Menendez Family Pressures D.A. To Resentence Brothers, Calls For Their Release From Prison

Members of the Menendez family held a rally outside Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón’s office Wednesday, voicing their desire to have brothers Lyle and Erik resentenced and possibly released from prison.

The siblings have been behind bars for 34 years after being found guilty of murdering their parents in 1989. Now, their defense team is arguing that new evidence, including the accusation that the boys’ father, Jose Menendez, sexually abused an underage member of Menudo, a 1980s boy band, should be sufficient to get the case reevaluated. 

During their first trial, the brothers said they had been sexually abused by their father, which is what prompted them to commit murder.

“I had no idea the extent of the abuse they suffered at the hands of my brother-in-law. None of us did,” Joan Andersen VanderMolen, Kitty Menendez’s sister, said. “We know that abuse has long effects, and victims of trauma sometimes act in ways that are very difficult to understand.”

“The whole world was not ready to hear that boys could be raped,” she said, per ABC News. “Today we know better.”

Erik and Lyle’s cousin Anamaria Baralt said the brothers were “victims of a culture that was not ready to listen.”

“Lyle and Erik deserve a chance to heal,” she said, per Variety. “Our family deserves a chance to heal with them.”

The press conference attracted a crowd of almost 100 media members outside the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center in downtown Los Angeles, plus dozens of spectators standing nearby, the outlet noted.

The defense is hoping to have the charges downgraded to manslaughter in light of the alleged sexual abuse the brothers say they experienced. Mark Geragos, an attorney for the brothers, said the understanding of sexual abuse has changed over the past three decades.

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The demand for their release comes less than two weeks after Gascón said his office would review new evidence in connection with the case. A hearing is set for November 26 to evaluate the proceedings.

The D.A.’s office said in a statement that it is “exploring every avenue available to our office to ensure justice is served.”

“Prosecutors are still seeking full documentation of the defense’s claims,” the statement said. “The office is working as quickly as justice permits,” adding that they have “empathy for all the victims involved in these tragic incidents.”

There has been renewed attention on the trial and its outcome since the release of a Peacock docseries and Netflix drama series. Both brothers and their lawyer condemned the Netflix series, however.

Geragos called it “a phobic, gross, anachronistic, serial episodic nightmare that is not only riddled with mistruths and outright falsehoods but ignores the most recent exculpatory revelations.”

Not all of the Menendez brothers’ relatives are calling for resentencing. Milton Anderson, Kitty Menendez’s brother, believes they should remain incarcerated.