Los Angeles’ District Attorney has revealed he will make a decision on whether to free the Menendez brothers by the end of the week.
George Gascón told CNN he is expediting the process around a possible resentencing amid the heightened public interest in the case.
Erik and Lyle Menendez have spent 34 years in prison for the 1989 murder of their parents.
However, new evidence has recently emerged supporting the brothers’ claims that they were sexually abused by their father, Jose Menendez, prompting a reappraisal of the case.
The infamous murders have been thrust back into the spotlight in part thanks to a Netflix dramatization and a documentary examining Jose’s violent history of their father.
Los Angeles ‘ District Attorney has revealed he will make a decision on whether to free the Menendez brothers by the end of the week
Gascón admitted that there, ‘was certainly implicit bias that took place at that time that perhaps may have had an impact in the way the case was perceived and presented to the jury’ at the time of the conviction.
He explained today his office is split on whether there should be a resentencing.
‘I have a group of people, including some that were involved in the original trial, that are adamant that they should spend the rest of their life in prison and that they were not molested,’ he said.
‘I have other people in the office that believe they probably were molested and that they deserve to have some relief.’
The brothers were convicted of fist degree murder over the shooting of their parents Jose and Kitty at their Beverly Hills Home.
Prosecutors argued that the men killed their parents to obtain their $14 million inheritance and denied that Jose abused his sons.
However, the Mendezes’ defense team have now filed a petition which argues that new evidence has emerged which refutes this position.
This includes a letter written by Erik Menendez to his cousin in which he details the abuse he was suffering before the killing, as well as the claims from former boyband member Roy Rosselló who claims he was also raped by Jose.
George Gascón admitted that there, ‘was certainly implicit bias’ around the time when the brothers were convicted in 1996
Jose and Kitty (pictured) were killed in their Beverly Hills mansion in 1989
Erik Menendez wrote a letter to his cousin, Andy Cano, in which he alludes to serious, and long-term, abuse at the hands of his father Jose
Another way in which the brothers could be freed is under California law allowing for the early release of long-term prisoners who are not considered a threat to the public.
‘We have been looking at these cases for over a year,’ Gascón added. ‘But given the public attention I have decided to try and speed up the case and I will.’
The Menendez brothers were convicted of the murder of their parents in 1996 after their first trial was declared a mistrial.
The brothers never denied killing their parents by shooting them 14 times with 12-gauge shotguns in their million-dollar home in August 1989 when they were just 18 and 21.
But Lyle and Erik, now aged 53 and 56, claimed they acted in self-defense. They said they were lifelong victims of sexual abuse at their hands of their father, a high-flying businessman who worked across several industries.
Gascón said that the newly emerged letter, written by Erik months before the killings, ‘probably should’ have been included as evidence in the original trial.
‘It’s up to a jury to decided the evidentiary value of that letter,’ he added.
The siblings fatally shot their mom Kitty, a socialite and dad Jose Menendez, a Cuban immigrant who went on to land an executive role in the entertainment business
The brothers claimed they suffered years of emotional and sexual abuse at the hands of their father, and that he forced them to perform sex acts on their mother
This was the scene outside the Menendez family’s Beverly Hills mansion when police arrived on August 20, 1989
The letter, written to his cousin Andy Cano, reads: ‘I’ve been trying to avoid dad. It’s still happening Andy but it’s worse for me now. I can’t explain it.
‘He’s so overweight that I just can’t stand to see him. I never know when it’s going to happen and it’s driving me crazy.’
Prosecutors argued during their second trial that the abuse did not take place, and the judge who oversaw the trial refused to allow much of the defense’s evidence of sexual abuse to be presented.
But Cano, who died in 2003, testified that Erik told him about his father’s abuse when he was 13.
His mother found the letter nine years ago, and it was included in a 2023 petition to examine whether the brothers were unlawfully imprisoned.