Erik and Lyle Menendez appeared virtually in a Los Angeles courtroom Thursday for a hearing that was expected to examine a hotly contested question: Should the brothers, who are serving sentences of life without the possibility of parole for the shotgun murders of their parents in 1989, be free?
Instead, the proceedings were delayed after prosecutors asked the judge late Wednesday to review an inquiry into the potential dangers the brothers may pose if released — and the defense said they would seek to have the district attorney’s office thrown off the case.
A new hearing was set for May 9 to examine a forthcoming recusal motion and the “comprehensive risk assessments” cited by prosecutors. The assessments were conducted by parole and prison officials who were tasked by California Gov. Gavin Newsom with investigating the brothers’ clemency request.
A resentencing hearing previously scheduled for Friday was canceled, and no new date was set for the matter.
“The family does not want to go this through this charade anymore with the DA,” defense attorney Mark Geragos told reporters outside the courtroom.
Geragos said they planned to file a motion demanding Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman's removal over what he described as the prosecutor's bias and an alleged violation of a state law that grants victims the right to fairness, respect and dignity.
Geragos has said a prosecutor in the case violated Marsy's Law when he showed a crime scene photo during a hearing last week.
Hochman has apologized for not warning that the brothers’ conduct would be shown through imagery.
Before court Thursday, he dismissed the defense’s criticisms, saying: "There’s an old adage — if you don’t have the facts, pound the law, and if you don’t have the law, pound the facts. And if you don’t have the law or the facts, pound the prosecutor. And that’s exactly what the defense strategy has been."
Speaking to reporters, Hochman declined to discuss the content of the assessments but said his office received them unexpectedly in recent days. Prosecutors filed a motion Wednesday night seeking to potentially delay the resentencing hearing if the judge overseeing the case wished to review the assessments before making a decision on resentencing, he said.
"We want all the facts to come out at this hearing," Hochman said.
Geragos called the filing a "Hail Mary" and suggested Hochman's disclosure of the assessments, which the defense has not seen, may also be grounds for recusal.
The acrimony spilled into the courtroom as well.
At one point, after Geragos called a prosecutor’s presentation a "dog and pony show," Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian said the attorney was "degrading" them. When Geragos shot back that he deserved to be degraded, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic told them to behave.
Before the hearing began, a handful of people had lined up outside the courthouse in Van Nuys, located north of downtown Los Angeles, to secure a seat in the limited public space available. One woman told NBC News that she had flown to Los Angeles from Chicago and wants to see the brothers released.
Another woman told NBC Los Angeles that she took an Uber from Downey, roughly 35 miles away, and also wants to see the pair out of prison.
"Hopeful" is how Anamaria Baralt, a cousin of the brothers who has publicly advocated for their release, described her mood upon entering the courtroom.
The resentencing process began in October, when Los Angeles County’s former top prosecutor recommended that Erik, 54, and Lyle, 57, be resentenced to 50 years to life, which would make them eligible for parole immediately. He said they had been “exceptional” inmates during the 35 years they had spent in prison and were “poster cases” for his office's resentencing unit.
That position has been backed by celebrities and many of the victims’ relatives, who in recent months have frequently spoken out about the brothers’ accomplishments in prison and the abuse they believe the siblings suffered at the hands of their father, José Menendez.
But the former top prosecutor, George Gascón, was voted out in November, and his replacement, Nathan Hochman, has taken a very different view of the case.
Hochman — a former federal prosecutor and general counsel for a business litigation firm — has said that after his office launched a review of tens of thousands of pages of trial transcripts, prison records and other evidence, he concluded that the brothers haven’t taken complete responsibility for their crimes.
Last month, Hochman said he would withdraw Gascón’s recommendation.
In court papers and at a news conference, Hochman and his deputies have pointed to 16 “unacknowledged” lies they say the brothers have told about the murders. Among those lies, the prosecutors have said, was the brothers’ claim that they killed their parents in self-defense after Lyle confronted his father about his alleged abuse of Erik.
That claim featured prominently at the brothers’ first trial, which ended with a hung jury in January 1994. During their second trial, a high court ruling barred the brothers from invoking an “imperfect” self-defense, as the legal doctrine is known. They were convicted of first-degree murder.
Prosecutors who tried the brothers have described the murders as cold-blooded and financially motivated. One of the prosecutors in the second trial, Juan Mejia, told NBC News last year that their mother may have known about the alleged abuse and didn’t do anything about it.
"But there’s no justification for shooting your mom eight times with a shotgun and reloading," he said.
Hochman has taken a similar position and said that if the brothers "come clean" with the court, their family and the public, they "can be said to have fully and completely accepted responsibility for their actions."
The brothers’ family countered that Hochman's assessment was based on "outdated arguments, a misleading presentation of facts, and a deep misunderstanding of the purpose of the resentencing process itself."
The district attorney could not undo the process his predecessor initiated "simply because a different administration is in office," a family-led advocacy group, the Justice for Erik and Lyle Coalition, said in a release this month.
The two sides squared off during a lengthy hearing on the matter last week, with a deputy district attorney recounting the brothers' alleged lies and detailing the "severity" of the killings.
The defense focused on the brothers' deeds while they have been incarcerated — they’ve helped inmates with severe disabilities, completed college courses and established a green space “beautification” project — and criticized the prosecution for showing the crime scene photo, which Geragos said "retraumatized" Menendez family members who attended the hearing.
The brothers are still pursuing two other possible paths to freedom: the request for clemency and a petition that cites what the defense team has described as new evidence that seeks to overturn their convictions. Both efforts continue.