() — The lawyers for brothers Erik and Lyle Menéndez —who were convicted of the murder of their parents in 1989— say new evidence shows that the convictions and life sentences should be overturned, according to court documents filed Wednesday.
In their high-profile trials decades ago, the brothers did not deny killing José and Kitty Menéndez, but argued that they should not be convicted of first-degree murder because they acted in self-defense after enduring a lifetime of abuse by their father. The brothers were retried and found guilty in 1996, after the first trial ended in a deadlock.
In a habeas corpus petition filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, lawyers for the brothers say a letter Erik sent to his cousin eight months before the killings shared details of their father’s abuse.
The petition also says that Roy Rosselló, who was part of the Latin band Menudo in the 1980s, claims that he was raped by José Menéndez, who was an executive at RCA Records.
The Los Angeles County attorney’s office, which prosecuted the two lawsuits in the 1990s, told in a statement: “We have received the habeas petition in the Menendez matter and it is currently under review.”
Erik Menendez’s letter to his cousin, Andy Cano, from December 1988, reads: “It keeps happening, Andy, but now it’s worse for me.”
“He’s so overweight I can’t bear to see him,” the letter reads. “I never know when this is going to happen and it’s driving me crazy. Every night I lie awake thinking that he may come. I need to get it out of my head. I know what you said before, but I’m afraid. You don’t know dad like I do. He is crazy. He’s warned me hundreds of times not to tell anyone, especially Lyle. Am I a complainer? I don’t know if I’m going to get over this. I can handle it, Andy. I have to stop thinking about it.”
The letter was discovered by José Menéndez’s younger sister and Andy’s mother, Marta Cano, who shared it with journalist Robert Rand in April 2018. That same month, he shared the letter with Erik Menéndez’s former appeals lawyer, Cliff Gardner, according to the court document.
A review of court records shows that the letter was not produced at either trial, the document says.
Gardner also discovered last year that, as part of a documentary, Rosselló said in an interview that he “was anally raped twice, and orally copulated, by José Menéndez when Roy was only 13 or 14 years old” while he was in New York performing shows. , according to the document, Rosselló recounted the attacks in an affidavit included in an evidence presented with the habeas corpus petition.
The lawyers argue that these two pieces of evidence counter prosecutors’ narrative that José Menéndez was not violent or the type of person who would molest children.
“In summary, the new evidence not only demonstrates that José Menéndez was a violent and brutal man who sexually abused children, but suggests that he was, in fact, continuing to abuse Erik Menéndez in December 1988. As the defense had argued all the time,” the court document says.
The lawyers ask the court to vacate the conviction and sentence against the two brothers, or to allow the presentation of evidence and an evidentiary hearing when they can provide it, as indicated in the document.
has contacted the two attorneys for comment.
‘s Chloe Melas and Cheri Mossburg contributed to this report.
