Los Angeles – As the destiny of the Menéndez brothers stop for another month, a legal analyst and a litigating lawyer says that the fact that his freedom is even an argument is thanks to a new law signed by Governor Gavin Newsom.
Roger Bonakdar, a California headquarters, shared with Fox News Digital that after almost 35 years after bars, Erik and Lyle Méndez received a new hope to leave behind thanks to the former county of Los Angeles or the death or death.
The law allows people who remain imprisoned under sentences that were imposed when the hardest and less flexible laws were in force, request a review of their sentences, so that they can benefit from more recent legislative reforms that send you a text.
“What is happening is that the previous DA Gascon, infamous for certain policies and practices that he instituted in the Los Angeles County, which many accredit with the explosion of violent crimes and theft in Los Angeles, had presented a motion before the court so that the Menéndez brothers again sensitive.
Menéndez Brothers Case: What follows for the murderers after the defense, gives spar about resentment?
Lyle, left, and Erik Menéndez sit down with defense lawyer Leslie Abramson, on the right, in the municipal court of Beverly Hills during an audience, November 26, 1990. (AP Photo/Nick UT)
Bonakdar said that Gascon’s argument was that the Menéndez brothers “supposedly are no longer a threat to the community and that they have fulfilled their debt to society,” at the time of their sentence and sentence.
“Gascon also put himself in the form of his defense, which did not flee in the trial, about his alleged sexual abuse at the hands of his father now murdered. Then, what is happening now is that the current day has been back to Motdraw does not believe that the Meséndez brothers say or deserve resentment, and that is what is before the court.”
Bonakdar said that what makes this hearing even more interesting is that the judge’s powers are “quite broad” and that “they intention them again based on a crime of which they are convicted.”
“The judge can even sentence the cordination of the issue to what is called a minor crime included. That means a crime of which the acts are part or that are included in the position they will judge, that they could include those who are found, burn.
The Menéndez brothers and their supporters have been pressing for a resentment audience, saying that the brothers were unfairly condemned to life imprisonment in 1996 for killing their two parents, José and Kitty Sendez, in their Beverly Hills Home in 1989.
The approach of the Menéndez brothers in the spooky photos of the strategic defense, the strategic defense game for free murderers: experts
Lyle and Erik Menéndez are seen as young men with their photos of the photos. The brothers are currently fulfilling life imprisonment for the murders of their parents, José and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menéndez in 1996. (Ronald L. Freele/Los Angeles Times through Getty Images)
His first judgment ended in a null trial, when jurors could not agree on their destiny. After a second trial in the mid -1990s, in which some of his evidence on the Alleged sexual abuse It was excluded, the jurors agreed with the prosecutors that their reason was greed.
If the judge decides to resent the Méndez brothers, he will go to the State’s probation board to consult his release.
Because they were less than 26 years old at the time of murders, according to the current law of California, the new 50 -year sentences to life would be immediately eligible for a hearing in probation.
“If this comes completely in their own way, they could be granted probation and released. His sentence could be switched,” said Bonakdar. “And the reason for that is that there are certain changes in the California Law That allow certain criminals, if they were young enough at the time they were sentenced to re -reinnate under these rules of compassionate liberation that say that, for example, if he was 26 years old at the time of the commission, or Irey “ eligible to request the court in search of relief. “
Bonakdar added that the only thing here is that Gascon affirmed the relief, and that the judge rejected the current attempt of Da Nathan Hochman to withdraw the motion of Gascon.
The aunt of the Menéndez Brothers hospitalized after DA shares graphic photos in the Court: “There was no warning”
“This is quite important because the new law, says that the Government, where the prosecutor moves for liberation, actually gives the accused right, the convict, for the benefit of a presumption, that is, white to the red of the red. The tumpt of the twopt of the twopta is the twopt The dos -two that is one that presents the dosptspt the twoptos of the twopts that is the senting -SentttTTTTETTCEPTSPT’s, are eligible or that must be granted.
What also establishes this entire audience and saga from others is that the Menéndez brothers “definitely have an advantage over their average criminal defendant,” said Bonakdar.
Follow the Fox True Crime team in X
The deputy prosecutor Habib Balian addresses the Court in front of a photo of the Menéndez family shown on a screen in the Superior Court in Van Nuys, California, on Friday, April 11, 2025. (Bill Robles)
“In the first place, obviously they had resources in this. They had hired first level lawyers. They raise everything in the sink of the kitchen in this trial,” Bonakdar said about their evidence in the 90s. “The distance is given and simply testified in their criminal trials. Therefore, it is not surprising that a defendant who had that level of resources and put that level of effort could be a relief now.”
Bonakdar said the most important thing, he thought, is that Gascon affirmatively presented the motion.
“There is the argument that these defendants could have sought the clemency in another way or have presented a motion based on the change in the statute. The fact that Gascon, the former district prosecutor, presented this independently and affirmatively on behalf of these defendants really gives them a stage at the hearing.
Register to get TRUE CRIME BULLETIN
Hochman has firmly opposed the ressentation, in motion by Gascon, but said that they would be the “sincerely and unequivocally pootic brothers, for the first time in 30 years, the full range of criminal activity” “
He said in a previous statement that the brothers “have opted for hindered in their bunker of lies, deception and denials of more than 30 years”, and that it corresponds to the Court take into account if the “lack of acceptance or sponsoring is whether the Menendez brothers represent an irrazonable risk of danger to the community.
Bonakdar said, in his opinion and point of view, that there are “agent factors that prevent the judge and probaly should” before making his decision in May.
“Premeditated murder is extremely serious and obviously because of its nature, violent crime. And particularly, if you have the mental ability to process the idea or mutter your parents in cold blood, it is said. It is said. A serious audience.” This is the argument that will be made in Meaage or the Menéndez brothers. Menéndez Boys. ”
Look at Fox Nation: Menéndez Brothers: Victims or villains?
The Méndez brothers, on the left, and is given by Nathan Hochman, to the right. (Getty images)
One of the obstacles that the audience maintains voted from the Comprehensive Risk Assessment Report (CRA), which was an orderly psychological examination By Newsom’s office And it has become the greatest obstacle for defense to overcome.
The lawyer of the brothers, Mark Geragos, presented a motion of challenge against Hochman after the decision of Judge Michael Jesus to reprogram his hearings until May. A motion of challenge requests that the individual move away from a case due to a possible conflict of interest or bias that prevents them from operating Impartially.
Go here to obtain real -time updates from the Fox Hub of the True Crime
There was also an accusation of a violation of Marsy’s law, which protects the families of the victims, that place of Toks when the prosecutors showed graphic photos of the scene of the crime of the murder, which led to the hospitalization of an elderly member, and some some family years.
Hochman’s office said prosecutors had no intention of “causing anguish or pain” to the audience attendees.
“To the extent that the photographic representation of this conduct would alter any of the members of the Menéndez family present in the Court, we apologize for not previously noticing that the behavior would be described in detail not only the photo of the scene, shared with Fox News Digital.
The judge rejected the request of the Méndez team so that the prosecutor’s prosecutor was admonished to show the photos of the crime, but asked both parties to provide warning.
Click here to get the Fox News application
“It’s extremely strange … where you have victims who also support the defendants,” Jesus said. “I not only thought about that when the image is exhausted.”
“It was a horrible murder,” he continued. “If someone feels uncomfortable, maybe they shouldn’t be here.”
Lyle and Erik Menéndez will return to court on May 9, since Wheter’s decision will be released in balance.
They are scheduled to appear before the Board of Probation on June 13 as part of the CRA report ordered by Newsom, who is considering the clemency application of the brothers, a potential path separated out of prison.
Fox News Digital communicated with Newsom’s office to comment.
Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Michael Ruiz de Fox News Digital contributed to this report.
Stepheny Price is a writer of Fox News Digital and Fox Business. She covers issues that include missing persons, homicides, national cases of crimes, illegal immigration and more. The advice and ideas of history can be sent to stepny.price@fox.com