Extended Family of Menendez Brothers to Flock to LA for Mysterious Courthouse Presser

A large number of Erik and Lyle Menendez’s extended family has been invited by Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón to attend a press conference at a courthouse in Los Angeles on Wednesday, the brothers’ aunt Joan VanderMolen told Vanity Fair.

Although Gascón did not confirm what the presser will be about or whether he will attend, it comes amid a renewed bid for freedom by the brothers, who have been imprisoned without the possibility of parole for the past three decades after they brutally blasted their wealthy parents to death with shotguns in 1989.

Vanity Fair also reported that an unnamed source close to the situation believes Gascón’s office will make an announcement about the possibility of re-sentencing the brothers in the next few weeks.

Gascón announced on Oct. 3 that his office was reviewing newly emerged evidence that the brothers’ attorney had submitted in support of the claim—which they had unsuccessfully argued during their widely publicized 1996 trial—that the killing of their parents was in response to sexual abuse at the hands of their father and fear for their lives.

The two new pieces of evidence include a letter written by Erik to his cousin before the killing in which he seems to hint at his father’s abuse. The other is an allegation made last year by Roy Rosselló, a former member of the Puerto Rican boy band Menudo, that the brothers’ father, José Menendez, once an executive at RCA Records, sexually assaulted him in the 1980s.

“We are not ready at this point to say we believe or do not believe this information,” Gascón said at the early October presser. “We are here to say we have a moral and ethical obligation to review what has been presented to us.”

While he maintained that the brothers were “clearly the murderers,” Gascón said the question is whether the jury who sentenced the brothers to life in prison would have reached a different verdict had they seen the new evidence.

Interest in the brothers’ case, which gripped the national attention during the 1990s, has spiked as two new Netflix releases interrogate the case.

Ryan Murphy’s true-crime depiction of the killing and subsequent trial, a series titled Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, debuted on Netflix last month to huge viewership—and controversy, largely over insinuations in the show that the brothers had an incestuous relationship.

In a statement shared by his wife, Tammi Menendez, Erik slammed the series, which he says was full of “blatant lies” about him and his brother.

“It is with a heavy heart that I say, I believe Ryan Murphy cannot be this naïve and inaccurate about the facts of our lives so as to do this without bad intent,” Erik said. “So now Murphy shapes his horrible narrative through vile and appalling character portrayals of Lyle and of me and disheartening slander.”

Another statement, signed by 24 members of the extended Menendez family, called the show “a phobic, gross, anachronistic, serial episodic nightmare” and “a grotesque shockadrama.”

Murphy said in response to the grievances, “The Menendez brothers should be sending me flowers.”

“They haven’t had so much attention in 30 years,” he added. “And it’s gotten the attention of not only this country, but all over the world. There’s sort of an outpouring of interest in their lives and in the case. I know for a fact that many people have offered to help them because of the interest of my show and what we did.”

The other release, a feature-length documentary titled The Menendez Brothers released on Oct. 7, portrays the brothers in a largely sympathetic light, but didn’t highlight any new information about the case.