Los Angeles district attorney George Gascón has said the Mendez brothers don’t deserve to die in jail as their family asks for their resentencing.
‘Given the totality of the circumstances, I don’t think they deserve to be in prison until they die,’ Gascón told IMPACT x Nightline, as reported by PEOPLE.
The DA made the comments for the episode titled, Menendez Brothers: Monsters or Victims?, which will air Thursday on Hulu.
It comes as the extended family of Erik and Lyle Menendez are set to hold a press conference in Loa Angeles on Wednesday to advocate for the brothers’ release from prison as prosecutors review new evidence to determine whether they should be serving life sentences for killing their parents.
Erik Menendez, now 53, and his 56-year-old brother, Lyle Menendez, are currently incarcerated in state prison without the possibility of parole after being convicted of killing their parents in their Beverly Hills mansion more than 35 years ago.
Billed as ‘a powerful show of unity’ by more than a dozen family members — including the brothers’ aunt — who are traveling across the country to Los Angeles, the news conference will take place less than two weeks after Gascón announced his office was looking at the brothers’ case again.
Lyle Menendez, who was then 21, and Erik Menendez, then 18, admitted they fatally shot-gunned their entertainment executive father, Jose Menendez, and their mother, Kitty Menendez, in 1989.
They said they feared their parents were about to kill them to prevent the disclosure of the father’s long-term sexual molestation of Erik.
The extended family’s attorney Bryan Freedman previously said they strongly support the brothers’ release. Comedian Rosie O’Donnell also plans to join the family on Wednesday.
‘She wishes nothing more than for them to be released,’ Freedman said earlier this month of Joan VanderMolen, Kitty Menendez’s sister and the brothers’ aunt.
Earlier this month, Gascón said there is no question the brothers committed the 1989 murders, but his office will be reviewing new evidence and will make a decision on whether a resentencing is warranted in the notorious case that captured national attention.
A resentencing could see the brothers freed, as they have already served more than three decades in prison.
The brothers’ attorneys said the family believed from the beginning they should have been charged with manslaughter rather than murder. Manslaughter was not an option for the jury during the second trial that ultimately led to the brothers’ murder conviction, attorney Mark Geragos previously said.
The new evidence includes a letter written by Erik that his attorneys say corroborates the allegations that he was sexually abused by his father. A hearing was scheduled for November 29.
Prosecutors at the time of their conviction contended there was no evidence of any molestation. They said the sons were after their parents’ multimillion-dollar estate.
But the brothers have said they killed their parents out of self-defense after enduring a lifetime of physical, emotional and sexual abuse from them.
Their attorneys argue that because of society’s changing views on sexual abuse, that the brothers may not have been convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without parole today.
Jurors in 1996 rejected a death sentence in favor of life without parole.