LOS ANGELES (KABC) — A California parole board decided to deny Lyle Menendez parole after he spent nearly 30 years in prison for the 1989 murders of his parents when he was 21 years old.
Lyle and his brother Erik Menendez were convicted of first-degree murder in 1996 during a retrial and sentenced to life in prison without parole. After a years-long battle, the Menendez brothers were resentenced to 50 years to life with the possibility of parole. Due to that resentencing, they are now eligible for parole hearings under youth offender parole laws.
Erik Menendez’s parole hearing was Thursday and was denied parole. The parole board said he will be re-eligible for parole again in three years or can petition to advance, meaning he could face a parole board sooner.
RELATED: Erik Menendez describes parents’ murders in newly released audio from parole hearing
Lyle Menedez’s parole hearing was virtual, and he participated from a computer at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego.
In the board’s decision Friday, Parole Commissioner Julie Garland said the panel found that there were still signs that Lyle posed a risk to the public, however, she also commended Lyle’s lack of violence in his prison record, his work on programs inside and his positive relationships with other inmates and staff.
“We find your remorse is genuine. In many ways, you look like you’ve been a model inmate. You have been a model inmate in many ways who has demonstrated the potential for change. But despite all those outward positives, we see … you still struggle with anti-social personality traits like deception, minimization and rule breaking that lie beneath that positive surface.”
Garland added that “incarcerated people who break rules” are more likely to break rules in society.
“We do understand that you had very little hope of being released for years,” Garland said. “Citizens are expected to follow the rules whether or not there is some incentive to do so,” she said.
Garland said they did give “great weight” to the youth offender factors, since Lyle was under the age of 26 and very susceptible to his “negative and dysfunctional” environment created by Jose.
“Don’t ever not have hope … this denial is not … it’s not the end. It’s a way for you to spend some time to demonstrate, to practice what you preach about who you are, who you want to be,” Garland said. “Don’t be somebody different behind closed doors.”
She said Lyle be considered for an administrative review within one year, and Lyle could be moved up to a hearing as soon as 18 months.
The hearing started off with a discussion with Lyle Menendez and the board, followed by questions from the district attorney and the defense, then closing statements and ended with some statements from the victims’ family who all supported Lyle’s release.
During closing statements, Lyle’s parole attorney, Heidi Rummel, accused the D.A. of clinging “to their 1990s theory of the case” and ignores the role that abuse played in the shootings.
“I hope that we’re in a place today that we have a deeper understanding of childhood sexual abuse.”
Rummel noted the only acts of violence Lyle had ever committed were the murders themselves.
“This board is going to say you’re dangerous because you used cell phones … but there is zero evidence that he used it for criminality, that he used it for violence. He didn’t even lie about it.”
For his part, Lyle Menendez said the decision to use violence the day of the murders was solely his and not his “baby brother’s” responsibility. He also referenced Aug. 20 as the anniversary of his crime.
“It’s the anniversary of a crushing day for so many in my family … I think about all the phone calls on that day with the shattering news and the loss and the grief,” he said. “I will never be able to make up for the harm and grief I caused everyone in my family. I am so sorry to everyone, and I will be forever sorry.”
L.A. County Deputy District Attorney Ethan Millius questioned if Lyle has “genuinely” taken accountability for his conduct and cited Lyle’s inability to “follow basic rules while in a highly structured setting,” refrencing Lyle’s use of cell phone violations.
Millius said the recency of the cell phone violations is concerning, and indicative of a broader “pattern of conduct that culminated in 2024.”
“When you look at him, Lyle has a long-documented history of lies made to avoid the consequences of his own actions,” Millius said.
What happens next?
Since parole was denied, Menendez can ask the Board to review the case for errors of fact and to see if corrected, would that lead to a different outcome.
The board said with its denial that Menendez can be up for parole again in 3 years.
Another avenue for Menendez is Gov. Gavin Newsom.
“Newsom can also exercise his clemency power to pardon or release the Menendez brothers at any time,” the DA’s office said.
What did Lyle Menendez say about the abuse he experienced from his parents?
During the hearing, Lyle Menendez was asked about the abuse he suffered at his parents’ home.
Menendez said he was sexually abused by his father Jose Menendez from age 6 to 8. He believes it stopped when he told his cousin about the molestation, and she told her mother.
Menendez said around the age of 7 or 8 there was a lot of, “waiting and not knowing when something would happen” that night, or in the bathroom, or in the car, when it came to his father.
Menendez explained he felt a “total disconnection from everybody in my life growing up,” somewhat born from a fear that people would see the sexual abuse “in” him. He said his father never spoke with him about the abuse after it stopped.
“I worried a little bit that I was going to be less loved,” Menendez said, growing emotional, even saying he was unsure if he wanted it to stop.
“He was never harsh with me,” Menendez said about his father. “I never got beaten for doing something wrong. So, it was a devastating part of it in terms of just fear. I felt contaminated … but I felt love. So, I worried a little bit about that. But, I feel like my father loved me throughout my life.”
Menendez said he got “more attention, more focus, more emphasis on performance.”
“I was the special son in my family,” Menendez said. “My brother was the castaway.”
Lyle said taking care of his brother Erik gave him purpose, helped protect Lyle from “drowning in the spiral of my own life.”
Lyle said Erik was “openly punished, spanked, viciously. Thrown against things. My mother would drag him down the hall. I think I realized it was the two of us.”
Lyle said he didn’t feel competitive toward Erik in sports but felt like they were competing for their parents’ affections.
Lyle said Jose started abusing Erik when Lyle was 13. Garland asked Lyle about when he abused Erik.
“I don’t know why I did it,” Lyle said. “I think I was just trying to release it from me.”
During the hearing, Lyle Menendez said he was also sexually abused by his mother Kitty Menendez. Garland asked Lyle why that wasn’t included in the risk assessment.
“I didn’t see it as abuse really,” Lyle said after letting out a long sigh. “I just saw it as something special between my mother and I. So, I don’t like to talk about it that way.”
“Today, I see it as sexual abuse,” Lyle continued. “When I was 13, I felt like I was consenting, and my mother was dealing with a lot, and I just felt like maybe it wasn’t … it’s abusive, but I never saw it that way, in the same way.”
Lyle said he left details about his mother’s sexual abuse out of interviews with doctors, saying “They didn’t ask. I didn’t volunteer.”
What did Lyle Menendez say about his parents’ murders during his hearing?
Garland asked Lyle if the murders of his parents were planned because he and his brother bought the guns before the killings.
“There was zero planning,” Lyle said. “There was no way to know it was going to happen Sunday.” He added that buying the guns was “the biggest mistake,” explaining he and his brother bought the guns strictly for protection, “emotional protection.”
Lyle Menendez called the decision to buy the guns “somewhat impulsive.”
On the day of the murders, Menendez said he felt fear.
“Really, the only thought in my head was, ‘it was happening now. I needed to get to the door first,'” he said. “Fear overwhelmed reason. I don’t have a great explanation for why I felt such terror in those moments.”
After the shootings, Menendez said he dropped the gun and walked out. He said he had feelings of regret and shock afterwards.
“I think (I felt) shock. Numb at that point. Still panicked for a while,” he said. “At some point, I realized I should be expecting the police … kind of just collapsing into this feeling of the same emotion that put me in the room I was still in.”
Garland asked Menendez if he felt relief or happiness. Menendez said no.
“I felt this shameful period of those six months of having to lie to relatives who were grieving, just very much affected me,” he said. “I felt the need to suffer. That it was no relief … I sort of started to feel like I had not rescued my brother. I destroyed his life. I’d rescued nobody.”
Garland asked Menendez if one of the deaths caused him more sorrow than the other.
“My mother,” Menendez said. “Cause I loved her and couldn’t imagine harming her in any way, and I think also I learned a lot after about her life, her childhood, reflecting on how much fear maybe she felt. I learned from her psychology, her therapist, that she felt shame.”
Menendez said he struggles to talk about the abuse from his mother because there was a lot of love in the relationship.
“I get that it’s abuse, but there was a lot of love in it,” he explained. “I know when I talk about it someone else is going to use it as an abusive event, and I don’t like it.”
Menendez continued to say he had a deep connection with his father.
“He was the one who sort of guided my life … he had his plan. I was in his plan,” Menendez said. “I just felt lost without him. I had the opposite of relief, I had zero relief.”
Garland questioned the spending spree Menendez and his brother went on after the murders, saying those actions seemed inconsistent with his feelings of regret.
Menendez said it helped him feel good in the moment, lifted him out of “this anguish … my life had just collapsed without my parents.”
What was Lyle Menendez’s behavior in prison?
Deputy Parole Commissioner Patrick Reardon questioned Menendez’s record in prison, saying it felt like he was reading about “two different incarcerated people.”
“You seem to be different things at different times,” Reardon said. “I don’t think what I see is that you used a cellphone from time to time. There seems to be a mechanism in place that you always had a cell phone.”
Reardon said Menendez had a cellphone nearly all the time from 2018 to 2024.
Menendez said he used the cellphone to stay in touch with his family and community, adding he didn’t think he was harming anyone by having a cellphone.
“I had convinced myself that this wasn’t a means that was harming anyone but myself in a rule violation. I didn’t think it really disrupted prison management very much,” Menendez said.
Garland said Lyle Menendez lost family visitation rights for three years for phone violations in March 2024.
Menendez was on the Men’s Advisory Council, which allowed him access to wall phones. Garland said that position gave Lyle the opportunity to manipulate people on the inside.
Menendez said the position allowed him some control over the phone list, as to who would get to make calls and how long. He admitted that he would manipulate the control to his benefit.
Reardon points out Menendez has a good work history and an excellent educational history, as he is currently working on his masters. He applauds Menendez’s Greenspace program and other mentorship work, noting that time was when there was no guarantee Menendez would ever get out of prison.
Lyle Menendez said he sometimes justifies rulebreaking if it furthers a positive goal.
“I would never call myself a model incarcerated person. I would say that I’m a good person, that I spent my time helping people,” Menendez said. “That I’m very open and accepting,”
Menendez said he does a lot of work with the vulnerable and picked on population in prison.
“I’m the guy that officers will come to to resolve conflicts,” he said, calling himself a “peacekeeper.”
Menendez said he made a promise to his grandmother about being non-violent and that has played a big part in his behavior in prison.
“My life has been defined by extreme violence. I wanted to be defined by something else,” he said through tears.
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