Dateline NBC - The Menendez brothers' chance at freedom. Questions for top investigator at Karen Read retrial. Plus, what's RICO?

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

The Menendez brothers have been resentenced and are now eligible for parole. Will they go free? A supervisor in the Karen Read case is on the stand for a marathon three days of testimony.  Plus, updates in the cases of Donna Adelson, Lori Vallow Daybell, and Harvey Weinstein. Find out more about the cases covered each week here:www.datelinetruecrimeweekly.com

Already, I think we can get started. It's time for Dateline's morning meeting. So it's Tony, he works at the waterfront. Our team is swapping tips about the latest crime news. The case ends up going cold for about two decades. They're tired after three weeks and they don't want to come back here on Monday to deliberate. Isn't Yuri one of the guys Proctor was texting with? Welcome to Dateline True Crime Weekly.

I'm Andrea Canning. It's May 15th and here's what's on our docket. In Detum, Massachusetts, the state police sergeant who oversaw the investigation into the Karen Reed case faces tough questions at her retrial. So Sergeant Buchanek, you don't want to answer my question, correct? I will answer your question, absolutely. The investigation was conducted with honor and integrity. In Dateline Roundup, updates in the case of Donna Adelson,

the Florida grandmother accused of masterminding a hit on her former son-in-law, blistering testimony in the Harvey Weinstein retrial, and the latest motion filed by Lori Valo-Daybell ahead of her third trial. She was just claiming that her constitutional right to a speedy trial had been violated. Plus, racketeering 101.

It's one of the counts Sean Combs is facing in federal court. But what does RICO actually mean? NBC News legal analyst Danny Savalos will be here with an explainer. Instead of just charging with a federal-based sex crime, the key to the RICO allegations is that there's an organization involved. But before all that, it was one of the biggest true crime stories of the past three decades, the murders of Kitty and Jose Menendez by their own sons.

On Tuesday night, the brothers got a shot at redemption. Lyle and Eric Menendez are in their 50s now. They were just 18 and 21 years old when they gunned down their parents in their Beverly Hills home. Prosecutors at their trial said the killings were premeditated and motivated by financial gain. The brothers said that they had acted in self-defense to put a stop to their father's sexual abuse. After their first trial ended with a hung jury, they were convicted in a second trial in 1996 and sentenced to life in prison without parole. And that's where they might have stayed. But on Tuesday afternoon in a Los Angeles courtroom, Judge Michael Jessack ruled the brothers were

changed men and re-sentenced them to 50 years to life, which meant a chance at parole and a chance at freedom. Here to tell us more about the brothers' journey and what might happen next is NBC News senior legal correspondent Laura Jarrett. Hey, Laura. Hi. Great to be back with you. Great to have you.

We've seen so much on TV lately with the Netflix documentary everyone was talking about and Keith, of course, had his special for Dateline. Lots of people very interested in the Menendez brothers again. They are. And I think part of what's so fascinating about this case is that it obviously gripped everyone in the early 90s because it was really the first time a trial that

had been so sensationalized was televised, right? And then it goes dormant for the better part of 30 years. And then there's sort of this resurgence because of a Netflix series, a Peacock documentary, a Max documentary, if I'm not mistaken too. And so there's like this flurry of activity. And then the DA at the time decides, oh, I think I should support the resentencing.

That was a huge moment. New DA comes to town, pulls that support, which was another big moment, and it's sort of all is culminating now in this new path for freedom for them. You know, it's been put out there right into the universe, all this new retelling of this story, but it's people's attitudes, right, toward some of the content that has changed since, you know, all those years ago. Yeah, because their claim fundamentally was not that they didn't do it, right? Everyone sort of quickly figured out that they did it, and so they had to come clean

about that. But that part of the explanation was that they endured, they say, years and years of violent, awful sexual abuse at the hands of Jose Menendez, their father. And they had a habeas petition, which as you know is trying to get a new trial based on the idea that they went through all of this abuse and so they should be less culpable. Not that they didn't do it, but that they should be less culpable. And I think as a society, people have come around more to, you know, understanding feelings people have of, you know, being sexually assaulted, which is their claim. And the shame associated with it and sort of the campaign of silence around childhood

sexual abuse, I think for boys in particular, has changed dramatically over the past 35 years. The other thing that has changed is attitudes towards crime and punishment. And in California, a new law means that inmates of a certain age, you know, if they have a good prison record, they can have their case looked at again. Yeah. That has sort of provided this springboard for them to take advantage of the law. And the law was there to say, look, people are going to commit crimes when they're young. And at a certain point we may decide they're rehabilitated. And it doesn't mean they're going to automatically

going to get out. There's going to be a case by case analysis. And there's hundreds of these petitions that have come forward. And they're sort of just one of those cases that we happen to be focused on. Laura, you mentioned there's a new DA in town in Los Angeles. That really threw a wrench in the Brothers' plan. They had quite a fight on their hands to keep this going. DA Nathan Hockman came into office and then completely withdrew support from the resentencing effort.

He thought they had not owned up to their lies. And his sort of party line on this has been, we can't say for sure that their level of dangerousness is zero if they're not willing to fully come clean with all of the ways that they lied. And this new DA actually went to court to block the resentencing from moving forward, but he lost.

Judge Jessic granted the brothers a resentencing hearing, and that's what happened on Tuesday. Several witnesses testified on behalf of the brothers. Laura, who showed up? It was mostly family members who have been almost universally supportive of the brothers. And remember, these are the cousins of the two people that were murdered.

And those family members testified about what a toll this has taken on the family, but they also had people who had been in prison with them and to talk about the rehabilitation. Their whole thing is that they've participated in various programs in prison and have been active members of trying to help other people. I did think it was interesting. The prosecution didn't put on a single witness. Basically, it was just making arguments that we've heard before about the lies

and about the fact that they still, again, in the prosecution's view, had not fully owned up to everything. So we also got to hear from the brothers themselves. If you listen to their allocution, which is when they sort of have a chance to make a little spiel, it's all about, I take full responsibility for my actions. I lied to police. I lied to my family.

I'm so sorry. We own it. We own it. Our NBC News producers were in the courtroom when the judge announced his decision. Tell me about the mood and the reactions in court. It was quite emotional, again, because so many family members were there. They're sobbing, listening to the judge announce that resentencing is the right decision here. Sobbing when Eric and Lyle are apologizing to them for the damage this has caused their family. I think emotions were really raw in there because, again, they've waited so long for this moment. Let's take a listen to their press conference that they held outside afterwards.

We're feeling grateful. Grateful to Judge Jessick for restoring our faith in the justice system, for reading the law as it was written, for not being distracted by the circus that our family tends to bring to town. So we are happy and elated. Laura, what happens next? Now this will go to the Parole Board. They're supposed to get a hearing not more than six months from now. Then the Parole Board gets to take some time to evaluate the evidence, I think 120 days. And then even after that, Governor Newsom gets a say. And Governor Newsom can decide to approve or reject what the parole board has done.

Okay, Laura, thank you so much for your insight and for coming on Dateline True Crime Weekly. Anytime. I'll be back when we finally get a word from the parole board. Coming up, three days of testimony from a sergeant in the Karen Reed case. The prosecution is trying to put him at the center of the investigation, but the defense keeps bringing up someone else. After nearly four weeks of testimony in Karen Reed's retrial, prosecutors are still carefully laying out their case. They argue that after a night of heavy drinking in January 2022, Karen Reed hit John O'Keefe, her Boston police officer boyfriend, with her SUV and left him to die during a snowstorm. Reed has pleaded not guilty and her defense says she is the victim of a cover-up by law enforcement.

So far we've heard from O'Keefe's family and friends, first responders and law enforcement officers who investigated the case. This week, all eyes were on one of those officers who spent three days on the stand. Good morning. Good morning, sir. Could you please introduce yourself to the jury? My name is Yuri Bukhenik.

I work for the Massachusetts State Police. Dateline producer, Sue Simpson, is here to bring us up to speed on this witness and what his testimony tells us about where the retrial may go next. Sue, thank you so much for joining us again. Hi, Andrea. It's a pleasure. Yeah. And my first question is always, did you win the lottery? Did you get a seat in the courtroom? I am a winner.

Yay. Okay. All right. It is great to be there. All right. So this is like firsthand then right up close. So Sue, these past few days, they've been intense. Tell us about this witness who has been on the stand for so long and how he fits into the case. Yuri Buchanek is a sergeant with the Massachusetts State Police. On the day or the morning of January 29, 2022, do you know who was assigned to take calls for new cases?

Yes. Before 7 a.m. on the 29th, it was Michael Proctor that was assigned to be on call. Was there a supervisor assigned that morning? Yes, there was. And who was that? It was myself. Buchanan and Proctor worked together to develop the theory of how John O'Keefe was killed. Now, Michael Proctor was fired earlier this year due to misconduct, in part because of demeaning and derogatory

text messages he sent about Karen to his friends and even to his supervisors during the investigation. Buchanek was on one of those group text chains and even liked one of the messages. And the prosecution had Buchanek read some of those messages he received from Michael Proctor. The prosecution is trying to make Sergeant Buchanek the face of the investigation and minimize Proctor's role because of those demeaning text messages he sent. Andrea, you probably remember how damaging Proctor's testimony was in the first trial, so they're trying to avoid a repeat of that.

And they're trying to avoid mentioning Michael Proctor's name as much as possible. Prosecutor Hank Brannon did things like refer to Proctor as the case officer instead of the lead investigator. And they also had Buchanan show physical evidence collected from the scene to the jury instead of getting Michael Proctor to do that. So the defense clearly has a different perspective on the investigation. What did they have to say on cross-examination? So the defense, of course, had exactly the opposite strategy. Alan Jackson insisted that Proctor was really at the center of the investigation. Remember, Jackson called him a cancer in his opening argument.

And just as he did when he cross-examined Proctor during the last trial, Alan Jackson really hammered Buchanan about how the investigation was conducted. He asked him about procedural missteps, like witnesses being interviewed in groups and not being brought down to the station, for instance, to be recorded. And Buchanek was often evasive when Jackson pushed him and tried to pin him down about Proctor's role in the case. Let me just ask you this. Do you believe that Michael Proctor, his involvement in this case tainted the investigation? No.

Not at all? The investigation was done with honor, integrity, and all the evidence pointed in one direction, one direction only. You do know that he touched or had input in nearly every part of this case, obviously, as the case officer, correct? He managed the case. So he had some input or had some connection to nearly

every part of the case, be it the physical evidence, the search warrants, the interviews, things of that nature. He was one of the involved with collecting evidence, conducting interviews, and signing affidavits for the search warrants. He didn't take a minor role in this case. He had a major role in this case. Would you at least agree with that?

He had a role that was more significant than others. With a team of the size that we had working on this case, he did not have a major role. Sue, as we mentioned, you've been in the courtroom. What has it been like in the room? Is the jury very attentive as this is happening? Can you see them kind of perking up? Oh, they're very attentive. There's no question about that.

And I have noticed one man on the jury where every time Alan Jackson gets up, you get the sense that this guy, if he could applaud, he would. Oh, wow. Other jurors are more studious, they're taking notes, but this gentleman is clearly enjoying the spectacle, the theater that Alan Jackson brings.

Yeah, so you talked to Karen Reed after Buchanan's testimony finally wrapped up, and it appears at this point that the state will not be calling Michael Proctor. Did she offer any insight as to whether the defense would call him? Well, yes. I mean, first of all, let me say that Karen Reed, the defendant, has become kind of the voice of the defense team because there is a gag order. Remember, Andrea, that the lawyers were gagged even before the trial started, so we can't

talk to them. So Karen will sometimes talk to the media after a day in court. I asked her one-on-one, you know, what is going to happen with Michael Proctor, and she said TBD. They're still deciding. And it's a really interesting debate, Andrea, about whether or not they're going to call him. The defense may be thinking that Alan Jackson's cross-examination has left jurors with

the impression that Proctor is the bad actor in the investigation. And the calculation the defense team has to make is this. If they put Michael Proctor on the stand, will they in some way humanize him? And is that a risk that they're willing to take? So they've got a big decision to make and they have to make it relatively soon. One last question, Sue. Aside from Michael Proctor, there is another witness people are eager to hear from, and that is Karen Reed herself.

You know, whether her team will call her up there. You know, we're a few weeks into trial. Do you think that she will testify? You know, Andrea, you know, that's the million dollar question, right? It's something she's asked about almost every day. And so far, all she said was, that's also to be determined. I mean, this is hotly anticipated, you know, whether this will happen or not, and we know you'll be there. So Sue, thank you for this great update on what is happening in the trial.

We appreciate it. Thank you, Andrea. Up next, it's time for Dateline Roundup. We've got the latest on the retrial of movie producer Harvey Weinstein. And both Donna Adelson, the Florida grandmother accused of conspiring to murder her ex-son-in-law, and Lori Valo Debel get closer to trial. Plus, it's a crime you hear about a lot in gangster movies, racketeering. So why have prosecutors pinned the charge on Sean Diddy Combs? Welcome back.

Joining me for this week's Roundup is Dateline digital producer, Veronica Mazyka. Hey, Veronica. Hi, Andrea. For our first story, we wanted to talk about someone we haven't mentioned in a while, Donna Adelson, the Florida grandmother accused of orchestrating the 2014 murder for hire plot that killed her former son-in-law Law professor Dan Markell. She has pleaded not guilty to charges including first-degree murder and solicitation So Veronica Donna was supposed to go to trial last fall and now there are some updates about a new trial date

Since that one never happened Donna's defense attorney withdrew from the case literally on the eve of the trial last September citing a conflict of interest. He represented Donna's son Charlie, who was convicted of Dan Markell's murder in 2023. It took a while for Donna to find new attorneys, but a trial date was eventually set for next month only for Donna's defense to ask the judge for another delay, in part because they said the state had opened a new investigation into the case, which was taking up a lot of their time. Wow, what did the judge say to that request?

The judge granted the defense's request to delay the trial, so it's now set for August with jury selection starting on the 19th. Okay, we'll see if that one sticks. You mentioned a new investigation. What do we know about that? We don't know too much. The defense did not give much away, but according to a petition they filed within appellate court, we learned that investigators asked the judge in charge of Donna's case for a

warrant to search the phone records of her husband, Harvey, and put a wiretap on his phone. Harvey has never been charged in connection with any crime. Interesting, Veronica, because wiretaps have been a key part of this case so far. Prosecutors played wiretaps of Donna's phone calls with her son, Charlie, at his trial. Okay, up next across the country in Arizona, there was a familiar face in the news. Lori Vallow-Daybell, also known by Dateline viewers as Mommy Doomsday. She was recently convicted in an Arizona court for her role in the murder of her fourth husband,

Charles Vallow. Now she is preparing for yet another trial that starts at the end of this month. Veronica, what's this one all about? So Lori Vallow-Daybell is expected to stand trial in an attempted murder case involving her niece's ex-husband. His name is Brandon Boudreau. And not long after divorcing Lori's niece, Boudreau was in his car when he says someone shot at him, shattering his window.

He says the shooter was driving a Jeep Grand Cherokee with Texas plates and investigators say the car was connected to Lori Vallow Daybell's brother, Alex Cox. Okay, and Veronica, to remind our listeners who Alex is, he is the person investigators say shot Lori's fourth husband, Charles Vallow, to death. That's right. And the shooting happened just a few months before Boudreau says he was targeted. Alex actually died in 2019, so he's never faced any charges. Laurie has pleaded not guilty in this case,

and there is an update. Laurie, who's representing herself again, filed a motion arguing that this conspiracy to commit murder charge against her should be dismissed. So, Veronica, what is her argument? Really, she was just claiming that her constitutional right to a speedy trial had been violated. Okay, we know Laurie's been hitting the law books in prison. Did her argument work? The judge actually denied the motion to dismiss the charges, so the trial will be moving forward.

Okay, and we'll of course be covering the trial. Finally, we have an update in the retrial of disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein who was currently standing trial in Manhattan on one count of third degree rape and two counts of a criminal sexual act. He is pleaded not guilty. Veronica, we talked about this case a few weeks ago, and you told me that there was a big difference in the prosecution's case against Weinstein

this time around. The prosecution has a new accuser. Yes. Her name is Kaya Sokola, and she's a former model and aspiring actress, now a mom and a psychologist, who says she first met Weinstein when she was 16. What has she told the jury so far about her experience with Weinstein? So she testified that Weinstein assaulted her shortly after they met and again when she

was 19. Her testimony has been extremely emotional. She said she wanted to come forward for the sake of her son. Wow, powerful. She's been under cross-examination for days now. What kind of questions are Weinstein's attorneys asking? They are really just going after her credibility. They have asked her why she stayed in touch with Weinstein for years after that first alleged assault. And she said she hoped he'd help her acting career. Seems like a common theme we're hearing

with his victims and alleged victims. How much longer do we think is left in the trial? A while. Okay, thank you so much for all these updates, Veronica. Thank you. Testimony began this week in the federal sex trafficking trial of Sean Diddy Combs. As anyone who's been listening to our daily coverage

of the trial will already know, he's facing five criminal charges. For our final story this week, we wanted to talk about one of them, racketeering conspiracy, or what is also known as RICO conspiracy. It's a charge that is more often associated with mob bosses than record label executives like Combs.

But this isn't the first time the state has used RICO in the prosecution of a high-profile person. So we've invited our resident expert, NBC News legal analyst Danny Savalos to come on and break it down for us. Welcome back, Danny. Thank you for having me. Sure. So RICO refers to the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. But what does that mean? Rico is a pretty complicated law, but the concept is simple enough. What it does, essentially, is that it criminalizes corrupting an organization.

It can be a company, but it doesn't have to be. It can be any enterprise, a loose association of people. You need to show that somebody directed the enterprise and then that they committed a pattern of racketeering activity. That's a fancy phrase, but all it really means is that you have to prove that they committed two or more crimes in furtherance of this enterprise. And Danny, so RICO has been used in the past to take down mob bosses. It has. It was inspired by the problem of the Mafia.

Anyone who watches mob movies knows that there's often some guy who's at the head of the organization who doesn't actually commit any of the crimes. But as long as he is agreeing to be involved in the organization and has some awareness that these crimes are out there being committed, then he can be held responsible. So this is how they are able to use this for Sean Combs,

saying that Sean Combs was having his people commit crimes. Right, exactly. The focus is on what's called the enterprise. And when you have a company like Bad Boy Entertainment, that makes it a little easier for prosecutors because you already have the established company, and now they have to show that Combs directed it and that he used it for his unlawful means. We've started to see Rico in more of these high-profile

cases, R. Kelly being one of them, the R&B star. You're absolutely right. R. Kelly charged with Rico, and you wouldn't think of R. Kelly as a traditional mafia boss at all. But that's what federal prosecutors are very good at, especially with Rico. They don't necessarily limit the use of the statute to specific traditional organized crime. They will look for any organization that they believe has been corrupted and bring those charges. And it is actually similar to what's being alleged against Combs. They alleged in Kelly's case

that he had this criminal enterprise, but instead of what you might see in the mafia, which might be, I don't know, what you see in movies, they steal a bunch of trucks and sell a bunch of shoes, the allegations against R. Kelly were more like he was using his organization to achieve the sexual exploitation of women. And it's similar to Combs in that prosecutors allege that he was using bodyguards, runners,

assistants, you know, all these people, they say, helped him control and abuse his victims. Exactly right. And instead of just charging with a federal-based sex crime, the key to the RICO allegations against both Kelly and Sean Combs is that there's an organization involved. So we can expect to see some former employees of Combs taking the stand, I would assume. You can absolutely expect that the government has gone to some of his former employees and made it very clear that it's in their best interest to come in and testify against their employer or their former employer. Combs' defense team, you know,

is saying that this is prosecutorial overreach, that there is no proof of racketeering. Yeah, so there are really limited avenues for Combs in this case. It was no surprise in the opening statement that the defense gave that they took the approach of, you may think my client's a jerk, but even if he's a jerk,

even if he's into some kind of sex that you think is deviant, as long as it's consensual, it is not a federal crime. What the prosecution calls a RICO enterprise for the purpose of sexual gratification, it's not that. He's charged with very specific federal crimes, and these facts do not meet the government's proof. All right. And we should say that Sean Combs has pleaded not guilty in this case and denies all the allegations against him.

Danny, thank you so much for breaking this down for us. Rico can be very complicated. You definitely simplified it for us. Thank you. That's it for this episode of Dateline True Crime Weekly. To get ad-free listening for all our podcasts, subscribe to Dateline Premium. But remember, if you wanna take a listen

to our daily coverage of the Sean Combs trial, you can find it on our podcast channel, which is dedicated to all things Dateline True Crime Weekly. Every day after court, that's where we'll be dropping my conversations with NBC News correspondent Chloe Maloss about what she's seen, the witnesses, the evidence, and what it all means. So search for Dateline True Crime Weekly wherever you get your podcasts and follow us to keep

listening. And if you've got any questions for the team or any cases you think we should cover, send us a message through social media or leave us a voicemail at 212-413-5252. Coming up this Friday on Dateline, the murder of a North Dakota student left a community searching for answers. Why would somebody want to hurt Mindy? Who would hurt the outgoing, caring, compassionate girl

that everybody loved? The answer to that question was right in front of them. Watch Keith's episode, Who Killed Mindy Morgan-Stern, this Friday on NBC at 9, 8 Central. Thanks for listening. Dateline True Crime Weekly is produced by Franny Kelly and Katie Ferguson. Our associate producers are Carson Cummins and Caroline Casey. Our senior producer is Liz Brown-Koroloff. Production and fact-checking help by Kim Flores Gaynor. Veronica Mazaka is our digital producer, Rick Kwan is our sound designer,

Original Music by Jesse McGinty, Bryson Barnes is head of audio production, Paul Ryan is executive producer, and Liz Cole is senior executive producer of Dateline. Thanks everybody, good to see y'all.