The Menendez family have spoken out in hopes that new evidence will convince Los Angeles District attorney George Gascon to release the brothers.
About two dozen members of the family and defense lawyer Mark Geragos held a press conference on Wednesday as they ask for a revised sentence which could see the brothers, Erik, now 53 and Lyle, 56, walk free.
‘If they were the Menendez sisters they wouldn’t be in custody,’ Geragos said of the treatment the brothers received in their trial.
The family introduced a coalition called ‘Justice for Eric and Lyle’ and spoke of how the brothers have lived a life in purpose in prison – even though they did not expect to ever be freed.
They also said they have started a petition for people to support the brothers’ resentencing and release.
‘Lyle and Erik deserve a chance to heal, and our family deserves a chance to heal with them,’ said one of the brothers’ cousins.
About two dozen members of the family and defense lawyer Mark Geragos held press conference on Wednesday as they ask for a revised sentence which could see the Menendez brothers walk free
Geragos spoke of the new evidence his team sent to the DA – a letter written by Erik to his cousin that describes the sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of his father Jose Menendez before the murders.
He said the other new evidence is a declaration by Menudos’ former member Roy Rossello that he had been sexually assaulted by Jose Menendez.
In addition to the press conference, the relatives placed a full page ad in Wednesday’s LA Times, showing photos of the brothers and calling for ‘JUSTICE FOR ERIK AND LYLE’
The two men were convicted of first-degree murder and were sentenced to life without parole in 1996 after a retrial
The brothers, then just 18 and 21, killed their parents Jose and Mary Louise ‘Kitty’ Menendez with shotguns inside their million-dollar Beverly Hills home in August 1989.
Their subsequent trial prompted worldwide headlines. Prosecutors said they were motivated by greed, as they stood to inherit $14 million from their parents – while the brothers insisted they acted against a father who sexually abused them for years and a mother who turned a blind eye to the abuse.
That first trial ended with a hung jury. But at their second trial in 1996 – where the judge refused to allow any evidence about the brothers being molested by their father – they were convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole.
Jose and Kitty (pictured) were shot 14 times with 12-gauge shotguns in their million-dollar Beverly Hills home in August 1989
If a jury at any potential re-trial finds them guilty of voluntary manslaughter instead of murder, it would trigger their immediate release as they have already served more than the maximum sentence.
Gascon launched a new look at the case last month, saying his office was investigating fresh evidence of abuse that was not permitted in their trial,
Specifically, Gascon said he was reviewing shocking allegations made last year by Roy Rossello, a former member of the band Menudo, who claimed Jose Menendez – then a top executive with RCA Records – drugged and raped him in the 1980s when he was a teenager.
The brothers’ attorney, Mark Geragos- who is asking LA Superior Court to vacate the convictions – also provided Gascon with new evidence of a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin in which he said he was still being raped by his father eight months before the murders.
Gascon remains non-committal at present about whether he’ll push for the case to go back to court, his office telling DailyMail.com, ‘A decision regarding the Menendez case has not been made. Once DA Gascón has made a decision, the family members of the victims and the public will be notified.’
They were sentenced to life in prison in 1996, the two had not seen each other since
Lyle and Erik Menendez were convicted of the murder of their parents, Jose and Kitty, in 1996 after their first trial was declared a mistrial
O’Donnell isn’t the only celebrity supporting the release of the brothers. Kim Kardashian made a statement to NBC News earlier this month, saying, ‘The trial and punishment these brothers received were more befitting a serial killer than two individuals who endured years of sexual abuse by the very people they loved and trusted.’
New interest in the case was sparked over the past few weeks with the premiere of the Netflix drama, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story and the true crime documentary The Menendez Brothers – also on Netflix – which tell how the brothers claimed to police that they returned home from the theater to find their parents had been slaughtered.
At first it was feared that a vicious killer was on the loose in Beverly Hills, one of America’s wealthiest communities.
But cops switched their suspicions to Lyle and Erik after they set about spending their $14 million inheritance soon after their parents’ deaths.
The brothers’ attorney, Mark Geragos provided Gascon with new evidence of a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin in which he said he was still being raped by his father ight months before the murder
Chilling crime scene photos showing the blood-soaked couch where Jose Menendez was shot
Lyle bought a Porsche Carrera, Rolex watch and two restaurants, while his brother hired a full-time tennis coach to begin competing in tournaments.
In all, they spent $700,000 between the time of their parents’ deaths and their arrests in March 1990, seven months after the murders.
Erik – who said his father abused him from the age of six to 12 – insisted in the new Netflix documentary that it’s ‘absurd’ to suggest he was having a good time in the immediate aftermath of the murders.
‘Everything was to cover up this horrible pain of not wanting to be alive,’ he said.
‘One of the things that stopped me from killing myself was that I would be a complete failure to my dad.’
