTS OR BUILDERS?
The brothers pulled the trigger on their father, former RCA Records executive Jose Menendez, and their mother, Mary “Kitty” Menendez, while the couple were watching television at 10:30 p.m.
They ran out of bullets and had to go outside to get more to finish off his mother, who detectives say had blood on the bottom of her shoes, indicating she tried to run away after the shooting started.
An undated photo of the Menendez family as it appears on screen during a CrimeCon 2024 panel in Nashville, Tennessee, Sunday, June 2. Brothers Lyle and Erik were convicted of shooting and killing both their parents in 1989. (Michael Ruiz/Fox News Digital)
Not all family members of the brothers supported their release.
Kitty Menendez's brother, Milton Andersen, 90, strongly opposes a reduced sentence and on Wednesday asked the judge presiding over the case to sentence his nephews to life in prison – as they were originally sentenced to.
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“It is Milton Andersen's continued belief that the allegations of molestation are fabricated, and false, and he believes the right decision was made by the judge and the right sentence was imposed,” his attorney Kathleen Cady told Fox News Digital.
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