Speaker 1: Hey everyone, it's susy. Since we originally published this episode
Speaker 1: in May of twenty twenty four, there have been significant
Speaker 1: developments for Lyle and Eric Menendez, brothers, who were convicted
Speaker 1: of murdering their parents in the early nineteen nineties. The
Speaker 1: brothers do not deny the killings, but they say they
Speaker 1: endured years of sexual and emotional abuse from their father,
Speaker 1: and a recent documentary and a docudrama on Netflix have
Speaker 1: reignited interest in their case. A number of their family
Speaker 1: members have come forward with impassion pleas for their release,
Speaker 1: saying that they believe them about the abuse, and on
Speaker 1: October twenty fourth, in a studying development, the Los Angeles
Speaker 1: District Attorney said that he would request that the Menendez
Speaker 1: brothers be resentenced.
Speaker 2: I believe that they have paid their debt to society,
Speaker 2: and the system provides a vehicle for their case to
Speaker 2: be reviewed by a parole bar and the role concurs
Speaker 2: with my assessment, and it will be their decision. There
Speaker 2: will be released accordantly.
Speaker 1: If you're looking for contacts. This episode explains how we
Speaker 1: arrived at this extraordinary moment, and how kids on social
Speaker 1: media played an important role, and how new evidence may
Speaker 1: impact whether they are ultimately released, and as a warning,
Speaker 1: we discuss the sexual and emotional abuse of children in detail.
Speaker 3: Are we with the stands here? I mean maybe like
Speaker 3: the romantic stands? Yeah, But now you tell this in
Speaker 3: the light of twenty twenty four makes it sound like
Speaker 3: the TikTokers are actually onto something.
Speaker 1: I'm Susie Benacerm and I'm Jessica Bennett, and this is
Speaker 1: in retrospect, where each week we revisit a cultural moment
Speaker 1: from the past that shaped.
Speaker 3: Us and that we just can't stop thinking about.
Speaker 1: Today, we're talking about Lyle and Eric Menendez, two Beverly
Speaker 1: Hills brothers convicted of killing their parents in a case
Speaker 1: that captivated the nation in the early nineteen nineties. But
Speaker 1: we're also talking about how in recent years they have
Speaker 1: become unlikely social media stars despite being in prison for
Speaker 1: thirty four years.
Speaker 3: Susie, I remember so vividly this era of a number
Speaker 3: of years, when I think I was in high school,
Speaker 3: the Menanda's brother's case just being constantly, constantly on the
Speaker 3: air and on television. But it was with some surprise
Speaker 3: only recently I noticed it was trending on TikTok. Is
Speaker 3: that why you wanted to talk about.
Speaker 1: This, Yes, So I also have this memory of this
Speaker 1: being in the zeitgeist. Like I vaguely knew about this case.
Speaker 1: I wasn't someone who read all the details or watched
Speaker 1: the trial as it was happening. But the story about
Speaker 1: them was always the same story, which was they were
Speaker 1: these two spoiled rich kids from Beverly Hills who had
Speaker 1: everything they wanted. They killed their parents because they wanted
Speaker 1: their inheritance and they wanted the parents out of the way.
Speaker 1: And after they killed them, they went on this wild
Speaker 1: spending spree. So I hadn't really thought about the Menendez
Speaker 1: brothers in a long time. I mean, that's a pretty
Speaker 1: salacious story, and I remember being kind of fascinated by
Speaker 1: the concept of killing your parents for money that you
Speaker 1: already had access to, right right, And I think I
Speaker 1: saw one of the TV movies at the time, although
Speaker 1: I don't remember it that well. But a few years
Speaker 1: ago I did start noticing this on TikTok that occasionally
Speaker 1: in my feed i'd see a video about these brothers.
Speaker 3: Why did the Menandez brothers kill their own parents? This
Speaker 3: is part three of this chilling case.
Speaker 1: Did you hear the latest news about the Menandez brothers.
Speaker 3: Four facts about the Menendez brothers.
Speaker 1: Menanda's brothers and Menendez brothers Mede.
Speaker 3: These two brothers should be out of prison by now.
Speaker 1: I sort of just took a mental note. I was like,
Speaker 1: why is there renewed interest in this? But I sort
Speaker 1: of chalked it up to how obsessed everyone is with
Speaker 1: true crime now. But then a couple of years ago,
Speaker 1: Ezra Marcus wrote a piece for the New York Times.
Speaker 1: Did you read this piece? Yes? It was called the
Speaker 1: New Menendez Defenders, and it was about how, seemingly out
Speaker 1: of nowhere, suddenly hundreds of accounts on TikTok and Instagram
Speaker 1: were dedicated to the Menendez brothers and how they didn't
Speaker 1: receive a fair trial and how the abuse they suffered
Speaker 1: during their childhoods led to this crime.
Speaker 4: This became a trial by media, completely sensationalized, many believing
Speaker 4: that these two preppy, good looking, rich young men had
Speaker 4: killed their parents for money, and in reality, their motive
Speaker 4: for murder was far more heartbreaking and dare I say understandable.
Speaker 1: I honestly had such a vague memory that there had
Speaker 1: been some abuse allegations. I'm not sure I had ever
Speaker 1: really paid attention to that, so I thought that was
Speaker 1: really interesting. And even the way Ezrah describes these accounts
Speaker 1: as fascinating, right, Like a lot of them are just
Speaker 1: endless clips from the original trials or news were parts
Speaker 1: of the time. But some of them are literal fan
Speaker 1: accounts that are dedicated to how hot the brothers are
Speaker 1: or were.
Speaker 3: I guess is wild. It is the wildest. How old
Speaker 3: were the Menanda's brothers at the time this took place.
Speaker 1: They were twenty one and eighteen, and they were very attractive,
Speaker 1: kind of like Beverly Hills preppies at the time. Right,
Speaker 1: A lot was made of their looks. One of the
Speaker 1: reporters who covered them at the time talked about how
Speaker 1: they received thousands of letters a week at the Los
Speaker 1: Angeles County jail when they were on trial. Some of
Speaker 1: them contain nude photos and ropes would line up to
Speaker 1: see the trial. Yes, but these very specific stand culture accounts.
Speaker 1: They have a certain kind of like dreamy, soft focus vibe,
Speaker 1: and there's like music and often with the Menanda's brothers,
Speaker 1: it's stills of them stitched together, often from the trials,
Speaker 1: very weird things. It is amazing like my love Eric
Speaker 1: Menendez or Lyle Menendez, and one of them had a
Speaker 1: video that was captured Happy Birthday King for Eric Menende's birthday,
Speaker 1: and then just like had pictures from his childhood, which
Speaker 1: I also found creepy, Like I was like, what are
Speaker 1: you posting pictures of him when he was like six
Speaker 1: or seven, especially because what we know now of his
Speaker 1: childhood is not great. The other thing that the New
Speaker 1: York Times piece identified was that they're mostly gen z right,
Speaker 1: and that it's a very international crowd.
Speaker 3: Oh, it's an international crowd, but.
Speaker 1: Almost entirely teenagers who have looked at the details of
Speaker 1: this case and have wondered how the stories of abuse
Speaker 1: and we'll get into them were not more front and
Speaker 1: center in the coverage. And it is a good question,
Speaker 1: Like I have now gone back and fallen into this
Speaker 1: rabbit hole, and there's a lot of things to think
Speaker 1: about with this case.
Speaker 3: Okay, So just to take as a step back for
Speaker 3: a minute. I know that these things crop up on
Speaker 3: TikTok and people become obsessed with new subjects from the past,
Speaker 3: and you don't ever really know why. In this moment,
Speaker 3: we are talking again about the menandas brothers. So do
Speaker 3: you know anything about what caused this sudden renewed interest.
Speaker 1: Well, as you say, it's very hard to pinpoint exactly
Speaker 1: why something sort of returns. So the Zeidis, there's a
Speaker 1: couple theories about why. Okay, this has become kind of
Speaker 1: a popular case again, if that's the right way of
Speaker 1: framing it. A Andy did a documentary about them in
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, and that didn't get posted on Hulu until
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. So there's some sense that when that was
Speaker 1: posted in twenty nineteen, Blue, where you know a lot
Speaker 1: of gen z gets their content, they watched this documentary
Speaker 1: and it renewed their interests. That's sort of where it began.
Speaker 1: And one of the social media fans in the New
Speaker 1: York Times piece did talk about watching that A and
Speaker 1: E documentary, So that might have reintroduced this case to
Speaker 1: a new generation of true crime. Yeah, but I think
Speaker 1: the thing that likely had the bigger impact is that
Speaker 1: during the pandemic, Court TV, which aired this trial, Gabble
Speaker 1: to Gabble, as they called it. This was one of
Speaker 1: the first trials where that happened, posted the entire trial
Speaker 1: to YouTube.
Speaker 2: And we have both jury panels back in the courtroom
Speaker 2: and everyone else is present, the defense may call its
Speaker 2: next witness.
Speaker 1: Thanks he Joseph blowman Inus And so you know, at
Speaker 1: a time, oh, when we're all at home in the pandemic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: at a time when everyone's at home and desperate for
Speaker 1: like interesting content, I think a lot of kids just
Speaker 1: would have this on all day. And so a lot
Speaker 1: of TikTok and Instagram accounts start posting videos after that,
Speaker 1: and Google searches for the Menanda's brother Spike. In May
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty one, right after Court TV started putting
Speaker 1: the videos on YouTube of the trial. So I suspect
Speaker 1: that had a lot to do with it. And another
Speaker 1: one of the social media supporters from the New York
Speaker 1: Times piece, a twenty something student from London named Jordan Wynn,
Speaker 1: talked about how he watched the entire trial during the
Speaker 1: pandemic and that inspired him to start his Instagram account
Speaker 1: at Menendez supporter got it. But I went through some
Speaker 1: of these accounts last week because it had been a
Speaker 1: while since I looked at them, and I was curious. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and by the way, rip my algorithm. Obviously I'm just
Speaker 1: going to be served Menendez brother's content from now on.
Speaker 3: Yeah, forever, for the rest of your life. Sorry.
Speaker 1: I found that there are still hundreds of accounts and
Speaker 1: they have millions and millions of views, and it is fascinating.
Speaker 1: There's one called Menendez Supporter three RS and it has
Speaker 1: two hundred and sixty five thousand followers and almost thirteen
Speaker 1: million likes on its videos. One of its pinned videos
Speaker 1: has almost sixteen million views and the other one has
Speaker 1: seven million. So it just gives you a sense of
Speaker 1: how popular this content is. And the most popular accounts
Speaker 1: tend to be mostly news clips or news reports from
Speaker 1: the time, clips from the TV movies. There was a
Speaker 1: Law and Order special. They did a limited series that
Speaker 1: was just the Menendez brothers a few years ago. Clips
Speaker 1: from that seemed to do pretty well. Another element of
Speaker 1: what's happened here in terms of renewed interest is there's
Speaker 1: a change dot org petition. It was started in March
Speaker 1: of twenty nineteen and it has about three hundred thousand signatures.
Speaker 1: But weirdly, it's a petition to Leslie Abramson, who, if
Speaker 1: you don't know, was Eric's lawyer during his initial trials,
Speaker 1: and she's kind of a big character herself. She was
Speaker 1: a petition to do what well to you know, I
Speaker 1: guess file another appeal. But she's not their appellet attorney.
Speaker 1: She's not involved in their case anymore at all.
Speaker 3: Okay, So it's a petition to their former lawyer to
Speaker 3: file a new appeal on their case.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which gives you a sense of how plugged in
Speaker 1: these kids are to the reality of what's happened to
Speaker 1: the wrong person. Okay, God, but I found this also fascinating.
Speaker 1: There was an LA Times piece recently and they reached
Speaker 1: out to Leslie Abramson just to get her take on
Speaker 1: what's happening. Oh, okay, and she said she doesn't discuss
Speaker 1: the case anymore. And then there's this quote from her,
Speaker 1: I am still harassed by TV producers, high school kids
Speaker 1: and nutcases who promise to get my clients out of prison.
Speaker 1: Oh she said it an email. I have nothing else
Speaker 1: to say to you. But I was like high school kids, Like,
Speaker 1: imagine how many of these TikTokers must be reaching out
Speaker 1: to Leslie Abramson.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 1: And you know, Leslie Abramson I think is in her
Speaker 1: eighties now, Like she's probably like, who are these kids?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 3: She's like, get going literally.
Speaker 1: Get all of my law and she probably has no
Speaker 1: way of understanding what the fuck they're talking about. She
Speaker 1: doesn't know what stan accounts are, So yes, it's just
Speaker 1: I do think it's kind of a hilarious twist that
Speaker 1: she's sort of been dragged into this and is suddenly
Speaker 1: being contacted by children all around the world. But it's
Speaker 1: not just kids. Rosie O'Donnell the actress and former talk
Speaker 1: show host. She is a big defender of the Menanda's brothers.
Speaker 1: She recently interviewed Lyle from prison for her podcast It's
Speaker 1: a Very Special Episode.
Speaker 6: I talked for the full hour to Lyele Menendez, who
Speaker 6: has been in prison for thirty four years for the
Speaker 6: killing of both of his parents after a lifetime of
Speaker 6: child abuse and incest.
Speaker 1: And she did an interview with Court TV, and she
Speaker 1: said that she felt like the brothers didn't deserve to
Speaker 1: still be in jail, and that she grew up in
Speaker 1: a family with an abuse dynamic, and that she believed
Speaker 1: that they had been abused and really believed that their
Speaker 1: lives were in danger.
Speaker 3: Okay, so for people who don't remember, remind us what
Speaker 3: was the situation with the brothers and their trials and
Speaker 3: how long have they been in prison.
Speaker 1: They've been in prison for thirty four years. And there
Speaker 1: are just a lot of wild twists and turns to
Speaker 1: the story. I actually do think it's fascinating. I understand
Speaker 1: why it captured the imagination of the country then and
Speaker 1: why it's capturing the imagination of all these kids now.
Speaker 1: In a lot of ways, felt like a story made
Speaker 1: for the tabloids. Right he was in LA there was
Speaker 1: immediate interest in it. It felt like a TV movie
Speaker 1: from the start. So here are the particulars of the crime.
Speaker 1: Two brothers, Lyle and Eric Mendez. They were twenty one
Speaker 1: and eighteen at the time of the murders, whose parents,
Speaker 1: Jose and Kitty Menendez, were brutally murdered in the family
Speaker 1: home in August of nineteen eighty nine. And initially this
Speaker 1: seemed just like a random crime. The boys called it
Speaker 1: in to nine one one. The father, Jose, who was
Speaker 1: this very successful, wealthy and powerful Hollywood executive who had
Speaker 1: sort of lived the American dream. He had immigrated to
Speaker 1: America from Cuba with very little money and he'd made
Speaker 1: all his own money. There was some set that maybe
Speaker 1: this was a mob hit or somehow related to his
Speaker 1: business because he was this big wig executive.
Speaker 6: It's not supposed to happen in Beverly Hills. A movie
Speaker 6: executive and his wife were brutally slain and.
Speaker 1: Their million dollar mansion.
Speaker 6: There were no clues and no suspects.
Speaker 1: The crime initially was treated as just a random crime
Speaker 1: that had happened to this family, and the family had
Speaker 1: always projected this really all American family dynamic, right, successful dad,
Speaker 1: pretty blonde mom. The two sons were very handsome. Lyle
Speaker 1: was at Princeton, Eric had been accepted at UCLA, So
Speaker 1: they seemed like classic Beverly Hills kids and Beverly Hills
Speaker 1: nine oh two and oh. The show actually debuted in
Speaker 1: October of nineteen ninety so the year okay, the year after, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that image would have been very much in the zeitgeist.
Speaker 1: So initially there was a lot of sympathy for the boys. Right,
Speaker 1: they were victims. I'll called nine one one after they
Speaker 1: quotes found their parents.
Speaker 3: Waits was the story that they had come home and
Speaker 3: found the parents dead.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I assume that that's kind of the
Speaker 1: story they told, Right, The story was they came home,
Speaker 1: they found their parents dead, got it? But the story
Speaker 1: really blows up because the brothers do end up turning
Speaker 1: themselves in in March of nineteen ninety okay, and admitting
Speaker 1: to the murder. So there really isn't a doubt. They
Speaker 1: have admitted for almost thirty four years that they murdered
Speaker 1: their parents, but it wasn't really clear why. And the
Speaker 1: reason they even got caught is because Eric was seeing
Speaker 1: a therapist, Eric who is the younger brother, and he
Speaker 1: confessed to the therapist, and in a really weird twist,
Speaker 1: the therapist mistress got mad at him about something. The
Speaker 1: therapist mistress, yes, the therapist mistress got mad a therapist
Speaker 1: about something and in a rage, told the police that
Speaker 1: the therapist had told her that he had this tape
Speaker 1: recording a session with Er. He confessed to the murder.
Speaker 1: So it was this very convoluted way that they got caught.
Speaker 3: I mean, you can see why. This is like the
Speaker 3: perfect made for TV. So there's even a mistress involved,
Speaker 3: and the.
Speaker 1: Police almost immediately started making statements about how savage these
Speaker 1: murders were. These were really bloody murders. The crime scene
Speaker 1: was incredibly bloody. Jose the father was shot six times
Speaker 1: and the mother kitty was shot ten times. Oh wow,
Speaker 1: so it was I think what they referred to as overkill.
Speaker 1: The brutality of the murders is commented on a lot
Speaker 1: in the media. It's part of what really sways public
Speaker 1: opinion away from the boys. And then there are really
Speaker 1: two other things that get a lot of attention. The
Speaker 1: first is that after the murderers, the boys seem to
Speaker 1: have gone on what is described in the press as
Speaker 1: a spending spree.
Speaker 5: They didn't do a very good job of acting their
Speaker 5: roles of grieving. Sun police say the boys went a
Speaker 5: wild spending spree, and unlike the relatives of most murdered victories,
Speaker 5: the Menandoz boys did not seem to take much interest
Speaker 5: in the police search for their parents' murderers.
Speaker 1: So this sort of supports the idea that they're motivated
Speaker 1: by greed and just wanted access to their father's money.
Speaker 5: Right, Why did you need to buy a Rolex watch
Speaker 5: four days after your parents were killed?
Speaker 7: I didn't need to.
Speaker 3: You wanted to.
Speaker 1: Lyle bought a Porsche and a Rolex and randomly a
Speaker 1: Hot Wings restaurant in Princeton, New Jersey, which I don't
Speaker 1: even know. That's a strange investment. They moved out of
Speaker 1: the house, which I guess is not weird since there
Speaker 1: had been these brutal murders there, But they moved into
Speaker 1: adjoining condos, which I think people found odd. Eric hired
Speaker 1: a full time tennis coach and went on the tennis circuit.
Speaker 1: But playing in the tennis like semi professional tendants are.
Speaker 3: Good even if they hadn't murdered them. Strange way to
Speaker 3: behave if your parents have just been murdered and you
Speaker 3: don't want to look suspicious.
Speaker 1: So that's the interesting thing. I read that some of
Speaker 1: their family after all this came out, said, actually, these
Speaker 1: were just their spending habits, like this is just how
Speaker 1: they spent money. Oh, this was normal, and that this
Speaker 1: may have seemed odd if you were grieving, but they
Speaker 1: just spent money like crazy, and so they may just
Speaker 1: have not understood that they needed to shift their behavior.
Speaker 3: That's so like to the rest of America. When it's
Speaker 3: now being reported in the press, it's insane because he's
Speaker 3: I think, this family, but if you live in that
Speaker 3: bubble in Beverly Hills, maybe you do right.
Speaker 1: But in the press, this spending spree is treated as
Speaker 1: a clear sign that they're just absolutely entitled, greedy brats
Speaker 1: who were after the money. And that's really the second
Speaker 1: thing I think that really sways public opinion against them.
Speaker 1: They have this very clear motive. The motive is money.
Speaker 1: That their father's estate is worth fourteen million dollars. The
Speaker 1: two brothers are the sole beneficiaries of that fourteen million dollars, okay,
Speaker 1: And one of the things that circulated was that maybe
Speaker 1: he had been planning to withdraw them from his will
Speaker 1: or he was planning on cutting them off. So the
Speaker 1: motive was they wanted access to the money and they
Speaker 1: wanted to secure that access forever. The other thing that
Speaker 1: police revealed during this time is that they had become
Speaker 1: suspicious of the brothers fairly early on. You know, at
Speaker 1: the crime scene, they weren't suspicious of them. They didn't
Speaker 1: actually test to see if they had fired guns recently,
Speaker 1: which is very common if you're a suspect in a crime.
Speaker 1: That really would have made a big difference, I think
Speaker 1: in this case, but they weren't tested for that. They
Speaker 1: really were initially treated like grieving suns, but the police
Speaker 1: felt that they weren't really acting like grieving suns.
Speaker 3: It's so interesting because hearing it now, you're like, Okay,
Speaker 3: if this wasn't an uber, wealthy Beverly Hills family, isn't
Speaker 3: the person who finds about it always the first suspect?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, everything I know about this I know
Speaker 1: from law and order, So I have no idea what
Speaker 1: it's like.
Speaker 3: Standard protocol in this case.
Speaker 1: But I assume that usually you would be a suspect
Speaker 1: if both your parents were murdered and you happened upon
Speaker 1: them in your home. But I think in general this
Speaker 1: case was so out of the ordinary. Murders like this
Speaker 1: just did not happen in Beverly Hills, So I think
Speaker 1: in general the police were caught a little flat footed
Speaker 1: at the top. And what eventually happens here though, and
Speaker 1: this is really the crux of what these new fans
Speaker 1: are really focused on, is that the brothers attorneys come
Speaker 1: forward and say that their clients actually acted in self defense.
Speaker 1: They killed their parents because they had been suffering from
Speaker 1: years of emotional and sexual abuse, that the father had
Speaker 1: been sexually abusing these boys for the majority of their lives.
Speaker 1: And at the point that that story starts to be
Speaker 1: put forward by the boys attorneys, there has been three
Speaker 1: years where the majority of the public perception has been
Speaker 1: shaped by the prosecution side of the story. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: so no one really believed that they were victims themselves,
Speaker 1: and in fact, the prosecutors said this was just an
Speaker 1: attempt to assassinate the characters of the real victims, which
Speaker 1: were their parents. So going into the trial, I think
Speaker 1: it was safe to say that most people thought that
Speaker 1: this was an open and shoycase and that the brothers
Speaker 1: were just going to go to jail. And one other
Speaker 1: sort of interesting thing about this is that this was
Speaker 1: considered a landmark case because this was the first time
Speaker 1: that lawyers were going to use the same defense used
Speaker 1: in domestic violence cases, which is that the homicide was
Speaker 1: in self defense and they feared for their lives. But
Speaker 1: it's what's referred to as imperfect self defense because you're
Speaker 1: not literally with a knife to your throat, but you
Speaker 1: feel that your life is in danger. And this hadn't
Speaker 1: been tested before outside of domestic violence, so in that sense,
Speaker 1: it was like a.
Speaker 3: Really interesting So it hadn't been used in a child
Speaker 3: abuse case before.
Speaker 1: No, and in the nineties, this was just considered a
Speaker 1: shocking defense. Right, Conversations like this around sexual abuse, certainly
Speaker 1: about sexual abuse between a father and his sons just
Speaker 1: did not happen in the open. And so when this
Speaker 1: trial began in nineteen ninety three, it was just a
Speaker 1: huge case. There was an intense amount of attention. It
Speaker 1: was broadcast in its entirety, as I said, gavel to
Speaker 1: gabble as they called it on court TV. And in
Speaker 1: the opening statements, the lawyers for the Menanda's brothers really
Speaker 1: get into the sexual abuse.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was going to ask you what evidence did
Speaker 3: they provide for the sexual abuse.
Speaker 1: There actually was a lot of contemporary US evidence, which
Speaker 1: obviously you and I now understand is one of the
Speaker 1: ways that you corroborate sexual abuse. But I think this
Speaker 1: wasn't like a very well understood field, And as you
Speaker 1: and I have talked about, there is sort of the
Speaker 1: sense of how victims are supposed to behave and so
Speaker 1: there was a lot of questions around this. But the
Speaker 1: defense really paints this house as a house of horrors,
Speaker 1: and there were many witnesses to it, like friends, families,
Speaker 1: colleagues came forward and supported the brothers version of events.
Speaker 1: The picture of Jose Menendez was essentially one of a
Speaker 1: terrifying monster and Kitty as an alcoholic with a drug
Speaker 1: abuse problem who was also emotionally abusive to the boys
Speaker 1: and knew about the sexual abuse and did nothing about it.
Speaker 3: And were they painting the father as physically and sexually abusive?
Speaker 3: What had the people.
Speaker 1: Witnessed, Yes, bruises, marx, etc. Okay, so they had not
Speaker 1: witnessed the sexual abuse, but the boys had told some
Speaker 1: of their cousins about the sexual abuse contemporaneously, so there
Speaker 1: was a sense that this had gone on for years.
Speaker 1: And you know, you would expect that if two people
Speaker 1: were brutally murdered, their family would want to support them.
Speaker 1: But for the most part, family came out in support
Speaker 1: of the brothers because they really had seen that they
Speaker 1: were treated pretty badly.
Speaker 3: Had they also confessed the abuse to the therapist?
Speaker 1: No, So that's I think one of the things that's interesting.
Speaker 1: It seems that they had not confessed the abuse to
Speaker 1: the therapist, and that was one of the things that
Speaker 1: was used against them in the trial. But I think
Speaker 1: that that's one thing that is part of that imperfect
Speaker 1: victim trope that we talk about. I think for boys,
Speaker 1: especially young men, talking about your father pretty brutally raping you.
Speaker 1: The scenes that they end up describing, they both take
Speaker 1: the stand. They both describe these scenes.
Speaker 7: That started out with him coming in my bedroom and
Speaker 7: telling me to get on my knees. I was on
Speaker 7: the bed at the.
Speaker 1: Time, and that was fairly common, wasn't it.
Speaker 3: Yes. What did he tell you about telling people?
Speaker 8: He just said that it was our secret. The bad
Speaker 8: thing is what happened to me. Have I told anybody?
Speaker 8: And I told him I never would.
Speaker 1: And when he came back with the knife, what did
Speaker 1: he do with it? If anything?
Speaker 7: He put it on my neck. He put his hand
Speaker 7: on my head and put the knife on my neck.
Speaker 1: Did he threaten you with it?
Speaker 7: Yes?
Speaker 1: What did he say?
Speaker 7: He said, I should kill you and next time I will.
Speaker 1: And did you believe him?
Speaker 7: Yes?
Speaker 1: Really really disturbing details, like one of the brothers talked
Speaker 1: about how he ate just an enormous amount of ketchup
Speaker 1: and always needed lemons nearby. Was it at some point
Speaker 1: after you were eleven years old that you developed a
Speaker 1: rather peculiar eating habit.
Speaker 7: Yes, I used a lot of lemon in my food.
Speaker 1: And what do you mean by you? And no one
Speaker 1: in the family understood why it was a weird kind
Speaker 1: of like obsession with lemons, and he testified during the
Speaker 1: trial that it was because that's what he used to
Speaker 1: get the taste of his father semen out of his mouth.
Speaker 3: WHOA, that is a fascinating detail.
Speaker 1: It's a fascinating detail, but it's so upsetting. The details
Speaker 1: are really specific, and I think also hard to imagine
Speaker 1: that these details are lies, because what kind of lie
Speaker 1: is that? That's not a lie you make up? Right,
Speaker 1: it's so very specific the thing. But the media is
Speaker 1: not buying it. They are really skeptical of the defense,
Speaker 1: and from what I can tell, almost the majority of
Speaker 1: the media coverage at the time is incredibly pro prosecution.
Speaker 1: A lot of talk of this defense refers to it
Speaker 1: as the abuse defense or the abuse excuse, and they
Speaker 1: just are like, this is a lie, and even if
Speaker 1: it's true, it isn't an excuse for murder, which you know,
Speaker 1: the lawyers for the brothers weren't arguing that it was
Speaker 1: an excuse for murder. They were saying that it meant
Speaker 1: that the murders were actually manslaughter. Right. The way that
Speaker 1: they should consider this crime was as a manslaughter crime
Speaker 1: rather than a murder crime. Because of the corroborating evidence
Speaker 1: of this abuse. Yeah, and by the time the boys testify,
Speaker 1: it's already a huge, huge circus. And then I think
Speaker 1: this really dramatic and emotional testimony from the brothers. These
Speaker 1: intense descriptions of abuse are just not something most people
Speaker 1: have ever heard in their lives. This is the early nineties.
Speaker 1: These aren't things that people talk about.
Speaker 3: And so to be clear that their testimony is being
Speaker 3: aired live, right, Yes.
Speaker 1: This like incredibly dramatic testimony is ying aired live. Lyle
Speaker 1: testifies that his father has been sexually abusing him since
Speaker 1: he was six years old, but that at some point
Speaker 1: he stopped.
Speaker 5: How old were you when this stopped?
Speaker 7: Eight? When you were about thirteen?
Speaker 5: Did you think that it might be happening to someone else?
Speaker 7: Yes, sir? And who did you think it was happening to? Eric?
Speaker 1: And then Eric is crying while he watches Lyle, his
Speaker 1: older brother, testify, And then Eric testifies, and he says
Speaker 1: that the abuse never stopped for him.
Speaker 7: I told him that things between dad and I were
Speaker 7: still happening and that, and he kept asking what I
Speaker 7: was talking about? Did you tell him what you were telling?
Speaker 7: Finally I told him I told him they were just
Speaker 7: sexual things, sexual things.
Speaker 5: Yes, And did you tell him anything about any kind
Speaker 5: of violence that would accompany it, or any kind of
Speaker 5: threats from your father?
Speaker 7: Yes?
Speaker 1: And what did you tell him about violence?
Speaker 7: I told him that there were pens and texts, that
Speaker 7: dad would die, that Dad was sick in me and use.
Speaker 1: And so he had basically been suffering in silence all
Speaker 1: this time because his father had been threatening him that
Speaker 1: if he ever told Lyle, he would murder them both.
Speaker 1: And that is what Eric and Lyle say actually precipitated
Speaker 1: the murders. That they began to realize that this was
Speaker 1: never going to end. That they were terrified of their father.
Speaker 1: They thought he was going to kill them, and Eric
Speaker 1: was really terrified that now he told Lyle that they
Speaker 1: were in danger. And so they say that they confronted
Speaker 1: their parents and that that is when they learned that
Speaker 1: their mother had known all along. They had thought that
Speaker 1: they were protecting her from this information, but that in
Speaker 1: one of these confrontations between the parents and the boys,
Speaker 1: it becomes clear that she knew, and that in fact,
Speaker 1: the parents are not really apologetic, and so again they
Speaker 1: feel that this really proves that their lives are in danger.
Speaker 1: And it's really hard to watch this testimony now, Like
Speaker 1: I can't explain to you how hard it is to
Speaker 1: watch with all the distance that we have, And I
Speaker 1: really don't understand how people couldn't have found it believable.
Speaker 1: I mean, if these boys were lying, they were incredible acting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: to think of like an eighteen and twenty one year
Speaker 1: old boy probably by the time the trial happened, like
Speaker 1: early twenties, you know, to think of these two boys
Speaker 1: getting up in front of what they knew was a
Speaker 1: national televised audience and talking about these issues in the
Speaker 1: way that they did.
Speaker 2: Like it.
Speaker 1: It's really hard to watch it and not have your
Speaker 1: heartbreak for them. I really have trouble wrapping my head
Speaker 1: around the way it was viewed at the time. But
Speaker 1: it just gives you a sense of how poorly this
Speaker 1: kind of thing was understood.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, wow, So what happens next?
Speaker 1: I want to mention a couple more things, just because
Speaker 1: they end up being relevant. Later, one of the cousins
Speaker 1: testified that when Lyle was eight, he told her about
Speaker 1: the sexual abuse, so that would have been in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy six, and that she told Kitty, So there was
Speaker 1: actual roborating evidence that the mother was aware. Mother knew,
Speaker 1: and there was another cousin that Eric confided in when
Speaker 1: he was thirteen, so there were some people around them
Speaker 1: that knew. And again, as I mentioned, the defense team
Speaker 1: is really trying to go for a manslaughter charge, right.
Speaker 1: They just want to make sure that the brothers aren't
Speaker 1: put away for a murder charge, which not only means
Speaker 1: they'll be in prison for life, but there was a
Speaker 1: death penalty element to this case. Okay, So they're not
Speaker 1: even suggesting that the brothers shouldn't be held accountable in
Speaker 1: some way. They're just saying that this is not a
Speaker 1: first degree murder. And jury deliberations went on for a month. Wow.
Speaker 1: One thing to note here is that the way this
Speaker 1: trial was structured was a little weird. There were two
Speaker 1: separate juries, but it was one trial, so each brother
Speaker 1: had his own jury. Oh, but the trial was done
Speaker 1: at the same time, okay. And what is really interesting
Speaker 1: is that both jury's deadlock and there is a mistrial
Speaker 1: for both brothers. And I saw this fascinating interview with
Speaker 1: a female juror who said that on Eric's jury, at
Speaker 1: least the deliberations broke down entirely on gender lines, that
Speaker 1: the men really dug in that no man would ever
Speaker 1: do to his son what these boys were saying Jose
Speaker 1: Menendez did to them, really, and they wanted to convince.
Speaker 3: The women were like yeah, obviously, yeah.
Speaker 1: And the women believed them because women know that there
Speaker 1: is a lot of abuse.
Speaker 3: In the world. Okay, So mistrial means what exactly?
Speaker 1: So mistrial means that they can be tried again. Often
Speaker 1: in cases like this, there's like a settlement at this
Speaker 1: point because the government doesn't want to go through this
Speaker 1: whole circus again. But that doesn't happen here for reasons
Speaker 1: that aren't clear. What does happen is that the second
Speaker 1: trial takes place two years later. And it's worth noting
Speaker 1: that between the two trials there is the OJ Simpson trial,
Speaker 1: which is another huge media circus in LA happening at
Speaker 1: the same time, essentially, and the prosecutors also lose that case.
Speaker 1: So the judicial system in LA is reeling, and so
Speaker 1: by the time the boys get back into court for
Speaker 1: the second trial, there is only one jury, No cameras
Speaker 1: are allowed, and the new prosecutors ask the judge to
Speaker 1: limit the amount of testimony.
Speaker 3: Regarding from the boys.
Speaker 1: Okay, they say the abuse is not relevant and it
Speaker 1: didn't happen, and the judge essentially agrees, and there's no
Speaker 1: clear indication of why he made that choice, but it
Speaker 1: significantly changed the trial. The prosecutors had a real advantage.
Speaker 1: They went in knowing what the defense strategy would be,
Speaker 1: whereas they didn't really know the extent of the abuse
Speaker 1: going into the first trial, and they really focus on
Speaker 1: the fact that this was a well planned and executed murder,
Speaker 1: which I don't know how well planned it was, but
Speaker 1: it is true that they bought guns a couple of
Speaker 1: days beforehand. You know, there were things that they did,
Speaker 1: and the judge just kept ruling against the defense on everything.
Speaker 1: He took manslaughter off the table, which left only first
Speaker 1: or second degree murder. Leslie Abramson, who was Eric's lawyer
Speaker 1: who I mentioned, described the second trial as hell. To
Speaker 1: give you an idea, there were fifty plus defense witnesses
Speaker 1: for the first trial and half of that for the second.
Speaker 1: The family members weren't even allowed to testify. So are
Speaker 1: convicted on first degree murder and luckily they don't get
Speaker 1: the death penalty and they are sentenced to life in
Speaker 1: prison without parole. Wow, and that is where they are today.
Speaker 3: That's where it's at. Okay.
Speaker 1: They've been in prison for thirty four years since their convictions.
Speaker 1: Both brothers have been married, even though California doesn't allow
Speaker 1: conjugal visits for inmates with life sentences. One of them
Speaker 1: has been married more than once, I believe. And you know,
Speaker 1: they have just made the best of their lives in prison.
Speaker 1: They do a lot of mentoring and peer work in prison.
Speaker 1: One of them helped to design this big mural.
Speaker 3: Have there been like profiles of them from prison over
Speaker 3: the years.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there have been some profiles, and Lyle does interviews.
Speaker 1: Eric is more media shy. I think Eric's wife has
Speaker 1: done some press initially when they first got married. But
Speaker 1: this new interest I think has probably taken even them
Speaker 1: by surprise. There were a lot of years where they
Speaker 1: were just sort of making the best of their lives
Speaker 1: in prison. And it's worth noting that one of them
Speaker 1: said to a family member at one point, honestly, life
Speaker 1: in prison is better than the life I had growing
Speaker 1: up in that house, which really gives you a sense
Speaker 1: of how scared they were as children in that house.
Speaker 1: It really does sound like growing up in their house
Speaker 1: was a brutal way to live.
Speaker 3: Okay, so are we with the stands here, like I mean,
Speaker 3: maybe not like the romantic stands.
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely not the romantic stands.
Speaker 3: But hearing you tell this in the light of twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four makes it sound like the TikTokers are actually
Speaker 3: onto something. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think they have a point. I have to be honest.
Speaker 1: Really digging into this case made me wonder how it
Speaker 1: was possible that this was done in the way that
Speaker 1: it was. The fact is, we just understand so much
Speaker 1: more about the psychology of abuse and of victims, and
Speaker 1: you can sort of understand that if you grew up
Speaker 1: in a house where you were sexually abused from six
Speaker 1: years old and physics abused and emotionally abused, the fact
Speaker 1: that you would be so terrified of your parents that
Speaker 1: you didn't feel like you could just like get up
Speaker 1: and walk away. This idea that you could just leave,
Speaker 1: and why didn't they just do that they were adults.
Speaker 1: That is something we understand is not so simple, And
Speaker 1: just like battered wife syndrome, we now have the concept
Speaker 1: of a battered child syndrome.
Speaker 3: It reminds me a little almost of the Gypsy Rose
Speaker 3: case as well, Yes, and which TikTok is also obsessed with. Right, yeah,
Speaker 3: but where yeah, years and years and years of abuse
Speaker 3: she then has her boyfriend murder hermel anyway.
Speaker 1: Yes, very similar I think in some ways to that
Speaker 1: case where people said the same thing. That was a
Speaker 1: case where it was munchilds and biproxy. So the mother
Speaker 1: pretended she was sick and it turned out she was
Speaker 1: in a wheelchair but she could walk, and people were like, well,
Speaker 1: why didn't she just walk away? Which is just really
Speaker 1: overly simplistic.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: We develop a relationship with your parent when you're so
Speaker 1: young and dependent that if that relationship is rooted in
Speaker 1: this kind of intense sphere, you don't feel like you
Speaker 1: can just walk o way. You think they're going to
Speaker 1: find you and kill you. And honestly, who knows Jose
Speaker 1: Menenda's does not come off like a man that you
Speaker 1: should not be scared of in every depiction of him
Speaker 1: that comes out during the trial.
Speaker 3: Okay, So what happens now? Have the fans been effective
Speaker 3: in asking for further scrutiny to the case.
Speaker 1: I mean, they've certainly been effective in drawing more attention
Speaker 1: to the case. Yeah, but the appeals process had pretty
Speaker 1: much played itself out. But recently there have been two
Speaker 1: big developments that may actually change the fate of the
Speaker 1: Menenda's brothers. The first one is a letter was discovered
Speaker 1: written by Eric to one of the cousins that testified
Speaker 1: on his behalf, and he had written him this letter
Speaker 1: just eight months before the crime, in December of eighty eight, okay,
Speaker 1: And this letter was found by one of their aunts,
Speaker 1: that cousin's mother after the cousin died, So you know,
Speaker 1: they've been in prison a long time. One of their
Speaker 1: cousin passed away and the mother was going through his
Speaker 1: papers and she finds this letter, and presumably it's a
Speaker 1: letter that both Eric and the cousin forgot about because
Speaker 1: it wasn't about the abuse. But in it Eric very
Speaker 1: clearly references the abuse. Wow. At one point he writes,
Speaker 1: I've been trying to avoid Dad, but it's still happening. Andy.
Speaker 1: It's worse for me now. And then there's another part
Speaker 1: where he says, every night I stay up thinking that
Speaker 1: he might come in. I'm afraid he's crazy. He's warned
Speaker 1: me a hundred times about telling anyone, especially Lyle oh Wow,
Speaker 1: this is a piece of very contemporaneous evidence that happened
Speaker 1: so far before the murders that there's no way that
Speaker 1: they're just like making it up to cover up this crime.
Speaker 1: But there's a bigger twist even and this one is wild.
Speaker 1: At one point, Jose Menendez, who as I said, was
Speaker 1: a Hollywood executive, was a top executive at.
Speaker 3: RCAA Records, okay.
Speaker 1: And while he was there, RCAA signed a very popular
Speaker 1: Puerto Rican boy band from the eighties called Menudo Manudo.
Speaker 1: It's the band that gave the Ricky Martin. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: it was one of the biggest boy bands of all
Speaker 1: time and RCA signed them for thirty million dollars. And
Speaker 1: an interesting thing about Menudo is that it is a
Speaker 1: band that had an age limit, so once the boys
Speaker 1: hit sixteen, they actually swapped them out so that the
Speaker 1: boy band stayed forever young.
Speaker 3: Oh wow, whoa Okay?
Speaker 1: So in April of twenty twenty three, so just last year,
Speaker 1: there is a former member of the band named Roy Roussello,
Speaker 1: and he comes forward and says that in the nineteen eighties,
Speaker 1: when he was fourteen or fifteen, the band's manager sent
Speaker 1: him to go see Jose Menendez, the father of Lyle
Speaker 1: and Eric Menendez, at the family home, and while he
Speaker 1: was there, he was given a glass of wine which
Speaker 1: he believes was spiked and Jose Menendez raped him. Oh wow.
Speaker 1: And he says that there were also other occasions, at
Speaker 1: least two other times where Jose Menendez sexually abused him.
Speaker 3: Oh so this is new.
Speaker 1: So this is totally new, and it corroborates the boys
Speaker 1: descriptions of abuse. He came forward as part of a
Speaker 1: docuseries that you can watch on Peacock called Menendez and
Speaker 1: Menudo Boys Betrayed and it's actually a fascinating docuseries. I
Speaker 1: recommend it. It's based on the reporting of two journalists.
Speaker 1: One is named Robert Rand. He covered the case initially
Speaker 1: and has become sort of an advocate for the boys
Speaker 1: over the years. And the other is this woman Nary Inclan,
Speaker 1: who Robert reaches out to when he realizes that there
Speaker 1: is this sexual abuse component that he needs to do
Speaker 1: some additional reporting. On the way Robert Rand thinks to
Speaker 1: connect these two cases is that he's going through some
Speaker 1: old notes and he remembers that Jose Menendez's assistant in
Speaker 1: interviews with him often emphasized how obsessed with Minudo Jose
Speaker 1: Menendez had been. He would go all the time to
Speaker 1: their concerts, which was not a thing you know, you
Speaker 1: usually did when you were like the top executive of Marcia.
Speaker 1: That he talked about them all the time, that he
Speaker 1: was kind of fascinated by them. And there have been
Speaker 1: other allegations of abuse. That manager that ran Manudo, that
Speaker 1: created Manunda, has been accused by other boys in the
Speaker 1: band of having abused them. So it occurs to Robert Rand,
Speaker 1: wait a second, maybe there's a connection here.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: He reaches out to this other reporter. She is someone
Speaker 1: who's very skilled on doing sexual abuse reporting. She spends
Speaker 1: a lot of time starting to talk to members of
Speaker 1: Menudo just even to tell that story. And eventually, in
Speaker 1: one of her conversations with Roy, she's talking to him
Speaker 1: as part of this larger Menudo investigation, and he just
Speaker 1: mentions it. He says, oh, you know, there was this
Speaker 1: RCAA executive and he raped me, And she says she
Speaker 1: got absolute chills.
Speaker 3: Did the person making the accusation even make the connection
Speaker 3: to the Menandez brothers.
Speaker 1: No, Wow, he had not realized in all these years,
Speaker 1: he had not made the connection. But in the docuseries
Speaker 1: he describes going to the family house and he remembers
Speaker 1: meeting the brother, but he just never connected it to
Speaker 1: the larger story that was in the press at that time. Also,
Speaker 1: you know, he was in Puerto Rico. He was in
Speaker 1: this band. And that manager, by the way, is now
Speaker 1: being investigated by the LAPD for the rape of Roy Roussello,
Speaker 1: who is the person who has come forward to say
Speaker 1: that he was abused by Jose Menendez. He has also
Speaker 1: come forward to say that he was abused for years
Speaker 1: allegedly by the manager Edgar Diez of Minundo.
Speaker 3: Wow, it's amazing how these guys just like find each other.
Speaker 3: They're like, oh, yeah, he's my kind. We'll just run
Speaker 3: a sex trafficking right.
Speaker 1: It feels like it was essentially a factory for this.
Speaker 1: I mean, the way he describes what went on with
Speaker 1: this particular manager is that he would essentially just bring
Speaker 1: in new boys and constantly wait.
Speaker 3: Well, that makes you wonder if that's why they had
Speaker 3: to stay forever. Y'all?
Speaker 1: Right, of course, of course it makes you wonder that.
Speaker 1: And so I was thinking about this, like, why do
Speaker 1: we see so many cases of abuse like this, Like
Speaker 1: the Nickelodeon case that's obviously become more prominent recently, and
Speaker 1: I think what happens is is that if you are
Speaker 1: a predator, you look for places that will give you
Speaker 1: the most access to children. And working in entertainment, often,
Speaker 1: especially when it's related to children, does give you a
Speaker 1: lot of access and power and power because people want
Speaker 1: fame and they want money, and so they're willing to
Speaker 1: give their children over to you and trust you because
Speaker 1: there's a tangible benefit to that. And so it was
Speaker 1: really really sad to watch the stock You series, but
Speaker 1: I really recommend it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it makes me want to watch it.
Speaker 1: It just really broke my heart for poor Roy. So
Speaker 1: where that leaves us is that in May of last year,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, lawyers for the brothers filed a petition
Speaker 1: in LA and asked for a new hearing and said
Speaker 1: that this new evidence, the letter and Rory Roussello, the
Speaker 1: former member of Menudo, coming forward, this evidence contradicts the
Speaker 1: arguments prosecutors made in the second trial that there was
Speaker 1: no abuse, and they've asked for the conviction to be overturned.
Speaker 1: And their argument is that the brothers should never have
Speaker 1: been convicted of murder, that this was clearly a case
Speaker 1: of manslaughter because the brothers genuinely believed that they were
Speaker 1: in danger because of the sexual and physical abuse. And
Speaker 1: in June, a judge asked the LA District Attorney's office
Speaker 1: to respond to this request before a judge can rule. So,
Speaker 1: so this past June, and so because I have never
Speaker 1: found a rabbit hole, I can't fall too deeply into,
Speaker 1: I spoke to one of their lawyers yesterday, didn't.
Speaker 3: Yes, of course, is this a different lawyer from there?
Speaker 3: These are different lawyers from the original lawyers.
Speaker 1: Yes. The lawyers are Cliff Gardner, who is a well
Speaker 1: known attorney in California, and Mark Geragos, who is a
Speaker 1: very famous attorney who often turns up.
Speaker 3: Wait, okay, back up. So you're like, we got to
Speaker 3: do this recording tomorrow. I just got it. Well, well,
Speaker 3: I had a really.
Speaker 1: Good reason for calling up Cliff. There have been recent
Speaker 1: reports because of this filing, but I couldn't find a
Speaker 1: timeline anywhere, Like I was like, okay, so now we're
Speaker 1: waiting for the LA District Attorney's Office to respond, Like
Speaker 1: when are they going to respond? And when can we
Speaker 1: expect a ruling? It is true that if in fact,
Speaker 1: the court agrees to give them a new trial, and
Speaker 1: if they are convicted of manslaughter, they will get out
Speaker 1: of prison because they have already served beyond the maximum
Speaker 1: for mansilter.
Speaker 3: How old are they now, like in their fifties.
Speaker 1: They're in their fifties, Okay, So I mean they would
Speaker 1: get out of prison. So I imagine that they're pretty
Speaker 1: interested in the timeline as well. But I couldn't find
Speaker 1: one anywhere online, so I thought, why not. I left
Speaker 1: a message for Cliff Gardner. I found his number online
Speaker 1: and was like, Hey, I'm a reporter and I'm looking
Speaker 1: into this story. I'm recording something tomorrow. Could you give
Speaker 1: me a callback? And he did, and he was a
Speaker 1: lovely man, and he said that they are in fact
Speaker 1: waiting for the LA District Attorney's Office to respond. The
Speaker 1: DA's office has asked for a couple extensions because there
Speaker 1: is just so much from the first trials to go over,
Speaker 1: and that even once they respond, there will be some
Speaker 1: time before the court makes a decision, so there is
Speaker 1: no clear timeline, which is why I could not find one.
Speaker 1: So I see it's my little bit of reporting. Wow,
Speaker 1: the other big thing that's coming soon is that Ryan
Speaker 1: Murphy has a series coming for Netflix about the Menanda's brothers,
Speaker 1: So we're about to see a lot of attention. This
Speaker 1: is the second installment of a series Ryan Murphy does
Speaker 1: called the Monster Series for Netflix. Oh right, And the
Speaker 1: first one was Dahmer, and it became the most watched
Speaker 1: English series of all time within twenty eight days. It
Speaker 1: reached a billion view hours in its first sixty days,
Speaker 1: and wow, it was nominated for a bunch of Golden
Speaker 1: Globes and Emmy Awards and won an Emmy Award.
Speaker 3: And like a million think pieces written about how we
Speaker 3: assessed Dahmer then, and every piece was sort of a
Speaker 3: little many in retrospect exactly.
Speaker 1: So I think we're about to get a lot more
Speaker 1: in retrospect on the Menandez brothers. Javier Bardem and Chloe
Speaker 1: Sevignier will star as the Jose and Kiddy Menendez. Wow,
Speaker 1: So I think interest in this case is only going
Speaker 1: to grow in the coming months. So I think that's
Speaker 1: what comes next.
Speaker 3: You can see why this has been the subject of
Speaker 3: endless fascination. There's so many shwists and turns. You can
Speaker 3: see why TikTok or wherever the stands are choosing to
Speaker 3: post their mems, and I've decided to pick up on it. Yeah, gosh,
Speaker 3: I mean, I really want to keep following where this
Speaker 3: ends up. I'm very interested to hear, and I hope
Speaker 3: that we can keep in touch with the lawyer to
Speaker 3: understand when this actually is happening.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm now. I'm very invested in the future of
Speaker 1: the Menandez Brothers case, and I will be following it,
Speaker 1: so don't worry. I will keep you updated. This is
Speaker 1: in Retrospect. Thanks or listening. Is there a pop culture
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Speaker 3: Lauren Hansen is our supervising producer. Derek Clements is our
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