Crime Weekly - S3 Ep212: The Menendez Brothers: Monster Behind the Mask (Part 7)

Episode Date: May 31, 2024

Beverly Hills, located just southwest of the Hollywood Hills, was and still is a place that the rich, famous and glamorous choose to make their homes. Known for its opulence and luxury, the homes in Beverly Hills are some of the most expensive in the United States, with some properties worth tens of millions of dollars. But behind the country clubs, cocktail hours and shopping trips, there was something much darker brewing in a high end Beverly Hills neighborhood. On August 20th, 1989, business executive Jose Menendez and his wife Kitty were brutally murdered while sitting in the living room of their sprawling Mediterranean style mansion, and what seemingly made this tragedy worse was the fact that their two son’s, Lyle and Erik, were the ones to make the gruesome discovery of their bodies. Suddenly orphaned, the Menendez brothers were initially looked at with sympathy, but soon they would be on trial for the murder of their parents. Lyle and Erik didn’t deny that they had taken their parents' lives, but according to them it was because they were scared and broken down after a lifetime of abuse. At the time, most people believed this was a fabricated excuse, and the prosecution gave greed and money as the true motive. A tragedy and trial played out for the world on television, ending with both Erik and Lyle confined at the Richard Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego for life, with no chance of parole. Recently, newly discovered evidence and testimony has raised questions of whether Erik and Lyle were being honest about the constant state of stress and fear their parents forced them to live under. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. Storyworth.com/CrimeWeekly - Save $10 on your first purchase! 2. StitchFix.com/CrimeWeekly - Get $20 off your first Fix! 3. FactorMeals.com/CrimeWeekly50 - Use code CRIMEWEEKLY50 for 50% off! 4. MasterClass.com/CrimeWeekly - Get an additional 15% off any annual membership! 5. Prose.com/CrimeWeekly - Get 50% off your first subscription order and your FREE in-depth hair consultation!

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one pound increments as you get stronger, so you're always challenged. Tonal lets you choose from a variety of expert-led workouts, from strength to aero hit to yoga and mobility to keep you coming back for more. For a limited time, go to tonal.com to get $500 off your tonal purchase, plus a free four-year warranty. That's tonal.com for $500 off, plus a free four-year warranty. Tonal.com. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek Levasseur. And this is part seven of the Menendez Brothers series. Finally. Yes. This is the last part. Derek and I in a few days are going to be getting on planes,

flying to Nashville, going to CrimeCon, meeting a bunch of you. We're super excited, but we are very tired right now. However, we're very, very, very much looking forward to seeing everybody in Nashville

and we will not be tired then. We will be rejuvenated, rested and ready to hang out, have fun, and talk true crime. Yeah. No, and we're going to finish strong. We're going to finish strong on this one because you were kind of giving me a little bit of a heads up. We have a lot to cover tonight, things that are important to this story. And I was actually making some notes today as far as my final thoughts on this case overall, because I got about eight pages of notes from all the episodes. So I wanted to consolidate and hopefully at least give my opinion on some of the questions that we posed when we first started covering this series, as far as the child abuse,

the premeditation versus just a spontaneous crime of passion. And then finally, the most important thing, should the Menendez brothers still be in prison now? So at the end of the episode, we're going to give our opinions on those questions as well. Yeah, it's a great episode, actually. Lots of information. I think that seven parts for the Menendez murders, obviously we can't get all the information in.

There was so many little tidbits I found along the way that I kind of wanted to insert, but it would have seemed sort of random. And you can't cover everything. It doesn't matter if we did 20 parts, right? These are people's lives. This happened over the span of many decades at the end of the day. It's still happening, as we're going to talk about at the end of this episode. But we covered it to the extent where I think that Derek and I, as well as anyone listening or watching, will be able to objectively say whether or not they think that the Menendez brothers should be successful in their current appeal and either get out of prison or have a new trial.

Yeah, I look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on it. Everyone's been very vocal about this case. we'll go over this last episode and we'll let you guys weigh in. Yeah. So at the end of last episode, we talked about how Dr. Jerome Ozeal, the psychologist, he had treated Eric Menendez. Eric and Lyle confessed to him that they'd killed their parents. And then Dr. Jerome Ozeal and his, what would you call her, girlfriend, paramour, affair partner, lover. Pick your poison, whatever one you want to go with. Cult victim, I don't know, stalker, whatever. It depends who you talk to. But she and Jerome Ozeal were basically responsible for getting Eric and Lyle arrested.

And the Beverly Hills Police Department came for Lyle Menendez on March 8th, 1990. Now, at that time, Eric wasn't even in the country. He was finishing up a tennis tournament in Tel Aviv, and he got a phone call, found out his brother had been arrested. He got right on a plane, and then he flew back to California, where three days later, he turned himself in at LAX. Now, when the arrests were made public, those who knew the brothers expressed their disbelief that they could have ever have done this to their parents, including Lyle's friend, Glenn Stevens, who was actually in the Jeep with Lyle when he was taken into police custody. We pull out of the house in Beverly Hills. We're driving about a block and a half

up the road, and there's a blue Ford Taurus in the way with a red light flashing. And there's a guy running with, I think with a red light flashing and there's a guy running with I think a bulletproof vest and a double barrel shotgun in front of the car. Lyle puts the Jeep in reverse and starts to back up slowly and we hit something and the next thing I know I turn around and it's a van and two or three policemen come out with police windbreakers on and everything and they pull guns and they just surround the jeep. They pulled us out one by one,

put us face first on the pavement and handcuffed us. And then they dragged me away into one of the police vehicles and said, do you know what this is all about? And I said, no, I'm sorry, I have an idea, because it started to click just then, after thinking about it for 15 minutes, what they could come out in such force about. And they said, well, Lyle's being arrested for the murder of his parents.

Charging the kids is the most outrageous, outrageous thing ever. They both were given enough money to live very good lives. They had great clothes, they had cars. You couldn't ask for more. I don't see any reason. I have never seen any predisposition to violence in Lyle, and I don't think he was capable of thrusting the barrel of a shotgun into his father's mouth and blowing off the back of his head.

And the same with Eric. Adored his mother. Adored his mother. This boy killing father and mother? No, no, and no. But the police and the district attorney's office believed they had built a strong case against the Menendez brothers, and they pressed forward with their murder indictments. L.A. County D.A. Ira Reiner told gathered reporters during a March 11th press conference that the boys had become suspects shortly into the investigation. He actually said it had only been a matter of days. Reiner also announced that he believed their fans from across the country gathering on Elm Drive in March of 1990. Members of Jose and Kitty's families traveled to the mansion slash murder scene to settle in for what promised to be a long and wild ride. And they all unanimously showed their support for Eric and Lyle. And I would like to mention that even to this day, they still support Eric and Lyle. In fact, members of Kitty's own family, members of Jose's family have said, we forgive the

boys, but we'll never forgive Jose and Kitty. And I think that says something about the character of these two individuals who, yes, are victims, but also, and yes, maybe victims of their circumstances, but also not super good people. Yeah, and I do think that's their circumstances, but also not super good people. Yeah, and I do think that's extremely important as we go through this episode. And eventually we're going to talk about the decision-making process of the judge and coming to his conclusion as far as what the sentencing should be. I absolutely think that the opinions of the family members of the quote-unquote victims here should be considered. Absolutely. the family members of the quote unquote victims here should be considered.

Absolutely. Well, no matter who you look at as being the victim here, these are family members of anyone you would consider to be a victim, whether it's Jose, Kitty, Lyle, or Eric. They're all their family members. It's just the point of, yes, if Jose and Kitty had been completely innocent, had been the best people, I don't think that their own siblings, their own nieces and nephews would be out here being like, well, you know, it's not great that they're dead, but they kind of, you know, they kind of had it coming. They kind of deserved it. Yeah.

Yeah. I think that says a lot about Jose and Kitty's character. And not so much Eric and Lyle's, but Jose and Kitty's for sure. So these family members even began searching for who they believed would be the best attorneys for the boys, bringing dozens of lawyers to meet with Eric and Lyle, but one in particular seemed to be the most compelling and the most compatible. Leslie Abramson was a 46-year-old criminal defense attorney who had graduated from UCLA before passing the California State Bar in 1970. Leslie worked passionately for the Los Angeles County Public Defender's Office for seven years before going

into private practice and defending some high-profile clients, but none of them would be as high-profile as the Menendez brothers. She'd been twice named the Trial Lawyer of the Year by the L.A. Criminal Courts Bar Association, and Vanity Fair would go on to describe Abramson as, quote, the most brilliant defense lawyer for death row cases, end quote. Over the course of her career, only one client that Abramson represented was sentenced to the death penalty, and he was a serial murderer named Ricky Sanders who had killed 11 people in a restaurant's walk-in freezer. So I kind of feel like no matter how good you are as a lawyer, it's going to be very difficult to prevent somebody who brutally murdered. Yeah, that's a tough one. You can only do so much.

Can't really hold that one against her. Yeah, nope. We're going to give her a pass on that one. You know, she's over here thinking like, damn, I'd have a perfect record too if it wasn't for that pesky serial murderer. So Eric and Lyle didn't know it yet, but with Leslie, they had a true shark on their side and she was going to give their case her all. And she did. She went above and beyond. And we're going to touch on that later. But many people believe that it was Leslie Abramson who eventually would save Eric and Lyle from getting the death penalty. So while Abramson and her co-counsel Jill Lansing started preparing for trial,

Lyle and Eric began their lives as prisoners. Initially, they were housed in the Los Angeles County Men's Jail. They'd be there for the three years while they were waiting for their trial. They were segregated from the other prisoners and placed in separate cells in the 7,000 section of the jail. This is where they would put high-profile inmates. In fact, on June 17, 1994, O.J. Simpson joined the Menendez brothers in the 7,000 section. He had just been apprehended after the infamous slow-speed police car chase, and he was being charged with the murder of his wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman. So as they all spent time together,

but in separate cells, Eric and Lyle formed a jailhouse friendship with the former football player turned murder suspect. Eric Menendez said, quote, I didn't see him cry, but I believe he was. I could hear him moaning. I told him not to talk to the deputies or inmates about his case. I told him not to worry, just calm down and relax. After that long chase, you can imagine what shape he was in. He wasn't happy to be in jail, like anyone else. He wasn't any worse than I was or Lyle was. He was real delusional, thinking he was going to get out in three weeks, end quote. Eric also mentioned that O.J. Simpson received special treatment from the police officers at the county jail. He said

they treated Simpson like royalty. They wanted to talk to him. They were showing up at his cell to chat with him. They were asking him for autographs, taking pictures of him. Eric said, quote, they were giving him good food, the officer's food, roast beef, pork chops, burritos, and they were letting him use the phone all day. They kept his cell open all the time, end quote. When I was covering this case, one of my first experiences with true crime, the documentary we did on it, this was some of the things we talked about. The preferential treatment that he had. I mean, he was a huge celebrity.

This is even after his football career. He was a big time sports announcer. And at this point, he was still considered innocent, obviously hadn't gone to trial yet. And so there was a big problem with this where he was a very charismatic guy and he was able to get things even on the outside because of who he was, but also the way he interacted with people. So it was easy for him to befriend these prisoners. And they had a major issue on their hand inside. They were concerned about the information he was getting relayed to him as far as the investigation, because there were a lot of fans of his that were willing to do what they could do in order to gain his friendship or at least have them interact with him. I mean, back then, he just died. And we saw how people were coming out in droves, like RIP, RIP, you know, what a great football player, like completely forgetting, you know, the whole chapter of his life where he murdered two people and got away with it. And then did write a book, right, called If I Did It.

But Eric and Lyle would only actually see OJ when they would be walked to the showers together. But they did spend a lot of time talking through the cell walls. And once Eric left OJ a letter in the showers trying to offer him some encouragement. He said, quote, I told him a lot of things. This is his life, I said. When you cry, remember those tears. Hold them because you're crying for your children. You're crying for everything you're losing. I said, remember who's doing it to you and fight. Continue to fight. I told him you've got to start worrying about your life, not your reputation, end quote. Now, O.J. Simpson had retained high-profile criminal attorney Robert Shapiro,

and Robert Shapiro was actually someone the boys had considered hiring when they'd been arrested, but he wasn't available. Now, it seemed that Eric might have believed O.J. when he said he didn't kill his wife, but Lyle, who also spoke to Simpson and wrote him a letter once, he was not so convinced because like recognizes like. Anyways, Lyle said, quote, I told him I thought the public would understand. I expressed my concern that Robert Shapiro wouldn't let him tell the truth. I said I knew it obviously wasn't planned and that he and Lyle have towards OJ, where Eric's over here, like, offering moral support. Like, I know you're probably struggling. I hear you're crying.

Think of your family. Think of your life. You know, now you have to fight for your innocence, like to get out of here. And Lyle's over here like, listen, dude, we all know you did it. Just tell them the truth, okay? Tell them the truth because people are going to feel bad for you. And it's very interesting. Well, what we've heard over the last seven parts, it actually isn't as surprising as you may think.

I mean, now, right, knowing what we know and what it appears as far as who is kind of directing the ship of these two murders, Lyle's a lot more pragmatic. He's a lot more logical and analytical. He's just like, let's get to the point.

I kind of feel like Eric's just this sweet, childlike little boy who just also wants a father figure so badly. You know, kind of like, it felt like any kind of older man that entered his life, Eric would sort of try to get close to and like, you know, encourage him or

try to form some sort of bond, attachment, relationship with him. And I think that at the end of the day, OJ was probably far more like Lyle where it really didn't bother him. If he was crying, it was because he got caught and he was in jail. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. 100%. Yeah. Those tears were for himself. So there was some drama with the brothers while they were in jail awaiting their trials because allegedly they were accused of concocting a plan to escape. And this plan was discovered on June 8th, 1990. Deputy Robert Burkett claimed that he found what he thought to be an escape plan in Eric's cell during a random search.

So what happened is Eric and Lyle were transferred out of the jail and they were brought to Santa Monica to be prepared for a hearing. And the police officers kind of go in their cells and look around while they're not there. And Burkett found this escape plan. And then another deputy found a small map in Lyle's cell and had the letters E and L penciled

onto this map and kind of showed like different routes that they could take. And according to the Los Angeles Times, quote, shortly before the hearing began, deputies noticed cut links on Eric Menendez's ankle chains. Deputy Rudy Arielenez found the second links from each end of the chain had been cut one side completely through and the other neatly through, end quote. They said it would have only taken the pressure of a stomping foot to break the rest of the chain completely. However, even if his chains had been broken on his ankles, he still was secured with wrist chains and there was a chain wrapped around his waist that connected to the wrist chains. So those chains seemed to be intact and it wasn't an issue. And after an investigation, it was decided that there actually wasn't enough evidence to say for sure the brothers had been planning an Alcatraz-level jailbreak. Lieutenant William Sieber, who was the head of the sheriff's fugitive warrant escape detail, said, quote, In our professional opinion, the chains were not cut by either of the Menendez brothers, end quote.

He also said that the notes and diagrams recovered from their cells were of a building that wasn't the jail. It was a building that couldn't be identified, and he could not conclude that they had anything to do with an escape plan. Yeah, that's fascinating. I want to weigh in on it, but let's take our first break. We'll be right back. So that's really interesting. Obviously, the decision was made not to charge them with anything, but it sounds like based on what you laid out, they would have had probably a decent case against them, but maybe they figured from what they had, they caught him beforehand. They didn't actually attempt it. They might've been planning for it, doing some things that contributed to a potential breakout, but they never tried to execute it. I don't know. I don't know what the rationale is behind closed doors. Maybe they said, listen, they didn't get out. Maybe this makes us look bad by pointing out that they almost could have gotten out and that we didn't catch any of it till now. And they're also on trial for murder. So let's just, we're not, we're not going

to charge this one. They got enough on their plate and we don't really want to deal with it. I don't know what conversations went on behind closed doors that we're not privy to. Yeah. I don't know how he would have been like, I know for like, I don't think that either of the Menendez brothers did that to the chains. Well, like who did then? And I'm not saying they did, but either that, or you got some faulty ass chains that you're using to secure inmates with.

And like, then you just brought it to everybody's attention now because you just said Eric and Lyle didn't do it. Who the hell did? OJ Simpson? And that's the other thing when we think about it, like it exposes some of the weaknesses of the prison, maybe some of the ineptness of the prison guards. Like this stuff should have been caught well before this point. So just like in other situations when it could essentially make the prison look bad, maybe it's in their best interest not to make a bigger deal out of this because it will expose some of the inadequacies of the prison itself. This might've been a self-preservation tactic where they were like, you know what? By exposing the Menendez brothers for this attempted breakout,

we're also exposing some of the things that we're doing wrong. So we're going to let this one slide. I kind of was thinking the same thing where it's like, yeah, maybe they were thinking about escaping, but if the jail itself had been ironclad and going and doing things according to how they should be doing it, they never would have had a chance and they wouldn't even gotten as far as they did. So at end of the day that one guy sieber he was like all right guys no harm no foul no one escaped everyone's fine water under the bridge let's pretend this never happened yeah let's let's you and they probably some people got some tongue lashings and you know what are you doing how do they have time where do they get the instruments to cut this stuff all that why'd you let oj simpson cut their chains right right all right because they probably provided OJ with a saw.

Oh, they gave him a steak knife for his filet mignon. Oh, my God. All right. It's sad because it's probably true. I know. I know. It always reminds me of that Goodfellas scene where the big mob boss. Yeah, they're having a full course meal.

Yeah, and he's making homemade pasta and making homemade mozzarella. And he's like, no, I want the good prosciutto. And it's just like crazy. But yeah, that was OJ's experience. I have no doubt. So for the trial, the first trial, Eric and Lyle would be tried separately with one jury for each of them. But both of those juries would witness the trials at the same time, but then come to

their decision separately. So everything's happening in the same courtroom. Each of the boys, Eric's going to be represented by one lawyer. Lyle's going to be represented by another lawyer. They're each going to have juries, but everybody's going to sort of be all together. And then when they go to deliberate, these two juries are going to split up and come to their decisions separately, which I don't get that, man. I don't get it. It's so dumb to me. Like, why are you going to do the trial at the same time with the same witnesses, everything the same, but then have two separate juries? I think there could be a situation where we're kind of finding out now that they're not equal

in the accountability for their actions. And maybe there's a world where they say, Lyle, it was premeditated murder for you, but Eric, you were more so an associate who was manipulated or groomed or whatever. You were convinced to do this and you were more of an actor than you were a planner. I get what you're saying. If you're involved in a conspiracy to commit murder, you're going to be charged're involved in a conspiracy to commit murder, you're going to be charged the same. But maybe there was a world where they were starting to do their work, especially when they started looking at what Dr. Ozeal had said. And as far as who was really leading the charge, maybe they felt it was better to separate them in case

Eric got off. They could still potentially get Lyle. I don't know. And that makes total sense. But then do the trial separately on separate days and not have both juries there, because now something that one jury might hear about Lyle, even though they're not Lyle's jury, might alter the way they think about Eric. Like, it just doesn't make sense. But I was thinking about this earlier. And it's funny you say that because I was reading the comments of the video that posted of part six.

And somebody said, oh, it's weird that Eric went in and started shooting first. And I was like, it is kind of weird. And I thought to myself, I said, self, do you think Lyle had Eric go in and start shooting first, not just so that he was a part of it and equally culpable, but so that it almost preemptively would pose an argument for Lyle being the ringleader. How am I the ringleader? He went in, he started shooting first. I followed his lead. I followed him into that room. And that's some top level, manipulative, nefarious, long game stuff, if that's the case. Yeah. So I'm not going to go that far.

I don't know if you recall, but we discussed this because we discussed after the conversation with Dr. Ozeal, if you remember, Lyle was saying how they might have to kill him as well. And Eric was like, no, I'm not doing that. And then Lyle backed off of it. He didn't, he didn't carry through with it on his own. And I had, had suggested that there was a possibility. This was a common tactic for, for Lyle. Maybe even when the decision was made to kill their parents, where Lyle knew what he wanted to do, he wasn't going to back off of it, but he could sense the apprehension in Eric. Even Eric said to Dr. Ozeo, he needed to carry out these murders sooner

than later while he still had that emotion. And I'm sure Lyle picked up on that as well. So to ensure that once Lyle started shooting, Eric didn't back out behind him, he said, you go first. And that way he knew Eric was committed and he was an equal partner. And we had given the analogy of training day where if Eric hadn't shot anybody that Lyle felt there was a possibility that he could turn him in. So he wanted to make sure he was as culpable to the same level that he was. That's what I think happened there, But could it have been to maybe pin it on him eventually? I guess, but you're right. Or just to sort of counteract,

because he's the older brother, right? He's the older brother. He would be technically like a fatherly figure to Eric. So to counteract anybody who would say, well, you influenced your younger brother to do this, he could say like, well, he went into the room and shot first. I followed him. I was hesitant. But when he was so like decisive about it, I just went with it. You know, we had to save ourselves. Yeah, it could be.

I mean, he never did that at trial. Because I don't think they ever brought up that he was kind of the ringleader. I don't think that ever really. No, maybe not. I mean, he could have changed his mind as well. I definitely think, I don't know about that, but I definitely think he could tell that Eric was on the cusp of not doing this. I think if Eric was in charge or making the decision whether or not to kill the parents, even after purchasing the guns, he might've rethought his decision and said, no,

let's just get out of here. Let's just take off. Let's just start a new life. We don't have to do this. And that's why Lyle wanted to make sure he pulled that trigger first, that Eric pulled that trigger first. So at that point, once you pull that trigger, there's no going back. Yes. And so they're going into this first trial. It starts in 1993. Court TV broadcasted the drama for the world to see. And a week before the trial, the defense attorneys dropped their bombshell. After nearly four years of Eric and Lyle saying nothing publicly about what had happened to their parents or why, it was now all out in the open. The Los Angeles Times printed, quote,

In an interview with Eric Menendez's lead defense attorney, Leslie Abramson, she said the time had come to detail what she will claim really happened, primarily because she was worried about the way the press had portrayed the brothers. End quote. Leslie Abramson said, quote, If people would just kick back and think for a minute, there are some fundamental precepts of family life. Precept number one is that children love their parents.

Good parents do not get shotgunned by their kids. Period. End quote. That didn't age well. That did not age well. I do not agree with the sentence or the statement, by the way, or the sentiment. The sentence, the statement, the sentiment, I agree with none of those S's. We covered one of our first cases we covered was Joel Guy, remember?

His parents were great. And he put his mother's head into a stew pot because he wanted their money. So Leslie Abramson, I applaud you for defending your clients with vigor, but that is a fundamentally false statement. Well, you can see though what she's setting up here, right? And you still got more to go about this, but she is looking at all the facts, just like the prosecution. And she's looking at Eric and Lyle and she's behind closed doors, talking to them saying, guys, if we go in there and claim that you didn't do this, you're getting the death penalty. It's going to be bad for you. Nobody's going to believe it. The evidence doesn't support it. I

can't defend you. We have to admit to what you did and we have to tell the story of what you endured. We have to give the why. It's not about whether you did it or not anymore. It's about why you did it. That's what's important here. We need to fill them in on everything, not just the murders, but what led up to the murders. That's your only chance of walking out of here as free men. And that's probably when the strategic decision was made. I mean, I kind of feel like Lyle always expected to tell the truth if a trial ever came into play. Look what he said to OJ, like, oh, just tell the truth. You know, people will understand. I think he thought in his head, because we both agree that these two people,

these two boys, I hate calling them boys because they're grown men, but they were abused by their parents. So in his head, he was justified. And he felt like other people would be like, yeah, totally checks out. Makes sense. He wasn't afraid of that. And yeah, I mean, he didn't deny it to Dr. Ozeal either. I mean, he confessed. He told him, this is why I did it. So yeah, I'm with you there. I think Eric was definitely the frontrunner in that. He really needed to get it off his chest. But I think Laya always felt like if a person comes to shove, I'm going to admit to tell your story. We got to tell your truth to the jury. And then they start sort of teasing this leading up to the trial that they have a story to tell and that these two boys were victims. And in response to Leslie Abramson saying, you know, good parents don't get gunned down by their kids. Deputy District Attorney Pamela

Bozenich responded, saying, quote, I have no doubt that these brothers must have had a great deal of antithopy for their parents. If your parents are rich and you love them, you generally don't kill them. As far as the allegations that this was a case of self-defense, I think you should watch the evidence we present very carefully, end quote. And I kind of like what she's saying here. She's saying if your parents are rich and you love them, you generally don't kill them. So she's not saying like, oh, they have to be bad parents. She's kind of putting it back on Eric and Lyle. You have to love them. If you loved them, you wouldn't have killed them. But it doesn't mean necessarily that they're bad parents and that's why you don't love them. She's kind of being a little creative with that. Yeah. I see what she's doing there. But I also think at this point, maybe when she's making those statements, she doesn't understand the magnitude, what has actually gone on in that mansion. They never did. The prosecutors never. Even during the trial, when it's all coming out,

they never believed Eric and Lyle. So I can tell you right now, I mean, in Eric and Lyle's defense, I disagree with her where if that is done to you, it's very easy to see why you wouldn't love those individuals because parents, yes, biologically, they may be your parents, but you have to earn that. And the way they treated those two boys, they were not their parents. But that doesn't mean that Eric and Lyle didn't love them. They did love them because it was this toxic trauma bond thing. That was all they knew of love. It was a different type of love, clearly. abuse, PTSD, CPTSD, trauma bonds, attachment issues. All of these things weren't really,

they were being researched and there was good research going on, but they weren't like very mainstream like they are today. And it wasn't well understood by the public at least. So opening statements in the trial began on July 20th, 1993. And we already know that the prosecution's position was that Eric and Lyle had killed their parents for the substantial estate they would inherit as a result. The prosecutors, Pamela Bozenich and Lester Kuriyama, made it clear that their case relied heavily on the testimony of Dr. Jerome O'Zeal. And defense lawyers announced for the first time that Eric and Lyle would be testifying on their own behalf. And also, they had not killed their parents for money. They'd killed their parents in self-defense after decades of torture. We also already know that there were

several people called to the stand to speak about Eric and Lyle's childhoods and lives and to comment on the way their parents treated them. Family members, friends, acquaintances, employees, many of them testified that Jose and Kitty ran their family like a business, coldly and callously. But what we haven't talked about yet are the people who testified that they had knowledge of the sexual abuse that was happening to Eric and Lyle far before these two men went on trial for murder. So to me, they're setting up the self-defense claim here where I feel like this is where the fork in the road for this whole case is because it's going to be one or the other. Either this is going to be a premeditated murder, or this is going to be a form of self-defense where the brothers were in immediate fear of their life. Immediate fear,

and I emphasize the word immediate, because if you're in fear of your life, but you have the ability to retreat or remove yourself from the situation, then it therefore is no longer self-defense. Self-defense is when there's no other choice but to use whatever force you need to use to maintain your own life. And that's the real question here. Were they in a situation where in that moment they had no other choice but to defend themselves. And that's what we're going to get into this trial. And that's going to be the big hot topic issue here because that decision, whatever way they go on that, will ultimately decide whether or not the Menendez brothers are freed. Yeah, I agree. I agree. We're going to take a quick break and then I'm going to

talk about the people who came forward and said that they had prior knowledge of what was happening to Eric and Lyle. Diane Vander Molen was an older cousin to Lyle and Eric on their mother's side, and she would testify that when she was a child starting in 1976, she would sometimes spend summers with her Aunt Kitty and Uncle Jose. Diane said that at first, the Menendezes were very good to her, but that began to change over time. Did he do well? In 1976, yes. And did that change over the period of time that you went to visit them? Very much so.

And did Jose change during that period of time? Or did he stay the same? Pretty much the same only more so. More what? Intense, driven, arrogant. And what about Kitty? Did she stay the same or did she change? She changed very much. And how did she change? In 1976, she became like a mentor to me during that time period. I felt special with her during that time. By 1982, 83 visit, I became, got to the point where I was afraid to come upstairs

from my bedroom because I wasn't sure what was going to happen because it seemed like I could do nothing right. And if you did something wrong, what would Kitty do? She would fly into rages, immense rages. How would she look when she flew into these rages? Her arms would be out. Would you stand up if you can? Yeah, of course she was not pregnant.

Her arms would be out to here. Of course she was upraised, Your Honor, for the record. And her teeth would be like this, and she would be coming at you like that. She would be coming at you? How close would she get? She would approach me at times. I'm sorry. Don't apologize. Is it frightening to you today to think about that? It was, yeah. It was and I recall that when I talk about it. How close would she come to you when she did this?

She could get into my face, and sometimes it would start from a brief distance away, but she would move towards me as her anger was flying towards me also. Is this something that happened once or twice, or is this something that happened more often? Oh, it happened more than once or twice. Three times? It was quite regular. And what's quite regular to you? Is that once a month? Maybe a couple times a week.

And what types of things would trigger these rages? If I hadn't performed up to her expectations or if I'd come home late. Would these fits or rages be in front of the boys? Sometimes. And what types of things would she say to you? She would attack me as a person and let me know on no uncertain terms that if that she was very capable of marching me downstairs and throwing tossing my thing belongings out on the street and not caring that I was related to her. She attacked my character as a human being. You said Jose became more intense and Kitty changed dramatically.

Can you tell me what kinds of changes you saw in Kitty? When I was there in 76, it seemed that Kitty was able to still enjoy herself and be herself, both inside the home and outside the home. I also saw similar characteristics with Jose. By 1982 and 83 visit there was a complete change in who they were inside the home when no one was around and who they would be to others outside the home. Who would they be inside the home? Kitty was quite frustrated and seemed to be immensely trying to keep up with what she considered to be her job, which was organizing the boys' schedules and keeping up with what was given to her from Jose to do each day. And in 76, there were moments when we could talk and relax,

and there wasn't any of that by 82, 83. Just always frustrated and unhappy. Were the rages more frequently in 82 and 83 than they were in 76? Oh, immensely, yeah. So I noticed a few things while I was watching that clip. One, Diane seems still to be very affected by what happened with Kitty and Jose. Even to that day when she was testifying, she was shaking. She was breathing heavily as if fighting off panic attack.

That's why you see a lot of jump cuts. She had to pause a lot. She was like, her voice was wavering. She was like shaking. She had to like stop. She kept apologizing. And I'm not going to say that all came from Jose and Kitty, but she seems to believe that they were contributors to it. She seemed genuinely to still be afraid just from the memory,

the childhood memory. This wasn't even recent things that happened to her. Now, Diane also witnessed the way that Eric and Lyle were treated by their parents. I tried to hug Eric one time, and she told me that I wasn't supposed to hug him, that he needed to grow up, that he was being too much of a baby. Which visit was 82 so he would have been 11 years old yes did you see her hug the kids not that time not not an 82 83 visit did she hug them did she hug eric earlier when we yes she did when putting them to bed and And what about Lyle? Did you see her hug Lyle? Not during the 82-83 visit. There was more animosity between the two.

Did she speak to them gently, using pet names? No, there were no pet names. Was she caring of them in terms of if they got injured? No, they were supposed to be tough. Were they allowed to cry? Was she caring of them in terms of if they got injured? No, they were supposed to be tough. Were they allowed to cry? Crying was considered a weakness. Was that even for you?

I'd say in general, showing emotion in that household was considered a great weakness that you didn't want to display. And what would happen if the boys would cry? They'd either be sent to their room or left alone what was jose like in the home versus in public first what was his behavior like at home he was in non-questionable control of the household and he was uh he had he he would laugh in an arrogantly teasing way, but he'd be humiliating and belittling to the point of being cruel at times. And what about in public? Did he demonstrate any of those behaviors in public? No.

Would there be times during the last visit where Jose would go to Eric's room before dinner? Yes. And meet with before dinner? Yes. And meet with him privately? Yes. And after those meetings, what would Eric be like when he came out? Jose would state that Eric was not feeling well and that he was not able to eat his dinner at that time and that he would eat later. And did you see times where Lyle and Jose would have talks? Yes.

And where would these talks take place? Frequently downstairs. This is during 82, correct? Frequently downstairs in the basement with Lyle on a stool and Jose standing over him. How close would Jose stand to him? He would be right here up against him.

Indicating approximately a foot away? Generally, yes. And could you tell what it was? Were these discipline sessions or were they just talking about things? It was understood that when Jose was speaking to Lyle, or either of the boys, that they were to be left alone, and you didn't intrude. How long would these talks in the basement go on?

An hour or two hours. And is this something that happened just once while you were there? No, it was frequently. And what is frequently? And it was serious. It could be once a week. And that's in the 82, 83 visit you're talking about? Yes.

Did talks like this take place on earlier visits? Yes, but not for quite as long. And starting in, say, 1976 when Lyles ate, are these similar types of talks taking place? Yes. And how long would they last at that age? You said they were shorter. Yeah, they could be shorter in length up to about an hour, but they wouldn't probably go to two hours at that point.

And would he have talks with him in other locations, dinner table, living room? Oh, always at the dinner table. And what was it like at the dinner table? An intellectual drill in a rapid quiz-like fashion. Was this every night? If Jose were home, yes. And who would be being drilled? Generally Lyle, Eric would try to answer, but since Lyle is three years older, Eric

had a hard time keeping up. And when Lyle would be having these talks with his dad, what would he look like physically? His shoulders would, he would be in this type of a position with his dad, what would he look like physically? His shoulders, he would be in this type of a position with his head down and being very serious and looking sad. Shoulders hunched forward? Yes. Head down? Yes. Hands in lap? Yes. So I have a question for you because you obviously saw more of the trial footage. You put this B-roll together and we're only getting clips of it. And these are very extensive. On the surface, physical abuse, just the verbal abuse that's going on. Are we also to assume, are we also to believe that some of these private, and I'm doing air quotes for people who are on audio, but some of these private

encounters with the brothers on their own may have also been sexual in nature and that's why they were not to be disturbed is that a reasonable assumption on my part yes that is that is where they're getting to with this yes right okay because it's like i'm assuming again it's just the whole thing sucks it's just terrible to hear because we've covered a lot of the abuse throughout the throughout the series and we talked about it a lot extensively in the be tough for them to hear. So we, we're sorry about that, but we do think in order for you to make a, an informed decision about how you personally feel about this case, you have to hear these things. And it's not necessarily from Stephanie, who is the, the storyteller here, but from the people who experienced it and more

importantly, unbiased third parties who witnessed it. Because there's also, I read the comments as well, there's also people who say, yeah, the Menendez brothers experienced a lot, but to what extent? Are they exaggerating? Are they flat out lying? You have to remember they're on trial for murder. They would have an incentive to lie and to embellish. But when you hear these stories from other individuals who are not on trial, it gives that much more credibility to what Eric and Lyle have been telling us this entire trial. Yeah. And I mean, like I said, this girl clearly I don't this girl doesn't give off the impression of being like a manipulative liar. No, not at all.

Yeah. No, she's telling you what she remembers. Yeah. And you can tell by the emotion she's displaying that maybe there's even some regret, like I didn't say more or say it sooner, you know, had to get to this point. There's a lot of emotions going through her head. You can tell. And that's kind of where we're going because not only did Diane, you know, witness what

was happening, how Jose and Kitty were towards Lyle and Eric, not only was she kind of on the receiving end of some of that, but she became privy to some information that she received from one of her younger cousins. Ms. Vandermolen, was there an incident in 1976 in which Lyle Menendez asked you to help him? Yes, there was. Where did this take place? In my bedroom downstairs in the basement in Muncie. I'm sorry. In Muncie. What time of day was it?

It was nighttime. And what happened? We had all been down, Lyle and Eric and I had been downstairs, and the boys had been called up to get ready for bed. I stayed and went into my bedroom, and a while later Lyle came down, and he was asking if he could, I thought he was there to say goodnight. And he started asking me if he could sleep down there because Kathy had already gone and there was two single beds. Okay. And what did you tell him? I, initially, I pretty much just brushed him off because I wasn't taking him seriously. And what happened next? He proceeded to indicate to me by touching himself down and saying that his dad and him had been touching each

other down there. And what did he ask you to do? He wanted us to sleep down there. And what did you do? I went and got Kitty and brought her downstairs and told her what was going on. How did Lyle seem at this time? Was this a joke? No, he was very, he was serious. What happened when Kitty came

down? She didn't believe me. Did you tell her? Yes, I told her what I believed to be going on, what Lyle was indicating to me. I don't remember that she said anything to me, just that I knew that she did not believe me. And she took Lyle and brought him back upstairs. When you say she took him, did she physically take him? Yeah, she took him by the arm and brought him back upstairs with her. And did you ever discuss the incident with Lyle anymore? No, it wasn't ever discussed after that. Wow. So we can imagine how that went. Not good. So you have two things there, right? You have Lyle talking about what had happened to him well before he had ever killed his parents, well before he would have

any reason to lie about what was going on. And he's relaying this to an outside party of what's going on with him and his brother. And then you also have some confirmation that Kitty was aware of what was going on. There's no doubt about it. She was aware of what's going on. She was being told by outside parties what was going on, and yet she did nothing. Yeah, there's going to be more support of that. But I want to talk really quick about what, because obviously you said something earlier. You said from the emotion, she clearly maybe feels some regret that she didn't say something sooner.

So Diane would later be asked why she had chosen to speak out for the first time in support of her cousins at that moment. And she said she wanted to defend them against the claims that there had been no sexual abuse in the family. She said, quote, I know for 100 percent there was. Their privacy was everything to them. They were completely different people when nobody was around. Jose and Kitty would turn on the charm when they had people over, which wasn't very often, end quote. Now there's going to be another cousin, Andy Cano, that comes out and also testifies on behalf of Eric and Lyle. And we are going to talk about him right after this next

break. So Andy Cano testified that when he was 12 and Eric was 10, Eric had said something to him about Jose massaging his private area. He did not use that word. I'm not going to use that word because basically, you know what I'm talking about. And Eric was basically trying to find out from Andy, was this normal? Eric also told Andy that the massages were starting to hurt. Now, sadly, Andy passed away in 2003 at the age of 30 from an overdose of sleeping pills. And he felt just absolutely shattered by this because he knew what had happened to them as kids and he knew they didn't deserve it. And he could never get over it. And he turned to drugs and he started like getting involved in crime and his life just took a downward spiral. And then he sadly died. But after he died, his mother was going through his things and she happened upon a letter that Eric had written Andy months before Jose and Kitty Menendez were killed.

I believe it was seven to eight months before. Now, because this letter was not found until 2003, long after Eric and Lyle had been found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, it was not evidence shown at trial. But the letter said, quote, mom isn't doing good. It's like she's here physically, but mentally, she's just gone, if you know what I mean.

She freaks out over nothing. I feel bad for her. I don't know why she puts up with dad's shit. At times, I wish I could talk to her about things, you know, someday. Especially dad and I. But the way she worships him and tells him everything, I'm so afraid she'll tell him whatever I say. I just can't risk it. So now I'm stuck here alone. I've been trying to avoid dad. It's still happening, Andy, and it's worse for me now. I can't explain it. He's so overweight that I just can't stand to see him. I never know when it's going to happen and it's driving me crazy. Every night I stay up

thinking he might come in. I need to put it out of my mind. I know what you said before, but I'm afraid you just don't know dad like I do. He's crazy. He's warned me a hundred times about telling anyone, especially Lyle. Am I a serious wimpus? I don't know. I'll make it through this. I can handle it, Andy. I need to stop thinking about it. End quote.

It's pretty, pretty compelling evidence there. No, I would agree. And I don't want to keep beating a dead horse. This is all before they would ever need to conjure up this defense for the murders that they would eventually carry out. But I don't think we have doubted them from the beginning. After hearing their testimony and the details that were provided, it's hard to make that up. I don't think you and I and a lot of people have doubted them, but there are still people that doubt them. There are, of course. And to think about the fact that these two people were made fun of relentlessly and they kept calling, the prosecution kept calling it the abuse excuse, the abuse excuse, the abuse excuse.

And basically going in and the prosecution said Diane was lying. They were all lying to help Eric and Lyle. Now, had this letter been found and admitted into trial, it may have made a difference. It may have turned the tide. Now, there was also another two cousins, Brian and Catherine. They would sometimes spend, you know, a few weeks or so in the summer with the Menendez family. And they would claim that when they were kids, Jose would take Lyle and Eric to their bedroom, Eric and Lyle's bedroom, and then forbid anyone else from coming down the hall. Brian testified that he could often hear cries and groans coming from the boys' bedroom.

And his Aunt Kitty would then turn the television setup way up to drown out the noises. And she would also stop him from going upstairs to up to drown out the noises. And she would also stop him from going upstairs to investigate what was behind the noises. Both Kathleen and Brian said that Jose took showers with his sons. And Diane Vandermolen said something similar, but she said it was Kitty who would go into the bathroom to help 14-year-old Lyle shower. And these showers would sometimes take upwards of 20 to 30 minutes. Wow. There was also the issue of Eric and Lyle's medical records. So when Eric was seven years

old, he was seen by a doctor for an unexplained injury to the back of his throat. It was actually the posterior pharynx, the uvular and the soft palate. And during the trial, Dr. Kerry English testified that this type of injury is consistent and to be expected when rough oral sex or sex abuse is seen in young children. And that now dentists are actually trained to look for this in young children so that they can detect and report child abuse. That's hard. That's tough. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard. And you had kind of warned us of this, that it was going to really drive home the point that Kitty didn't only only know about it and just choose not to say anything. Or maybe you could argue she was just. In denial or something. If you don't see it, you don't know it. Right. Keep, you know, but she was contributing to the the covering up of what was going on.

She was she was She was enabling it. Enabling it, absolutely. But I mean, she might not have been carrying out the actual- She was freaking Jelaine Maxwell over here. Yeah, she was carrying assault. And let's not forget, it was a few episodes ago. I don't know when you said it, but there were also allegations that she was sexually assaulting them as well, in addition to this.

These are just things that we're seeing from third parties. The only people who would know about those stories would be Eric and Lyle, but just from other people, I'm turning up the TV or the radio real loud. That's sickening. Absolutely sickening. Taking showers with her 14-year-old son? Well, taking showers with him, but it sounded like she was taking showers with him to cover up what he had just endured, what he had just experienced. That's what I was. Am I wrong in that interpretation? Yeah. I thought she was taking him into the shower after Jose was done sexually assaulting him. No, no, no. So Brian and Catherine said Jose would take showers with both of his sons. And Diane Vandermullen said, Kitty also took showers,

but just with Lyle. And she was still doing this when he was 14 and the showers would take 20 to 30 minutes. Okay. Still horrible. Not right. But I was under the impression when you were saying it was after, I thought it was chronological where they would hear the radio or TV would go up and then Lyle would come out and then go into the shower with Kitty. No, because remember, according to Lyle, by the time he's 14, the sexual abuse at the hands of his father is no longer happening. No, it's only happening to Eric. Jose's moved on to Eric, but Kitty is still trying to get to Lyle. And we did talk about that a few episodes ago where he said she made him sleep with him until he was 13, 14 years old. And we'd get mad at him when he was like, I don't want

to do this. And then she would touch him and things. So yeah. Yeah. Bad. This is why it's tough to cover it. Yes, we want to cover it so you have the full picture so that when we give you our opinions and you come up with your own, It's not based on partial information. And sometimes what we cover here, everything we cover here is hard, but sometimes it's even more difficult. And these are one of those times. Yes. But now we're going to talk about the medical records of Eric and Lyle and how they indicated that certain symptoms that these boys suffered from over the years would often be seen in children who are victims of sexual abuse. Things like teeth grinding, frequent headaches, stomach issues, unexplained abdominal pain, speech issues, and excessive hair loss.

Which might explain why Lyle needed a hairpiece at such a young age. The defense also introduced several expert witnesses like Dr. Ann Burgess, a professor of psychiatric mental health at the University of Pennsylvania. Burgess interviewed Eric Menendez for roughly 50 hours, and she testified that he said this, he did this because he was hoping that it would make the sexual acts more palatable for him, for Eric. And Burgess said that Eric had given labels for different types of sex. He referred to oral sex as knees. She said that child abuse victims typically use their own special language. Also, Eric told Dr. Burgess that he was suffering

from recurring nightmares, nightmares that would include a cow, a horse, and a green face. The green face would get larger as he would get smaller, and then that face would eventually turn into the face of Jose Menendez and chase Eric into the darkness. Burgess testified that recurring nightmares are a sign of traumatizing abuse, and the LA Times printed, quote, retracing the testimony that both brothers offered that they were in increasing fear for their lives after Lyle Menendez threatened August 17th, 1989, to expose the father as a child molester. Burgess said the fear seems genuine. It is very common, she said, for abused children to feel precisely the way Eric Menendez said he

felt just before killing his parents, without any adult to trust, with no place to go, and seemingly out of options, a combination that produces intense fear. When on the night of the killings, the parents and sons got into an argument in the mansion foyer and the parents closed the door to the TV room, Eric Menendez viewed that action as a sign of imminent danger. Imminent danger. That's what the defense is going to try to prove. An outsider might not view the closing of the door that way, she said, but Eric Menendez was hypervigilant after years of abuse. His brain biologically altered to be attuned to cues the outsider would ignore, she said. From then on and until the parents were killed, Burgess said Eric Menendez was reacting in fear to the fight-or-flight signals in his brain. When he grabbed his shotgun, went outside and loaded, dashed back inside and fired, all of it was done automatically, without conscious thought." There are three phases. The first is what's called, as the person reacts,

is the preparatory phase. And this is where the body is alerted that there is some danger. Maybe you hear that truck coming down the street. And so what starts to activate are the brain hormones, the stress hormones, that are now going to prepare the individual for the second phase, which is where the body now must make a decision as to whether it is going to uh... fight or flee in other words you're going to jump back uh... out of the street as that truck comes or are you going to run across the street to try to get out of its way what are the hormones that the brain releases

there are actually two and it's what's called a kind of biphasic in other words two phases it's the noradrenogenic system gets activated and it has what's called it inhibits and it activates so this is the the two phases that is now which speaks to the fight flight phenomenon so that you have both of these stress hormones going and it shows itself also in one's body because it is preparing the body to fight so that the muscles get taught the heart beats is this what releases adrenaline absolutely yes that's one of the stress hormones okay so one of the stress hormones releases adrenaline or activates the adrenal system to release adrenaline? Right and

it gets activated in the brain even though people feel it in the rest of their body, the brain is the primary place where it gets activated and then because these neurons are telling the rest of the body what to do, how to prepare itself to do something. Okay and people usually report that there are certain physiological symptoms of terror, if you will. Yes, they do. Rapid heartbeat, for example. That's because of adrenaline.

That's one of the things that the stress hormones release. Yes, it's getting more blood, if you will, to the body so that it will be prepared. Okay, adrenaline stimulates the heart to beat. Yes. The beating creates more blood. That's right. Okay. People also talk about a tingling sensation, breathing sensations. Are these things sometimes sweat breaking out on the brow? Yes.

Clamminess? Are these physiological reactions all caused by the release of these stress hormones from the center of the brain? Yes, and it's all automatic. It's not under anybody's control. This just happens automatically. First phase is the alarm bells are going off. Yes. And all this stuff is flowing.

Yes. Okay. The second phase now is when the body needs to take action of some kind. That's correct. In talking about, and this has been called the fight-flight stage, correct? That's correct. Now, what is going on then biologically in this second stage when I'm being faced by this attack?

Well, that's essentially when all of the hormones are spreading to tell the body to pick one of two of these decisions of what you're going to do, make a decision. If the body's with all these alarm bells going on, is the decision to fight or flight a decision that's made in the cognitive part? Or is this a decision that's being made from this automatic everything's flowing part? Well, it generally is automatic, because people,

again to use the other analogy, are going to jump back if they see a truck coming. They're not going to think. They're not even going to think, right. They're just going to, because it's instinctual. The fear response is present in the body to protect the person from danger. So survival becomes the main goal, if you will, of why this whole system gets activated. And these reactions, this fight-flight reaction, is instantaneous and automatic?

Yes. In this particular phase when the action, when the body is sprung into action either jumping back or running forward, is there another set of hormones that get released triggered from the limbic system? Yes, then there's the third phase. Okay. And this is what's called the blunting phase. And now the hormones change to kind of blunt pains. Take, for example, a physical trauma. In other words, people can not even realize that they've had an injury and they see the next day that their arm is black and blue.

And they might even say, how did I get that? Then they will have to think back to how they got it because the blunting, if you will, the opiate system is activated to protect the person from the pain. Now, the body releases opiate-type hormones that act upon neurons in such a way, nerve endings, that you don't feel pain. That's right. Now, is that the same thing that happens, say, if you're confronted and you're stabbed and you don't feel the wound for a while? Yes. In fact, trauma victims coming into an emergency room very often will describe that quite vividly.

Now, in this blunting phase when the opiate system is activated, are there physical symptoms of this as well? Yes. And what are the physical symptoms of this? What happens here is if the danger finally passes, then the body now is in almost an exhausted phase. And if there has been too much stimulation and activation of all of this, I mean, you can ultimately get death from such extended trauma. But essentially, in situations we've just been talking about, the person would feel kind of exhausted. There's a crisis and all the body reacts and then they

would just feel a lot of exhaustion. And that's the way the body is going to rejuvenate itself, get itself back, if you will, reset itself. The brain's got to reset itself. Okay. Now, with respect to those things that set off the alarms to begin with, the fear response, okay, is there a terminology for what those things are that set off a fear response? Well, extreme danger. Okay. Are there cues that set off a fear response? Yeah, anything in the environment that the person feels is a threat is going to set that off. Now, your research was not this fundamental research into how the limbic system works, because that's been a given in medical biological circles for a long time, correct?

That's correct. Your research and other more recent research has to do with what? With tying this to what? Well, applying this to the symptoms that we see in traumatized populations so that we can better assist and help someone who has had a traumatizing experience. Okay. Now, has it been understood and known in psychological research for some time that people who have been traumatized, who have experienced overwhelming fear over the course of their life, tend to react differently to new threats of fear than people who have not been traumatized by fear? Yes. And what is the difference that has been studied from watching and knowing about the behaviors of people?

Okay. What happens when there's been overwhelming fear and it's been repeated very often is that in the brain there is what's called a genetic recoding. And so the fear level now for that person is going to be at a different level than for someone who has not experienced whatever that fear was. Before we get to that, let's just talk about a behavioral stand. Before we get to what the brain is doing, okay, the recent research shows that there's actually been genetic changes in the brains of overwhelmingly traumatized people. Yes. So their brain system will operate automatically in response to new fear cues at a much quicker

level than people who have never been subjected to overwhelming fear. Yes. Is that what you're saying? Yes. But before we get to this new research on genetic recoding, was there observable in the behavior of people who had been traumatized, overwhelmed by fear, that they were having fear reactions. Oh, yes.

Okay. They were having fear reaction based on much lower levels of stimulus than my truck coming down the street. Yes. Okay. So a horn could honk and they'd freak out. That's right. Yes.

Okay. So that was very extensive, but it basically just describes the fact that this doctor, Dr. Ann Burgess, believes that Eric and Lyle had PTSD, specifically Eric, because she is the expert that his lawyer hired to speak to him. He had PTSD. He wasn't thinking about what he's doing. He reacted in a fear response. He took the gun. He went in and shot his parents. It was automatic. There wasn't a ton of thought going into it. And it was all because he lives in this hypervigilant state where the smallest thing, he's always looking for it to be on alert, to know when there's danger around. And there is scientific evidence to prove this, et cetera, et cetera. Very kind of dense sort of stuff. I love

it, but I know not everybody does, but it is very important. And even in 1990, 1992, 1993, when these trials are going on, this was not as well understood as it is today. The things that Dr. Ann Burgess is saying are widely accepted, understood, even by a layman now, but back then, not so much. So she's trying to be extensive and explain this to a jury so that they understand the medicating circumstances. So I know you probably want to weigh in and I want to hear what you have to say about it because there's a lot that she said. Let's take a quick break and we'll we're back. And I found that very interesting, that entire conversation. And it does for the most part make sense to me. I think the issue here is going to be convincing a jury of it because they're not experts in that field. And like you said, it was still relatively new. But

I still think even today, applying this methodology that was just laid out, I still think that it's hard for people to, everyone's heard, most people have heard the phrase fight or flight at this point, right? I think most people, including myself, believe that fight or flight response happens at a moment's notice. So for example, you're in a situation where there's a hammer next to you, somebody's on top of you, and they're choking you. And in that moment, you're in fear of your life and you grab the hammer and you whack them in the head, you kill them or whatever. And that's your fight or flight

response. Another example of that could be someone breaks into your home and you don't have an opportunity to retreat because they got you in a corner. And then you react and you start attacking and you fight back. I do think in this situation, and I think the defense attorney and this expert is doing a great job of explaining it, is they're basically saying, yeah, that's what happened here. But even though he went outside, even though he loaded up his shotgun, even though they went back outside and reloaded the shotgun, This was all in that fight or flight response where all these chemicals are going off in your brain. And basically he had no clue what he was doing. It was just this instinctual thing where that entire thing that went down, he wasn't really in control of his actions. And I think

that's a hard thing for most people to buy. If you had a situation where the narrative was slightly different, where Lyle and Eric are in the room with Jose and they had the gun in the room somewhere and Jose gets on top of them or does something that makes them, you know, they're fearful of their life and that they're going to be killed in that moment. They grab the shotgun that's nearby and they kill him. I think most people will go, yeah, I agree. Self-defense. That's what it was. It was a fight or flight response. I feel like the duration in which

this happened is what the holdup is for a lot of people. And I'm not spoiling anything because we know what the judge felt on this one. We know what the jury felt on this one. So that's where I think they went on it. But I do want to weigh in more on that when we get to the final thoughts, because as far as my opinions on where we are today and what should happen and how I got there, this will also be part of that. Yeah, I think it's more of a fight or flight and it's developed since. Now there's four different kind of categories of that. There's fight, flight, you know it's developed sense now there's four different kind of

categories of that there's fight flight freeze fawn and there's all sorts of different reactions that you can have to prolonged and extended trauma so what she's explaining is more of a cptsd sort of situation where your body is in your your brain's in a constant state of hypervigilance your bodies and your nervous system is just shot. The stimuli that you're getting from the outside world is not the same as a person who hasn't experienced what you've experienced would get from the outside world. You're perceiving things differently. As they had said before, the act of closing the door to the TV room to a normal person would not have been alarming, but to Eric and Lyle, it was. It signified something to them

because of their hypervigilance, because of what they'd experienced. So she's kind of going through that. And I don't disagree with you, okay? We're going to talk about our final thoughts, but I don't necessarily disagree with you there. Now, however, Dr. Burgess also testified that in her opinion, the crime scene was disorganized. And she did not believe, based on the disorganization of the crime scene, that the murders had been premeditated. She said, typically, murders that are planned out, thought out, are a little bit more organized, less messy, less chaotic than what she saw at the Menendez home. Stuart Hall, a psychology professor from Indiana University, interviewed Lyle Menendez for 60 hours and determined the same thing as Dr. Burgess, that the abuse had created and fed a fear

that ultimately led Eric and Lyle into taking their parents' lives. Another professor, John Conti from the University of Washington, testified that the abuse had probably gone on for Lyle longer than he could even remember, and he had blocked it out, which is why he thought the abuse had ended when he was much younger. Now, we know that the first trial left both juries deadlocked, unable to make a decision, resulting in a mistrial. The defense had tried to call 90 witnesses, but the judge had made them edit that list down to 50. They'd wanted to prove that the brothers had felt they were in imminent danger, but they would have needed to prove that Eric and Lyle had been in fear for their lives in the very moment they decided to take the lives of their parents. The defense built a strong case for this,

relying on what's called an imperfect self-defense law. And this argued that Eric and Lyle had an honest, yet unreasonable belief their lives were in danger. It's a little bit of a slippery slope in a gray area with this imperfect self-defense law, because what it's saying is it's like any other person would not understand why you felt your life was in danger at that moment. Only Eric and Lyle can understand that. And they honestly did believe that. But like, you can't see the logic and you don't understand why. But they do because they say they do.

So that's what happened. Yeah, that's the problem here, right? I think when it comes to a jury, it has to be what a reasonable person would believe or reasonable doubt to find them not guilty. And so if nobody else can empathize or sympathize with what they experienced, it's going to be hard for them to see this argument that they're making as far as this self-defense, this fight or flight response as a reasonable doubt. It's very much subjective because then anybody could say,

oh, I know you don't understand why I had to defend my life or why I felt I had to defend my life, but I do. And isn't that enough? I mean, it's not so black and white and cut and dry as that, but yeah, pretty much. And it was actually effective because it convinced some jury members to vote for manslaughter instead of murder. And apparently the defense did enough to cast a reasonable doubt because we know both juries were unable to reach a unanimous decision. On February 28th, Judge Stanley Weisberg set the date for the second trial to be June 12th, 1995, but there were several postponements and the trial didn't end up beginning until August of that year.

Now, this time, Eric and Lyle would be tried together in front of a single jury. By that time, the brothers were completely out of money because the estate of their parents had only been sufficient enough to pay for their legal fees for the first trial. What nobody really understood is that Jose and Kitty had a ton of properties and a ton more debt than anybody really anticipated. There was a ton of properties and a ton more debt than anybody really anticipated. There was a ton of mortgages out. And when somebody dies, those mortgages have to get paid off and they get paid off from the estate. So by the time the legal fees and all those mortgages and all of the debt had been paid off, the $12 million inheritance had been significantly whittled down. Now, Leslie Abramson continued to defend Eric,

although she was paid by the state of California, and Lyle got a public defender, Charles Geisler. This time, Dr. Ozeal was not called in to testify since he had not been the most reliable or likable witness on the stand during the first trial, but someone who had been considered a likable witness during the first trial would also not be taking the stand in the second one.

Lyle Menendez had been looked at sympathetically when he had testified about the abuse at the hands of his father. But between the two trials, the prosecution had gathered evidence that, I don't know any other way to say this, but it made Lyle look really bad. There were tape-recorded conversations between Lyle and a friend where Lyle bragged about how he had snowed the jury at the first trial when he was testifying. And there was also a letter Lyle had written to a girlfriend where he was giving her directions on how to testify and what to say during that trial. On February 16, 1996, Judge Weisberg gave a ruling that he did not believe there was enough evidence to mount an imminent danger defense. This meant that the imperfect self-defense law, which had been the cornerstone of the defense's case in the first trial, it was not going to be applicable in this one. After the second trial, the jury deliberated for four days and came back on March 20th,

finding the brothers guilty of two counts each of first-degree murder as well as conspiracy to commit murder with special circumstances, and those special circumstances meant that there would only be two sentencing options available, the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole. The defense took a hit when halfway through the penalty phase of the trial, a psychiatrist who had treated Eric after his parents were killed, admitted that he had edited his notes to omit incriminating statements made by his patients, and he had done this at the behest of Eric's lawyer, Leslie Abramson. There was a bunch of drama with this.

They had to do an investigation into her. Ultimately, nothing ended up happening to her. She was asked to testify. She pleaded the fifth a bunch of times. And, yeah, she was allowed to continue practicing law. But that's not that's not good. I mean, I told you she was she was going to defend them. OK, she was going to do what she had to do. She's going to do it. She did it. Ouch. Well, then obviously the sentencing portion of the trial goes through. And then on April 17th, the jury handed down a sentence of life in prison for both brothers.

Now, initially, Eric and Lyle were both being held in North Kern State Prison, but a decision was made to separate the brothers and place them in two different prisons. And this was actually sad because Eric and Lyle just recently reunited. They recently just saw each other for the first time in, I think, 20 years. They were separated for decades. And Leslie Abramson was kind of like, this is messed up. Why are you doing this? There's no reason to do this. And the prosecution was like, well, we think there is because if they're not together, at least they won't hurt anybody else. And it's like, dude, what are you talking about? They're in freaking prison. It was petty. It was to punish them. It was to hurt them. And honestly, I want to swear right now, and I'm not going to, but that's messed up. Okay? That's messed up. They had already lost everything. They were in prison.

The least you could do is let them be in the same prison so they have some sort of support system and they're able to better cope with what's happening. But they were separated for, I think, 20 years. Now, there would be appeals, of course. The brothers did appeal multiple times, but nothing ever came from these appeals until recently. But now, new allegations in a documentary, Menendez and Menudo, Boys Betrayed, where a former member of the 80s Latin boy band Menudo claims Eric and Lyle's father, Jose Menendez, raped him when he was 13 or 14 years old. If the testimony of this new alleged victim who's come forth with these sexual assault allegations, if that's allowed into trial, that is absolutely going to bolster and strengthen

the defense of the Menendez brothers. Prosecutors emphatically rejected their claims of abuse, arguing that their father, a prominent record executive, was not the kind of man who would be abusing his sons, telling the jury their cousin, who corroborated their claims, was lying in no uncertain terms. But on Wednesday, attorneys for the Menendez brothers filed a writ of habeas corpus in a Los Angeles court, saying that this new evidence by the Menudo band member, along with a resurfaced letter written by Eric Menendez to his cousin, eight months before the murders backs up their claims of abuse. The state based their case on the idea that this abuse was not happening, therefore there was no justification. In the filing, attorney Mark Garagas asks the court to either vacate the brothers' conviction and life sentences or grant a new trial. The letter gives the brothers one of their best chances for ever being released that I've seen. And we're very hopeful. So Roy Rossello, former Minuto band member, has made these claims after Eric and Lyle have spent decades in prison. But the brothers feel that the information came better late than never, with Lyle stating,

quote, I always hoped and believed that one day the truth about my dad would come out, but I never wished for it to come out like this. The result of trauma that another child has suffered. We'd heard rumors that something might've happened with Menudo through the years. You know, that would have made a difference at trial. End quote. Well, there we are. Just another piece of information that confirms what we've already established, which Jose's a monster. And I don't think I'm going out on a limb here to say nobody is crying about Jose no longer being with us.

I found out a bunch of stuff too. There was like a madam who came forward and said that Jose was a regular customer of hers. And he would always request like the youngest girls who kind of had like, you know, had kind of like an androgynous look and they were young and a bunch of stuff came out. It was it did not make Jose look good at all. Yeah. And I didn't need this Menudo story to I don't think you did either to feel that way. This is just at this point, just adding insult to injury. We already know, in my opinion, who Jose Menendez was and also how Kitty contributed to his behavior as well. And it's not good. It's not good. And like I said, you hate to say it, but there's certain groups of people

where it's very easy to get over the fact that they've been killed or are no longer with us. And that's the type of people that I'm referring to when I feel that way. Some people may not agree with us, but you and I both said it publicly. That's just how we feel. And I think most parents agree with that sentiment. Whether it's right or wrong, that's a different conversation, but you feel how you feel. Fascinating stuff. This was a crazy case, a lot of peaks and valleys, a lot of strong opinions on the series. And we know this, whenever we cover a series that has been talked about and has been in the media, and there's a big group of individuals who have followed this case from the beginning, there's going to be strong opinions on it because there's absolutely people out there who know more about this case than us that have been covering it since day one. So we always open ourselves up to that. And we've said this before, we always open ourselves up to that criticism when we're doing a case like this and we're aware of it. We never claim to know every single fact about it. We are trying to keep these series as concise

as possible, even though they're two hours and this one's seven series. So 14 hours of edited footage that you see, not even everything we record, not including all the research that's done. So it's a lot, but I think we've covered the gamut of it. I think we've established a lot, although we've probably missed some things. I don't think any of the things we didn't mention would change opinions other than more evidence of abuse, which I think we covered a lot of it again tonight. I'd like to give my final thoughts and usually I go first, but why don't you go first tonight? Change it up a little bit. So, I mean, my final thoughts are pretty much very basic. In the eyes of the law, I don't think self-defense applies here because to me, this was more

retribution than self-defense. I know that there's, and this is just my opinion, and I'm not in either of these people's shoes or brains, and I cannot tell you how they're feeling in that moment. And they very well could have felt like in that moment, based on what had happened to them. Luckily, unfortunately, some stuff has happened in my life, but what happened to Eric and Lyle did not happen to me. So I cannot say what I would have done or how I would have felt in that moment. I find it a little difficult to believe that at that exact second, they were like, oh, if we don't just completely cover them with bullets, they're going to kill us. I don't think that was their only out.

They could have just gotten in a car and driven away. And yeah, they're going to say, oh, we thought our father would find us. He was this looming figure. He was terrifying, etc. He was crazy. But still, something else could have happened. Is that the only thing they thought they could do? I don't think so. I think they were angry, rightfully so. I think they were sick of being controlled. I think they were coming into their own. They were

becoming men and they were like, okay, enough. We thought that this would end when we were older. We thought we would be given some leeway. We thought we could have our own lives and we don't. And we're pissed and we're sick of it. We're fed up. We're done. And they killed them. So in my opinion, it was more retribution and payback. And they just snapped because they were just done with it. Not so much self-defense. However, in my opinion as well, they've served their time. They've served more than enough of their time. And as far as I'm concerned, Eric and Lyle have been prisoners their entire life. And I would like to see them at least experience some portion of their time. And as far as I'm concerned, Eric and Lyle have been prisoners their entire life, and I would like to see them at least experience some portion of their life free. That's it. That's

my final thoughts. Let's see. And we have not discussed this prior. So I don't know if I'm going to surprise you or not, but we're going to go for it. So a couple of the obvious things, and I'm going to be looking down at my notes instead of looking at you guys on camera. So I apologize for that. I have a lot of notes. I'm going to be looking down at my notes instead of looking at you guys on camera. So I apologize for that. I have a lot of notes. I'm going to try to hit them quickly, but also make sure I don't miss anything. So first off, obvious, was Jose and Kitty scumbags? Absolutely.

Yes. Sorry. That's the case. Absolute scumbags. Absolute monsters. I do not care. I couldn't care less that they're no longer here. See you later. I've heard enough to know that what was being told for the most part is true.

Do I think that Eric and Lyle were horrifically abused habitually over the years? Absolutely. In my opinion, there's no dispute. I don't need this minuto revelation to prove to me that Jose was a scumbag and that he was not only doing this to other people that we may not even know about yet, but most importantly, Eric and Lyle, probably the most out of anyone because he could get away with it in the comfort of his own home with his wife enabling it. So I don't need anything else to know that about what Eric and Lyle had endured. And do I think that the trauma that came from that sexual and physical abuse and verbal abuse over those years created a fear for their parents that could have contributed

to them deciding to kill their parents? I absolutely do. So that brings up the main questions that I came into this series with. And the first one being knowing the facts and circumstances of this case, was this premeditated or self-defense, right? Because it's two different things. We're talking about first degree murder, or we're talking about maybe second degree murder or manslaughter. I would say maybe second degree where it happens in a moment. There's no premeditation, but they kill them anyways because they felt like they

could be killed at any second. I don't know if manslaughter would go there. That's usually by accident when that happens. They intended on killing their parents. There's no doubt about it. So maybe second degree, maybe second degree. But you did say there were people who thought manslaughter, that voted manslaughter, right? Some jury members, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, listen, and they heard a lot more than me. So with that being said, and you kind of hit on some of it, I think there was a lot of

things, but the real nail in the coffin for me were a few things. They admitted that they had discussed, Eric and Lyle had discussed killing their parents prior to doing so. They had talked about the idea of killing them. It wasn't like they never had a discussion about this and it just happened. What I really, for me as an investigator, which was really the big nail in the coffin was the purchasing of the firearms under fictitious names. In my own professional experience, people normally do that when the plan is to use those firearms to commit a crime. Most people who are buying guns, sometimes they may use them in a crime after the fact, but when they initially purchase them, they purchase them for the right reasons and then

something may change and then they may use them in a crime. But to go in there, to go out of your way to purchase them an hour away and to use fake names, I don't see how you get around the fact that they had to know that there was a chance that these guns were going to be used in a crime that they did not want linked back to them. To me, that is a huge indicator of premeditation. They preplanned it, right? That's exactly self-explanatory. The next thing is how it actually went down. And you hit on this. I feel the parents were shot without provocation. I don't believe that the parents were doing anything at that moment that caused the brothers to shoot them. I get the fight or flight thing, and you kind of hit on it, self-defense. To me, this was not self-defense because just as easily,

right? Self-defense to me is when there's no opportunity for you to retreat. Or if it's a stand your ground state where you're in a situation where you don't have the opportunity or the time to retreat, they're in this mansion. The parents go into a room and close their doors. Doesn't matter what they're doing in there. They could be creating a nuclear bomb. The brothers could have easily gone outside. They did go outside to the car to get the guns.

But they could have easily gone outside, got into their car. Driven away. And drove away. Yeah. Or drove to the police. They had an opportunity to retreat. Now some will come back and say, yeah, but look what the experts said. Or even Derek, go out, get the guns, stand there, hold the guns. Hold your ground. Wait for them to come out and try to do something to you, then shoot. them and it was all while still in this fight or flight mode. I'm not an expert. I'm not claiming

to be, but I feel like most people on a jury would agree with me. And I, and clearly they did. I was even thinking like, cause remember Eric and Lyle said they bought the guns for protection. Okay. So let's say Eric's in his bedroom and he's got the gun and he's waiting up and then Jose comes in to try to do what he does. and then Eric shoots him. Would that have been different? That would have been a bigger self-defense claim than what happened. Yeah, absolutely. So if you were afraid and it was happening all the time, why didn't you just wait till it happened so that you knew legally you were at least covered?

Right. I mean, they may say, hey, listen, I didn't want to wait until he could have gotten me because then it might have been too late. Yeah, yeah. We're talking about the facts here. And the final fact that I have regarding premeditation versus self-defense is after the fact. If this was self-defense all along, I know it's hard to do this, but you come out and you say it was self-defense from the beginning. There is a thing called consciousness of guilt. And we know without going over the whole series, there was multiple attempts to redirect, to mislead law enforcement and to make everyone else believe this was something other than a self-defense claim.

There was a mafia hit. There was this maybe a robbery gone wrong. There was all these different things that they were creating to try to spread a narrative that wasn't true. If you knew what you did, you had to do, and there was no other choice. You come out and say it. And I do think if they had done that, and you didn't have these recordings of them acting and crying, like they just walked into this horrific scene, maybe the jury would have found it more believable. Hey, listen, we're here telling you guys day one, we killed them because we had no other choice. They were going to kill us. That's not what happened. They're only on trial because they got caught. They got caught in their own lies. Well, if they shot their parents

and then called the police and said, we shot our parents and this is why, they still might have gone on trial, but it would have looked better for them. I think it would have looked better. So that brings us to motive. And I know I talked a lot about money throughout this series.

And do I think money was a consideration for them maybe after the fact? Hey, listen, these monsters ruined our childhood. Yes, we killed them, but we deserve something out of this. We don't deserve to be left without anything. They haven't done anything good for us our entire lives. They can at least do this. So in my opinion, I don't think that they went into that room to kill their parents because they wanted their money. But maybe after the fact, human nature, right? Listen, we need to survive. We have no one now. This money's got to go somewhere. If anything, the insurance companies, and they're just going to take it from us. The cops are going to seize it.

Nobody's going to get it. We are entitled to that money. So I leave this series as far as the money concerns saying, yeah, they had some things in the past, but do I think that the Menendez brothers killed their parents because they wanted their money? No, I do not. I agree. And I think that's big actually. So that leaves us with the sentencing because that's where we are. And I think it was either episode two or episode three where we talked about California penal code and what options were available to the judge in this situation. Because they are limited. They have guidelines that they have to follow. So I told you guys I was going to look it up and I wanted to make sure that I got it right as we're going through this. So here's what we have, because as we know, they were convicted of first degree murder.

That's just what it was. That's what we're left with. So what are the options available to the judge at that time? And as Stephanie mentioned earlier, there was really only two options. It was the death penalty or it was life without parole. The judge had no discretion, even based on everything that Eric and Lyle had endured. Even if he believed everything they said, he can't just come out and say, you know what? I'm going to just pick something else.

He can't do it. So really at this point, the only option the Menendez brothers have is another possible trial. That's their only hope. However, how do I personally feel? This may surprise some of you, but I also think that they should no longer be in prison. I do not think that they're a danger to society. I do not think that if not for the circumstances leading up to the homicides that we would be in this situation. I do not believe that they killed their parents for money reasons. I don't believe that was the driving motivation. So if prison is about reform and about rehabilitation, I feel confident in

saying that these two young men at the time would not have killed their parents if they hadn't gone through what they went through. Nobody else has done that to them since. And therefore, I do not think that they would be a danger to society. And I think there are people who are much more dangerous to our community that are out as free people because of the way the laws are written. So if they're out, I do believe the Menendez brothers should be out as well. I do believe that if you do the crime, you do the time. I do believe that two wrongs don't make a right. I'm not one of those individuals who think they should have walked away

scot-free from the beginning. I know some people believe that as well, but I do believe they've done more than enough time for what they've for what they've done and they've paid for it. And I think, as you said, Stephanie, it's, this would be an opportunity for them to go on with their lives with this behind them and, and, and somehow put their life back together. Cause they've, God knows they've, they got a lot of things to go over and maybe even to this point still need to go and seek professional help for the things they experience as children. I'm sure they do. So that may surprise some people. I don't think everyone thought I was going to go that way, but that's truly how I feel based on everything I've

heard. Yeah. I think that's a good point. If prison's about rehabilitation, I think that they would be rehabilitated. I think they would qualify. Yeah. And if their parents had been loving and good parents and created a healthy bond with their sons, this would never have happened. It wouldn't have. It doesn't mean that they shouldn't have paid for what they did. Because what you're saying is true, but it can also be true that they deserve to go to prison for their crime. And I think that's the disconnect with some of our listeners and viewers. They feel like, hey, if they weren't molested and they weren't abused, they wouldn't have killed. That's true. But it's also true that they committed a double homicide. And so you just can't, they can't just say, well, because it

was bad people. You got to do something for that. You can walk away scot-free. We can't have a world like that because then we open up a whole nother set of problems where people are out there saying, yeah, I killed these people, but they did something to me first. So I should be okay, right? So that's where I stand. And I think it was a great series. We talked about a lot of different issues. It was tough to disclose some of those things. I thought you did a great job with it, Stephanie. And on to the next one, on to the next one. Do we want to disclose what the next one will be, or are we just going to go with it? No, I want to, I want to make it a surprise, but I am interested to hear what everybody has to say in the comment section about what you think overall about the Menendez

brothers and should they get out? Have they done their time or what? Absolutely. Overall. About the Menendez brothers and should they get out? Have they done their time or what? Absolutely. Well, listen, we appreciate you guys being here. This was a long series. We know it's a lot of information to digest. If you enjoyed the series,

if you enjoy what we're doing here, please like the video, comment down below, let us know your thoughts. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to the channel. And if you're listening on audio and you haven't already, leave a review. We would greatly appreciate it. That's going to do it for us, guys. Everyone stay safe out there. We will see you next week. Bye.