- This was a gruesome murder.
A high profile executive and his wife
Shot to death in beverly hills.
We don't really think
That children can murder their parents.
You have to have a lot of evil in you
To shoot your mom and dad.
- Young, rich, handsome.
In a case made for hollywood,
They were ready for the cameras.
- It was the first televised courtroom drama
That captivated the united states.
It was a huge deal.
- Erik and lyle menendez
Convicted of murdering their own parents.
- I ran around and shot my mom.
- It wasn't real. It just wasn't real.
They're sociopaths,
And they're pretty big ones.
- Chilling new details.
A letter hinting at secrets too dark to imagine.
- This is so out of the norm.
Something's going on in that house.
- Did they kill in cold blood or in crippling fear?
- Oh, man, it was gut wrenching.
I wanted to bust the door down.
- They spoke the truth about what had happened.
- Hear from the brothers themselves.
- Let's go through this bit by bit.
- There was no way he was gonna let the secret get out.
Silence destroyed our whole family.
♪♪
- Hello, and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Jose and kitty menendez were living the american dream
In one of the country's most famous zip codes
And gave their sons, lyle and erik,
Every advantage money could buy.
Then a hail of gunfire shattered the life
They worked so hard to build.
As the ghastly details of the crime spilled out
So did family secrets.
Here's keith morrison
With "unthinkable: The menendez murders."
- Here it was,
The shining symbol of their success.
Here finally an address worthy of their long struggle,
Their amazing rise:
Beverly hills, california.
- Careful what you wish for.
- All these years later, it's still the case
That has the power to shock.
- It's beverly hills, it's the movie business,
It's kids killing their parents.
- What possessed those two handsome young men,
Who had been given everything?
- Black porsche or a rolex--
They got pretty much what they wanted.
- Why did they give back murder?
- How do you plead? - Not guilty.
- A sensational murder tonight--
- Theirs was the case to usher in
Wall-to-wall tv coverage, even before o.J.
- I was just firing as I went into the room.
I just started firing.
- The kind of horror you couldn't stop watching.
- What was in front of you?
- My parents.
- You'll hear the real story, told by the investigators....
- His face was disfigured
From the shotgun blast that he took
To the back of the head.
- By the young men themselves.
- The real life details
Of the defense that shocked america.
- We'd be in the bathroom,
And, uh, he would put me on my knees.
- What I'm lookin' to see is he telling the truth or not?
- We'll ask the brother at the center of it all
About truth.
- To this day, I'm still dealing with--
With the controversy of it,
Obviously my own guilt in what-- in-in what happened.
- Sure.
What really happened and why?
So, to understand, where to begin?
How 'bout here, illinois, the 1940s?
Everybody who knows this story knows her as kitty,
But that wasn't really her name, wasn't it?
- No, it was mary louise.
- She was the baby of the family,
Said her older sister, joan vandermolen.
It was one of their brothers who came up with
The nickname that stuck for life.
How did she get to be known as kitty?
- I think it was when brian went out to get her
For dinner one night, or something,
And he said, "here, kitty, kitty, kitty."
And she came.
- And then, when kitty was 3,
Her dad left the family for another woman
And as that little girl watched her mother struggle,
She imagined a way she could do better.
- Kitty grew up believing that she was gonna marry well
And have household help.
- How would she know such a thing?
- I think this is probably what my mother had
Maybe wanted for herself and never got.
- Kitty was pretty.
In 1962, she was crowned miss oak lawn.
"you should be in show business,"
Her mother told her,
So kitty studied radio and television
At southern illinois university.
Was that wrapped up in the whole idea
Of if you're in that field
You're more likely to meet a successful man?
- Yes, yup, absolutely.
- In college, she met a bundle of ambition
Named jose menendez.
He had fled communist cuba at 16 with bold dreams
Of striking it big in business.
Just the kind of man kitty was searching for,
And so they married in 1963.
- They were stars in-in our family,
Kitty and jose.
- Diane hernandez was kitty's niece
And lived with kitty and jose for a few years.
- I bet you idolized kitty. - Oh, I did,
From the very beginning,
And I was known as the daughter kitty never had.
- Of course, as the world would come to know,
Kitty and jose had sons,
Lyle and erik.
Did they seem to get along? Did they like each other?
- Oh, yeah, absolutely. - Very close?
- Yeah, I think erik depended on lyle a lot.
- Erik was quite introverted.
- Alan anderson was kitty's nephew.
He spent a couple of summers with the menendez family
And bonded with lyle.
- He was a, um, mischievous boy,
To say the least.
He liked to smile and laugh and giggle.
Oh, he loved to laugh and giggle.
- But what the menendez brothers did most, said alan,
Was practice and practice and practice
- Jose wanted his kids to be the best
And especially in sports, I noticed immediately.
- Swimming, soccer, tennis.
Jose pushed his sons to excel at everything
As his own career skyrocketed.
In the '70s, jose was the general manager at hertz
And impressed his sons
By bringing the company's famous spokesman,
O.J. Simpson, home to dinner.
- Jose was of course living the american dream,
And he wanted his boys to continue that american dream
That he had set forth for not only himself but for his family.
- In 1986, jose took a job
With carolco pictures in los angeles,
The company that produced mega hits
Like "basic instinct" and the "rambo" series.
Carolco had just bought a video distribution company
From a man named noel bloom,
And they gave jose the job of running it.
- So we think 1989 will be a tremendous year.
Think we'll be very happy with the growth of the company.
- That was the year, 1989, when robert rand,
Then a reporter for "the miami herald,"
Went to las vegas to cover a trade show
For the home video business
And happened to meet jose menendez.
What was your impression of the guy?
- Talked to him for maybe two or three minutes.
He seemed professional, dynamic.
- A high-powered career, a beautiful family,
And finally, the one missing piece
Of jose's american dream, the perfect home.
Jose moved his family from calabasas,
Then pre-kardashian
In the relatively unknown enclave outside of los angeles,
To a more tony address.
Joan was with her sister the day the realtor called kitty.
- They had accepted jose's offer
And, "kitty, you've got your zip code."
And that made her so happy.
- 90210.
- Mm-hmm, absolutely.
- 722 north elm drive, a 6-bedroom
Mediaterranean style home, swimming pool,
Guest house, tennis court.
Elton john once lived in this very house,
So did a saudi prince, and even prince himself.
By August 1989, jose had truly made it.
Now to ensure his sons did, too.
By then, lyle was a student at princeton.
Younger brother erik was going to ucla in the fall,
So perfect.
So why did diane feel this way?
- I said, "well, I know this sounds crazy,
But unless I am crazy,
Somebody who's really close to me
Is gonna die, and it's gonna be horrible."
- Horrible?
That it certainly was.
- Coming up...
Something chilling in the den.
- The first thing I noticed
Was jose menendez seated on the couch.
- It was grotesque what happened.
- Questions from the very beginning.
- We didn't see any shotgun shells.
- What did that say to you?
- Somebody collected the shotgun shells.
Somebody that didn't want, uh, fingerprints,
Uh, on the shotgun shells.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- It was August 20th, 1989, just before midnight.
A 9-1-1 operator picked up a call
From an apparently hysterical young man.
His name was lyle menendez.
- Les zoeller was a detective back then,
One of a grand total of two detectives
In the beverly hills police department
Who worked homicides.
How many murders occurred in, uh, beverly hills
In those days?
- Eh, in those days approximately two a year.
- Detective zoeller was asleep
That August night when his boss called.
- And he said, "come on in, we've had a murder."
And I asked him for some information,
And he said, uh, he gave me the address of 722 north elm.
- Zoeller drove to the mansion, walked inside.
- It was eerily quiet,
And when I went into the den library,
First thing I noticed
Was jose menendez seated on the couch.
He was, uh, slumped to one side, his head was to the one side.
- It was bad, very bad.
- But I could immediately tell that his face was disfigured
From the shotgun blast that he took
To the back of the head.
He was wearing shorts,
And he had a shotgun blast to his thigh,
Blood soaked all the way down to the white couch.
- Hmm.
- And then I noticed his wife, kitty,
At his feet on the floor.
- She was curled into a fetal position,
And like her husband, had been shot many times,
Several times near her knee.
And most horribly,
Kitty was shot point blank in the face.
- Shotgun killings are very messy,
And there were brains and blood everywhere.
- Back then, pamela bozanich was an l.A. County prosecutor
In the organized crime unit,
But nothing prepared her for this.
Jose and kitty had been riddled with 15 shots.
One image in particular lives with her still.
- There was a contact wound on kitty menendez's face.
It blew out her eye.
I mean, it was grotesque what happened to her.
- To investigators it appeared jose and kitty
Had been relaxing in the den.
An empty bowl of cream and berries
And erik's ucla paperwork were on the coffee table.
The television set was on.
There was no indication of a break-in,
But something did stand out to detective zoeller.
- We didn't see any shotgun shells.
- What did that say to you?
- Somebody collected the shotgun shells.
- But who does a thing like that if they've got
A messy crime scene of that sort?
- Somebody that didn't want, uh, fingerprints
On the shotgun shells, the only thing I could think of.
- While investigators examined the crime scene,
Lyle menendez, then 21, and erik, 18,
Went to the station to speak to police.
- The brothers said they were in and out
Throughout the day,
And then as evening approached they decided
That they wanted to go to the movies.
They wanted to see a james bond movie,
But it was sold out so they saw the batman movie,
Which, uh, they had both seen before.
- Hmm.
- So they decided to see that again.
- Curious.
-After the movie, they told detectives,
They planned to meet a friend for a drink
At the cheesecake factory,
But they had to go back to the house
To pick up erik's fake id.
And when they walked in, they said,
They saw a haze in the air, smelled gunpowder smoke,
Went into the den, and then dialed 9-1-1.
- The news spread quickly.
- I got a phone call from my brother.
And I remember putting the phone down on the table
And walking around the house screaming.
- Reporter robert rand's phone also rang.
It was a friend who had attended the las vegas trade show
With him ten days earlier.
- The friend had said, "hey, do you remember that guy,
Jose menendez, uh, you know, that you met briefly last week?"
And I said, "sure."
And he said, "well, he and his wife
Were blown away last night in beverly hills."
- Now that, thought rand, was a story tailor-made
For the miami community he was writing for.
A rags to riches story, capped by murder.
He worked the phones and soon met up with jose's sister,
Who told him...
- You know, the family was so close.
They were loving, they did everything together.
She said, "you have to interview erik and lyle."
And I said, "of course,
I want to interview erik and lyle."
- As he would find,
Getting to the brothers was not so easy,
But then they'd just lost their parents.
- Lyle and erik menendez were the grieving sons.
- Alan abrahamson
Is a journalism professor at usc.
Back in 1989,
He was a reporter for "the l.A. Times."
- Nobody quite knew who had killed the parents.
Was it because of jose's position in business?
Had he been taken out by the mob?
- After all, both jose and kitty had been shot in the knees.
A mafia signature perhaps?
And then there was the company jose was running.
Live entertainment distributed all kinds of movies,
Including children's movies,
But it got its start in porn.
- A lot of pornography is organized crime backed
'cause it's a great way to make a lot of money
In an industry that's not, you know, very well regarded.
- And there was actually a-a homicide
In the valley
A few weeks before they were murdered,
And jose mentioned to his sons, you know,
"this is what happens.
This guy was into the pornography business,
And he was murdered."
- Plus, jose was known to be aggressive
When it came to business,
And investigators found two rifles in his bedroom.
Was jose worried someone might come after him?
Could lyle and erik be next?
The brothers hired bodyguards.
And in an interview,
Erik menendez voiced his suspicion.
- Noel bloom,
The founder of the company jose was running
And an unapologetic distributor of adult entertainment.
The menendez boys were not alone
In their suspicion about noel bloom.
- Coming up...
Rivals at the office,
Was that a motive for murder?
- You didn't kill jose menendez?
- Ugh, absolutely not.
- Noel bloom speaks then and now.
- Were you sort of day-by-day waiting for somebody to call you
And you're gonna be taken in and put in handcuffs?
- Oh, yes. Yes.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Kitty menendez shot this home video
In August, 1989, capturing images
Of what looked like a happy family.
- Okay, wave goodbye, everybody!
- Twelve days later,
Kitty and her husband's murders
Were front page news.
- It was a big story from the get go
Because it happened in beverly hills, california.
- The big story became a big problem
For carolco pictures.
- The company was getting beaten up in the media
Because all the media stories were,
"this was a mafia hit."
Somehow related to shady dealings
That this company was doing.
- Carolco hired a prominent publicist
To help calm the media storm.
Sylvester stallone spoke warmly of jose.
- He was a-a true cornerstone of the, uh,
Of the-- this company, which I love.
- And jose's memorial service was held
At the director's guild of america headquarters
On sunset boulevard,
All of which might've led people to believe
He was a beloved hollywood insider.
- But the reality was,
Jose menendez was really not known
In the hollywood community at all
And most of the people at this memorial
Probably had never heard of him.
- Lyle and erik arrived late to the service
In a chauffeured limousine.
They had spent the night before
In the ultra chic hotel bel-air.
- How'd they behave when they were there?
- Lyle menendez was, uh, very cool, calm,
And collected.
- Kitty's sister, joan, was at the memorial, too,
And heard something disturbing about jose.
- Several men that worked with jose
Talked to me at that memorial service
And told me how...
He loved to humiliate other men.
- Pretty shocking thing to hear
At somebody's memorial service, isn't it?
- Mm-hmm.
Yeah, not very memorial.
- So, jose had made enemies.
The brothers confirmed it
And knew where to point the finger.
- They indicated that their father was involved
In some shady business contacts,
And one in particular
Was a gentleman by the name of noel bloom.
- That name again.
Noel bloom had founded the company
That became known as live entertainment,
And then wound up working uncomfortably with jose.
- They bickered about a lot of things.
- But mostly it was because of the pornography.
Jose didn't like that at all.
- Did it seem to you that there was a motive there?
- Possible.
- We found this tape of bloom deep in the nbc archives.
- You didn't kill jose menendez?
- Ugh, absolutely not.
- And wondered what he had to say all these years later.
What are you doing with yourself now?
- Well, I'm, uh, retired. [chuckling]
Kinda like forced retirement.
- Oh, but your resume-- - yeah.
- Your resume is special.
- Yeah, my resume, uh, could scare people.
- Noel bloom, known for years to law enforcement authorities
As a kingpin in the porn trade
With alleged ties to east coast mobsters.
- Why would they say
You were involved with organized crime?
- Because people had a perception that
People in the adult business were in organized crime,
Which is totally not true.
At least, I had-- I wasn't in--
- Were some of the people you associated with members?
- There was a couple companies back in new york that, uh,
I believe was.
- In the 1970s,
Bloom was one of the biggest porn producers
And distributors in the country.
Then he made an unlikely turn
To distributing children's programming--
"care bears" for example.
Along the way
You encountered this guy jose menendez.
- Unfortunately.
- What was he like in the office?
- Jose could be very sweet, smile at you, uh,
Even charming. - Mm-hmm.
- But he was very ruthless.
He would scream at people, uh, if he fired--
Brought somebody in his office and fired 'em,
Even though he had no business doing so.
You would hear him laughing like it was a big joke.
- Jose fought with his own family, too,
Said noel bloom.
- I-I met kitty several times.
She would sometimes go into his office
And yellin' and screamin' and hollerin'.
I mean, really loud.
- Oh, so they'd argue a lot?
- Oh, yeah, a lot.
And I think a lot of it was about the kids.
- What was your impression of them?
- Yeah, they were kinda quiet.
They weren't that friendly,
But it seemed like they were a bit troubled.
You know, I know they were afraid of him.
- Afraid of their father, jose.
- I saw him just stare them down a couple of times.
- But after jose was murdered,
Lyle and erik seemed to be afraid of noel bloom.
They told police
They thought bloom may have killed their parents
And might wanna kill them, too.
Bloom had been arrested before on obscenity charges,
But never convicted.
Still, with the brother's public accusation,
He was nervous.
Were you sort of day-by-day waiting
For somebody to call you,
And you're gonna be taken in and put in handcuffs?
- Oh, yes. Yes.
- Oh, the cops would be calling,
And the investigation would take a turn,
One that no one expected.
- Coming up...
New questions about the case.
- It wasn't an organized crime hit.
- And about the grieving sons.
- I was like, "wow!"
The way he was spending money was very strange.
- You begin to see a pattern here,
And you begin to think of greed.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow.
Jose and kitty menendez were gunned down
In the comfort of their beverly hills mansion.
Their sons, lyle and erik,
Pointed police to a potential suspect,
Jose's business associate,
A man who was rumored to have mob connections.
The brothers said they were afraid they were targets, too.
Now, the siblings were about to tell detectives
About something else they secretly feared.
Here's keith morrison
With "unthinkable: The menendez murders."
- In the weeks after the menendez murders,
One name, one whispered suspicion--
Noel bloom.
- I got a call from
The beverly hills police department.
They wanted to meet with me and ask me a few questions,
And I said, "I've been waiting."
- That meeting it turned out was about all it took.
- He was very cooperative,
And we couldn't determine that he had a motive at all.
- So, noel bloom was no longer a suspect.
And the rumored mafia connection to the crime?
Not a chance, said prosecutor pam bozanich.
- The number of shots would tell you
That it wasn't an organized crime hit.
- Why do you say that?
- Because they were torn apart.
If you think about what the media portrays
Or-or hollywood portrays as a mob hit, it would be--
- It's just a little hole in the back of the head.
- Yeah, it'd be a little, like, .22 or a .38
To the back of the head.
- But the knee cappings, the missing shell casings,
To investigators those were signs
It was staged to look like a mob hit.
Hours after the murders, detective zoeller
Looked at the scene, puzzled,
And right around that time
Lyle showed up at the house.
- He said, "we wanna get our tennis equipment."
And I said, "well, where is that?"
He said, "it's in the-the library
Where my parents were murdered."
- What was their demeanor?
- He was matter of fact
And-and, uh, didn't seem very upset to me.
- Then, zoeller learned somehing very odd.
Lyle and erik went to the bank days after the murders,
Looking for jose's safety deposit box,
Trying to find the family will.
- Did that surprise you that they would do it so soon?
- Oh, definitely.
- So, why would the brothers worry about the will?
Zoeller learned that
Jose had threatened to disinherit them.
Lyle had been caught cheating at princeton,
Erik had fought with his father over tennis,
But there was a bigger issue, too.
- Well, in the first house they took the whole safe.
The second house they got into the safe.
- Lyle and erik had burglarized the homes
Of their friend's wealthy parents.
One of the burglaries was in the exclusive community
Of hidden hills.
- Have you ever heard of such a thing before?
- No, it was just because, "we can do it.
Look what we can do."
- At the time, jose hired a prominent criminal attorney
Who arranged for the younger brother, erik,
To take the fall.
- Because he was a minor.
Knowing that erik probably wouldn't get any jail time,
And part of the disposition
Was that he contact a therapist.
In comes jerry oziel.
Dr. Jerome oziel; you'll want to remember that name.
A beverly hills psychologist who specialized
In phobias and sex therapy.
So, therapy and no jail time for the burglaries,
But were they written out of the will?
They finally did get hold of it
And discovered jose hadn't disinherited them after all.
So now, they stood to inherit the family's $14 million estate,
And what the brothers did after the murders
Shocked the whole country.
- They were just spending, spending, spending.
- Three rolex watches,
A private tennis coach for erik, a porsche,
Lyle even bought a chicken wings restaurant.
- I love to shop,
But I think that I might even wait a day or two.
- Lyle went to visit his cousin, alan, in chicago
After the murders.
- He ordered some of the most expensive shirts
I've ever seen in my life.
I mean, he ordered some jewelry.
He ordered these shoes, these expensive shoes, um,
And I was like "wow!"
The way he was spending money for me was very strange.
- But, to other relatives, the spending
Was just lyle and erik doing what they always did.
Lyle was grieving, said cousin diane.
- People would ask, you know.
People were like, "what's he doing?"
And I would defend him and say,
"well, everybody reacts differently
When somebody dies.
This is just his way of coping, I guess."
- Their casual behavior after the murders,
The hunt for the will, the spending spree,
None of it was criminal, but it certainly caught
The attention of the prosecutor.
- You begin to see a pattern here,
And you begin to think of greed.
- But to police,
Lyle and erik kept repeating the same story
They told the cops the night of the murders.
They had no idea what happened.
- Were they believable in those conversations,
That you recall? - Yes.
- So, they didn't seem to be lying or obfuscating or--
- No, they answered our questions willingly.
- So, maybe they were spoiled and self-centered,
But it was a long way
From that to killing their parents,
Except another interview was coming,
One that would reveal so much more.
- A son opens up to a reporter and opens the door
To a disturbing possibility.
Coming up...
- An emotional erik menendez speaks out about his father,
His family, and a killer script.
- That story was about a young man
Who murders his parents and inherits $157 million.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Report robert rand
Had been working the menendez story hard.
He was writing a biography of jose menendez,
But he couldn't complete it without talking
To two people, jose's sons, lyle and erik.
The brothers had blown him off for several weeks,
But finally, on October 20th, 1989,
Exactly two months after the murders,
Rand got his shot.
- I showed up at the menendez mansion
At 3:00 in the afternoon
And, uh, a young woman in her 20s answered the door.
And she said, "oh, erik and lyle
Are out playing tennis.
Uh, they-they'll be back at some point."
The woman invited rand in to tour the house.
- And immediately in front of me is the room,
The room where jose and kitty menendez were killed.
And, um, I had-- I had a chill up my spine.
I felt creeped out.
He waited.
Uh, they arrived, eventually.
- Erik and lyle came bouncing in the house
Wearing tennis whites and looking tan.
They were laughing and joking.
I'm not-- - as if nothing had happened.
- As if nothing had happened.
And I'm kinda torn up inside.
I'm-I'm just thinking to myself,
"I wouldn't be anywhere near this house
If my parents had been killed here."
- Rand pulled out his tape recorder
And notepad, but lyle stopped him.
- Lyle menendez said, "hang on," he said,
"we don't wanna do the interview today.
We'd just like to meet you and get to know you."
- The brothers had flaked on rand before.
He was annoyed but obliged.
They chatted informally and made plans to meet
Later that weekend for an official interview.
But when rand arrived...
- Lyle had left for new york on a redeye the night before.
He had a problem with his chicken wing restaurant
In, uh, princeton.
- Erik, however, was home,
And this time he was willing to talk.
- Erik was emotionally appropriate.
He would c-- he'd cry at times,
Um, and he was telling r-really lovely stories
About how wonderful his parents were.
- Erik said his father wanted to get into politics.
- But now, with his father's death,
Erik said he and his brother
Wanted to fulfill his father's dream.
- Then, the mood shifted,
And erik described what he saw
When he walked into the family den
On August 20th.
- And this was curious,
Erik also told rand about a screenplay he'd written
Called "friends."
- Now, that story was about a young man
Who murders his parents and inherits $157 million.
- Fancy that.
Erik wrote the screenplay
With a close friend of his named craig cignarelli.
When detective zoeller interviewed craig,
He learned that craig and erik often fantasized
About committing the perfect crime,
Which in their screenplay became the story of a man
Killing his parents and evading police.
- They thought about the perfect crime,
And here their parents are murdered,
And we don't have a suspect yet.
It's looking like a perfect crime to me
At that point.
- Zoeller began to wonder if erik's fantasy
Could be playing out in reality.
And then, craig told zoeller about his visit
To the menendez house after the murders.
- Erik had said, "do you wanna know what happened?"
And he described shooting the parents,
And then he summed it all up by saying,
"it could happen." - huh.
- And craig thought about it, and he says,
"well, is he saying that's what he thinks
Happened here at the house,
Or did they actually commit the crime?"
- Strange.
As was the story the brothers told
About discovering their parents' bodies.
- The brothers said that they saw this haze in the air
And some smoke that they smelled.
- Like gunpowder smoke.
- Gunpowder smoke, but I mean,
That dissipates pretty darn quick.
Well, the officers got there right after they did,
And they didn't smell anything.
- The gunpowder smoke,
And fantasizing about the perfect crime,
And the screenplay,
And even what might be called a confession
Had all led detective zoeller
To start thinking the unthinkable,
That the brothers had murdered their mom and dad.
And he wondered, would erik tell the story
Of the shooting to craig again, this time on tape?
- They decided to wire-wire up craig
And go to this restaurant.
- But, this time, erik wasn't at all talkative.
- Erik didn't admit anything,
But I think his conscience said,
"you better not talk too much about this."
- Not that day anyway and not to craig cignarelli,
But erik did talk eventually
And what he said would change everything.
- Coming up...
- Lyle burst into the room,
She heard him say, "why did you tell him?"
- The explosive secret hidden until now.
- Could you believe it? - No, no.
It was absolutely devastating,
Shocking beyond words.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Detective les zoeller had a very disturbing suspicion
That lyle and erik menendez
Had shotgunned their parents to death
In the den of their beverly hills mansion.
And then one day he just knew.
Was there a particular time when you thought,
"okay, yes, it's them."
- Well, when we got a call from judalon smyth.
- A name he'd never heard before.
What did she have to tell you?
- Her whole purpose was to talk about this doctor
And how he was her therapist
And he was having an affair with her.
- Not relevant information to a homicide detective,
But this was.
What was his first name, doctor--
- Dr. Jerry oziel.
- Dr. Oziel, the psychologist erik was sent to
After those burglaries.
Two months after the murders
Judalon smyth said she was with dr. Oziel
When erik menendez called to schedule an emergency session.
,smyth wouldn't talk to us for this report
But she did back then,
And here's what she told us dr. Oziel said
After getting that call.
- Well, all of a sudden he's saying, you know,
"I hope I'm-I'm not gonna hear what I think I'm gonna hear."
- Smyth told zoeller that dr. Oziel was worried
About what might happen at the session,
And so he asked her to stay
In the waiting room of his office
While he met with erik on October 31st, 1989.
She also told zoeller that from the waiting room
She overheard erik tell dr. Oziel the very thing
Investigators had suspected for months but couldn't prove.
- Erik said that they shot their parents.
- And dr. Oziel immediately says, uh,
"we need to call your brother
And have him come over here right away."
- Lyle menendez, who'd been at the elm drive home
Passing out candy to trick-or-treaters,
Rushed over to dr. Oziel's office.
- And lyle burst into the room.
- Judalon smyth told zoeller
She heard lyle confront his brother.
- And she heard him say, "why did you tell him?
We're gonna have to kill him now."
- Seriously? - Yes.
And erik said, "I can't kill anymore."
And he burst in tears and left.
Lyle and dr. Oziel more or less followed him,
And lyle got to the elevator,
And dr. Oziel said, "am I in danger?"
And lyle said, "that's all I can tell you
Is have a good life, dr. Oziel."
And it freaked him out.
- What followed was a strange and nervous dance.
Oziel told lyle and erik to come back
For follow-up therapy sessions.
The brothers, afraid oziel might go to the police, agreed.
During one of those sessions
They both confessed to killing their parents,
And oziel recorded the conversation.
Judalon smyth learned about the recording
And told detectives, who promptly seized the tape.
Just one problem, they weren't allowed to listen to it
Because of doctor-patient privilege.
- How frustrating was that?
- It was very frustrating.
A-a good piece of evidence,
And I couldn't even listen to it.
- Even though investigators didn't know whether
They'd ever get to play that tape in court,
They thought they had enough evidence
To arrest the brothers.
- Today, at approximately-- - it was March 8th, 1990.
- Detectives arrested joseph lyle menendez
For the August murders of his mother and father.
- Erik was playing a tennis tournament
In israel at the time.
- Erik menendez is being sought
By detectives of this department.
- He surrendered to police three days later.
Could you believe it?
- No, no.
It was absolutely devastating, shocking,
Just beyond words.
- Former "l.A. Times" reporter alan abrahamson...
- Who would imagine that these two young men
Of privilege, position, and power to be--
Could-could kill their parents?
That's-that's the kind of stuff that shakespeare wrote about.
- And yet, it seemed that's exactly what happened.
A few weeks after the arrests detective zoeller confirmed
Another tip judalon smyth gave them.
- Judalon said that the guns were purchased
At a gun store in san diego.
I was looking through gun records,
And I said, "this is it."
- The name on the sale
Was an old friend of lyle's from princeton,
But the friend was not even in california
When the guns were purchased, and he was missing his I.D.
- We learned later that lyle had taken the wal-wallet.
- It seemed like overwhelming evidence
That lyle and erik killed their parents.
The news rocketed around the country
And much of the world.
- The sons themselves shotgunned their own parents
In their own home.
- Two rich kids from beverly hills,
Coddled, spoiled, greedy,
Had murdered their own parents in cold blood.
Actually planned it,
Tried to make it look like a mob hit,
Used stolen I.D. To buy the guns,
Tried to get away with it,
And after went on a lavish nationwide spending spree.
Public judgement came harsh and fast.
- How do you plead? - Not guilty.
- They were smirking, they were smug--
People were not predisposed to think kindly
Of erik and lyle menendez.
- Media feasted on the story of the rich brothers
Who killed their parents for the $14 million estate.
Hard to overstate the public's disgust
With those young men.
But, on the other side of the country,
In an upscale new jersey town
Just a few miles from princeton,
People began comparing memories.
- Their home at the time, it was a tudor style home,
It was on a lake.
- This is the home where lyle and erik grew up,
Where bill curtain was a young tennis coach
When he met jose menendez and was certainly impressed.
- There were two clear sides of him--
One was the very friendly, outgoing, joking person.
The flip side was how driven and controlling he was.
- Jose engaged bill to teach his son, lyle,
And then watched the lessons, but didn't just watch.
- He would physically come onto the tennis court
And start giving instruction to lyle
While I was still there.
That was very, very strange,
Very uncomfortable.
- Only much later did bill learn
Jose had hired several coaches for lyle,
That the ten year old was working hours everyday
To learn tennis.
- He was incredibly quiet,
Especially when jose was present.
- Neighborhood memories about a successful
But slightly imposing family.
Everyone, uh, seemed to look up to them,
But not draw closer to them.
- Alicia hercz was a friend and neighbor
Of the menendez family.
- The minute they would come into a room,
They took the air out of it. - Wow.
- And we were all, you know, very, very careful.
- Why would you be careful?
- He tended, when he drank a little bit too much,
To become very derogatory of other people.
- Oh.
- So, people didn't wanna be embarrassed by him.
- They might be the next target.
- You may be the well the next target, yes.
- Did you see any examples of that sort of thing?
- Many.
- And that menendez house?
- It was like it was covered with a shield.
Like, uh, that was impenetrable.
- Thing was, alicia wasn't just a neighbor,
She was lyle's 9th grade spanish teacher
Of the exclusive princeton day school.
Was he a good student?
- He tried to be,
But he was not particularly talented at the language.
- Once, she caught lyle cheating,
And she said erik cheated, too.
- I think teachers understood deep down inside
What they were going through.
- That they were being pressured--
- Yes. - Strenuously
From their parents to do well.
- To perform. Right.
- And to alicia, it seemed to be taking a toll on lyle.
Alicia remembers more than once
Seeing lyle outside her office, staring blankly.
- I wish to this day that I had gotten out
And said, "please, come in. Please, come in."
- Did you talk to kitty or jose about this?
- Oh, no, I didn't reveal anything to them, no.
And-and not anything that could get them in trouble.
- The young boys alicia remembered
Were now adults in serious trouble,
Charged with killing the parents
Who had expected so much from them.
But their story of why they did it,
That would leave the family
And the rest of america speechless.
- Coming up...
The battle begins
With a powerful new ally standing by the brothers.
- How does he walk into a room with a shotgun?
This kid? It doesn't add up.
I mean, I'm totally, totally puzzled.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Continuing our story,
Lyle and erik menendez are under arrest
For the murders of their parents
In the family mansion in beverly hills.
- It was grotesque what happened.
- Blood soaked.
- I had a chill up my spine.
- Could you believe it?
- No, it was absolutely devastating,
Just beyond words.
- The question now, what drove them to kill?
- How does he walk into a room with a shotgun?
This kid?
I mean, I'm totally, totally puzzled.
- A dark secret was about to come to light.
- I just told him that I didn't want to do this.
- Something horrible is going on in the family.
- Oh, man, it was gut wrenching.
I wanted to bust the door down and say,
"what's goin' on here?"
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow.
A vicious double murder in a posh california enclave
Transfixed the nation.
The killers supposedly confessed their crime
To a psychiatrist and were about to lawyer up.
Soon, a tenacious defense attorney
Would help shift attention from the brothers
To the parents who raised them
And a troubled past, the siblings said,
They'd been keeping secret for years.
Here's keith morrison
With more of "unthinkable: The menendez murders."
- Lyle and erik menendez had been charged
With the unthinkable,
Murdering their mother and father.
Alicia hercz, their former neighbor and teacher,
Recalled two young boys whose parents seemed formidable,
Even to adults.
Like many others, said alicia,
She was careful around kitty and jose menendez.
But there was one episode she found too disturbing
To ignore, a diner party at the menendez home.
Jose told his guests he'd brought back a vhs tape
From a trip to brazil.
- "and I have to show you guys this
Because it's so unique."
And so he puts it in, and I don't remember the name.
- She said the film showed adults
Engaging in sex acts in front of children.
- And we saw a few seconds of it,
A few minutes, and we made excuses.
A lot of us stood up and said, "we have to leave."
We couldn't stand to see it, to watch it.
- But jose found this engaging.
- Hysterically funny.
- These stories of the menendez family
Had been buried for years.
- Here we go, guys.
- Until the sons were charged with murder
And she signed on to defend them.
Verteran criminal defense attorney,
Leslie abramson,
Known for her brash style in the courtroom...
And with the press.
- You want that? That's what you get today.
Reporter robert rand,
Who wrote a book on the menendez case,
Recalled the attorney's passionate devotion
To her clients.
- I've never seen anybody with the power of leslie abramson.
Watching her in court was like watching great theater.
- In this old interview from our archives
Leslie abramson described how her defense strategy
Began to take shape.
- I'm hearing a lot of very negative
And-and at least heavily psychologically abusive things.
But it's not answering, what's wrong with this kid?
'cause he's incredibly sweet.
How does he walk into a room with a shotgun?
This kid?
And it doesn't add up.
I mean, I'm totally, totally puzzled,
And that's when I bring in vicary.
- Dr. William vicary, then a forensic psychiatrist
And a graduate of harvard law school,
Agreed to meet with the brothers in jail.
He knew going in police believed
Lyle and eric killed their parents for money.
- But, based upon the, uh, dozens of parricide cases
That-that I had worked on in the past,
That's the exception, it's not the rule.
The rule is that something horrible
Is going on in the family.
- And something was going on in the menendez family,
Something very secret,
But what was it?
- Coming up...
New evidence seen on television for the first time.
A letter from lyle to erik
Hinting at the horrors in that house.
- Oh, man, it was gut wrenching.
Just the screams and the "daddy, don't hit me.
Daddy, don't." you know, that kinda stuff.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Lyle and erik menendez,
The boys from beverly hills, sat in jail
Charged with the shotgun murders of their parents,
And the great wheel of justice ground slow.
The main issue,
Was the jerome oziel confession tape admissible,
Or should doctor-patient privilege keep it out?
The argument went all the way
To california's highest court.
- We sat around for a couple years,
Waiting for the supreme court to rule.
- During which, the menendez brothers
Resided at the men's central jail,
Where soon after their arrest
Lyle slipped his brother a letter.
"dateline" obtained a copy.
It had never been broadcast before.
In it, lyle wrote about their father and the murders.
"he bore two brilliant children, only two,
They carry his name and his pride.
We did not do anything for the money."
He went on, "we alone know the truth.
We alone know the secrets of our family's past.
I do not look forward
To broadcasting them around the country.
I pray that it never has to happen."
Secrets?
At this point, even attorney leslie abramson
Knew none of them.
Lyle and erik revealed nothing, not to abramson
And not to the forensic psychiatrist
She hired, william vicary.
- What struck me in that initial interview
Was how together the older brother lyle was.
I mean, he was articulate, he made good eye contact.
- Yeah.
- He had very thoughtful organized answers.
- Erik on the other hand seemed broken.
- He very rarely made eye contact,
He was biting his fingernails.
So I was thinking in my head,
"boy, I sure hope I get to work with the older brother
And not the younger brother.
Because this is gonna be a piece of cake
With the older brother."
- How wrong he was.
After a few sessions with lyle, dr. Vicary hit a wall
And moved on to erik, who month after month
Seemed to stick to a kind of script
About his wonderful father, his loving family.
- And the minute something would leak out,
About maybe things weren't so wonderful in the family,
He would start crying. - Hmm.
- And he would kind of dissolve and-and-and whimper,
And he just wouldn't go any further.
[sighs]
- Vicary put erik on antidepressants,
And slowly a trust began to form.
- As the months rolled by, I got more and more
Pieces of information, and it got worse, and worse,
And worse as to what was going on in his family.
Until finally, the dam broke.
- Erik and lyle's cousin, alan anderson,
Had lived with the menendez family
And knew the public didn't understand.
- They just knew that, "okay, we've got
"these rich kids-- boom-- shot their parents,
"now they're-- think they're multi-millionaires."
Well, that's not the case.
- Alan had begun thinking back to
Some very disturbing things he had witnessed
At the menendez house, as had cousin diane hernandez.
- He would take their heads and push them under water
Until they started panicking and needed up.
He would let 'em up again. - Jose's way of teaching
His then quite young boys to swim.
What did kitty seem to think about it?
- I mean, if jose did or said it,
There was no questioning it. Absolutely none.
- Not by the boys, not by kitty.
- She became, like, his right hand man
In enforcing things.
- Including what diane and alan came to know
As the single most important rule in the menendez house.
- You cannot go down that hall
When jose is with his kids, truly.
- Kitty didn't go down the hall either?
- No, no. Uh-uh.
- But they did hear things.
- I've heard them being whipped.
Oh, man, it was gut wrenching.
The-- just the screams and the, "daddy, don't hit me.
"daddy, don't." you know, that kinda stuff.
- A disturbing series of stories that,
To the defense, began to explain
What those young men did to their parents.
But how do you get from disturbing stories
To a double murder?
The brothers' lawyers began to connect the dots.
Their defense would be unique and daring.
- Coming up...
The prosecution versus the defense.
The fireworks were about to begin.
- I felt that the brothers were evil,
But not as bad as she was.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Even before the menendez brothers went on trial,
The defense scored a big victory.
The california supreme court ruled that
The confession tape made by dr. Oziel
Could not be presented as evidence.
Of course, the defense had already conceded that
Lyle and erik killed their parents.
Nearly four years after the murders, July 1993.
If convicted here, lyle and erik could face
The death penalty. Their judge was
Stanley weisberg, who'd already presided over
High profile cases, notably the rodney king beating case
Whose results sparked the l.A. Riots.
Judge weisberg ruled that each brother would have
His own jury and...
- The electronic media that, uh, wants access
To this courtroom--
- He allowed cameras in the courtroom.
- The idea that there was a camera in a courtroom
In california was so new, so novel.
- Reporter alan abrahamson, once an attorney himself,
Covered the trial for "the l.A. Times."
- You weren't just playing to the jury,
You were playing to all of america.
- The judge's decision turned a local l.A. Story into
An international sensation.
How big was it?
The menendez trial was the case that put
An entire network, court tv, on the broadcast landscape.
Prosecutor pam bozanich knew all of america was
Watching her every move. How did you feel
As you prepared to make your opening statement?
- As I walked down the hallway, all the cameras were
There and, you know, I just threw up,
'cause I-I thought, "oh, god, you know,
"this is really stressful," so.
- What's more, prosecutor bozanich was
Going up against two fierce opponents, leslie abramson
Defending erik and jill lansing defending lyle.
These were three very smart, strong women.
- Definitely. - Engaged against each other
Over these boys. - Yes.
- I say, "boys," but they weren't really
Boys, were they?
- No, they weren't boys at all.
In fact, that's what the defense wanted everybody
To hear, was "boys," and "these poor boys,
"these orphans." - yeah.
Orphans, an impression the defense tried to play up.
Leslie abramson wrapped her arms around their shoulders,
Had them trade their dapper suits for preppy sweaters.
- Everything that jill lansing
And leslie abramson did was deliberate and calculated.
- Prosecutor bozanich steeled herself, determined
Not to let the optics distract the juries.
- Based upon this evidence, it will become apparent
That this murder was unlawful, unjustified,
And wholly premeditated.
- In basic english, the prosecution's case
Was this: "just the facts, ma'am."
- Fact number one: Lyle and erik driving
Down to san diego two days before the murders
To buy shotguns, and with a stolen I.D.
- Why are you using the fake I.D.?
'cause you know you're gonna be using the gun
To do something you shouldn't be doing.
That is evidence of intent.
- After the murders, the prosecution showed,
The brothers lied to the police for months,
Starting from the very moment lyle called 9-1-1.
- And they did it all for the family fortune,
The state said. Remember, lyle and erik had
Searched for the will just days after
Their parents' murders and went on
A lavish, multi-state spending spree.
- They were very aggressive about spending money
As soon as possible. - Yeah.
- Which I thought was very strange.
- It was pretty obvious, said the prosecutor,
First degree murder, and they did it for the money.
- At the end of the prosecution case
I was like, "okay, these-these two brothers are
"so guilty, it's not even funny."
- But then there was her. - Ms. Abramson
For the defense. - Thank you, your honor.
- We had a joke, um, the investigator, myself,
And my co-de-- uh, co-counsel, lester.
The joke was you have a gun, you have two bullets,
You go in the courtroom-- who do you shoot, okay?
So both the guys say they would shoot lyle and erik,
And I-- my thing was I'm gonna shoot leslie twice.
I felt that the brothers were evil,
But not as bad as she was.
- Abramson had a reputation for doing whatever it took.
- You guys haven't been fair to these boys,
And you're not fair to them now.
- And she had an unusual strategy for defending
The brothers. A law known as
Imperfect self-defense. - That is to say,
Under all those circumstances, it was reasonable
To the person to think that they were acting
In self defense. But the reality is
That that wasn't the case at all.
- In other words, an honest but unreasonable belief
That one's life is in danger. The defense argued that
The brothers weren't spoiled, they were damaged,
Subject to years of abuse, that made the decision
To kill their parents seem to them like
An act of self defense against imminent danger.
If the jury agreed, the menendez brothers
Would get manslaughter instead of murder.
- Our witnesses will paint a portrait
Of jose and mary louise menendez as parents that
Will make understandable to you how they could have
Died at the hands of their children,
What they did to their children
To bring this about.
- The parents were as much on trial
As lyle and erik menendez were on trial.
And-and while the prosecution tried to-to stick to
A "just the facts, ma'am" narrative,
The defense strategy was emotion, emotion,
Emotion, emotion.
- The defense called teachers and coaches
And family members to testify about
Emotional and physical abuse. One of them was cousin alan.
- And would you see bruises on the boys after that?
- Yes, yes in their-- above their--
Above their thigh area or thereabout would be hit.
- And then, cousin diane took the stand,
And here came the most explosive issue of the trial.
Diane testified that the abuse jose inflicted
On his sons was not just physical, but sexual.
- He and his dad had been touching each other,
And he indicated that it was in his genital area.
- And diane told us she observed even more.
- Three of them would take showers together.
Uh, lyle was 15 and erik was 12.
- Prosecutor bozanich was, to say the least, skeptical.
- If my daughter needed me to lie for her,
I'd lie for her. - Yeah.
- If it was a life and death thing, of course you would.
If it's your cousin that you grew up with,
Of course you would.
- Are you pretty sure that they were doing that?
- I'm positive.
- One reason why...
- A relative came to me and said
That she thought that the, um, defense was made up,
That she'd confronted lyle about it,
And he said to her, "that's the way it's gonna be."
- So, we had to ask.
Did the brothers ask you to lie for them?
- No.
- Did they ask you to sort of,
Like, shade things, or tell certain stories
And not other stories, or anything like that?
- No, mm-mmm, mm-mmm.
- The defense contended the abuse was real,
Went on for years. And finally...
- They came to believe
That something terrible was about to break loose.
- Specifically, that their parents were going to
Kill them if they didn't kill their parents first.
Mental health experts testified and said
That was understandable.
- Erik and lyle menendez purchased the shotguns
For their own protection.
- It was a high stakes defense.
And by far the most important witnesses would be
The brothers themselves.
Would the jury believe them?
Would america?
- Coming up...
- My dad had been molesting me.
- I just told him that I didn't wanna do this,
And that it hurt me.
- Shocking then, chilling even now.
Was it the truth?
When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- So what was it, then?
- According to leslie abramson,
There was only one relevant question
To consider in the menendez murders.
- Why did these killings occur?
- A question the brothers believed
They could answer best.
No one had ever seen televised testimony
Like this before.
- State your full name, and spell your last name.
- Joseph lyle menendez.
- The brothers testified in graphic, emotional terms
About what they said were
The darkest secrets of their family.
- Between the ages of six and eight,
Did your father have sexual contact with you?
- Yes.
We would be in the bathroom, and, uh, um,
It would-- he would put me on my knees
And, uh, have oral sex with him.
- Did you wanna do this?
At some point, did he do some other things to you?
- He-he raped me.
- Did you ask him not to? - Yes.
I just told him that I didn't wanna do this,
And that it hurt me.
And he said that he didn't mean to hurt me,
And he loved me.
- What did he tell you about telling people?
- He just said that it was our secret,
That bad things would happen to me
If I told anybody.
- Lyle testified his father stopped
Abusing him when he turned eight.
And he said for years, he had no idea
His brother was a victim, too.
Then erik took the stand.
- He would have me give him-- me oral sex,
And he would stick the needles or the tacks
Into my thighs, uh, as he was doing this.
- Erik testified that when he refused
To cooperate with his father's demands...
- He came back with a knife.
He put it on my neck.
He said, "I should kill you. And next time I will."
- Reaction to the brothers' testimony was,
To say the least, polarized.
- You either totally believed that
The brothers had been abused, or no,
You thought the whole thing was a complete crock
Of you-know-what.
- But, the defense said, the brothers' explosive claims
Were just the lead-up, the backstory
To what really prompted the murders.
- What do you believe was the originating cause
Of you and your brother
Ultimately winding up shooting your parents?
- Me telling lyle that, uh, m--
- You telling lyle what?
Was it you telling lyle about something
That was happening?
- My dad--
That my dad had been molesting me.
- And had been right up until the murders, erik said.
And he testified that his mother was aware of it all.
- She says, "I know. I've always known.
"what, do you think I'm stupid?"
- Lyle said he confronted his father
Several days before the murders.
- I told him I would tell everybody
Everything about him, I would tell the police,
And that I would tell the family.
- Then, according to lyle, his father said
Something that sounded like a threat.
- He said, "we all make choices in life, son.
"erik made his. You've made yours."
I thought we were in danger.
- And so, the brothers drove down to san diego
To buy the shotguns for protection, they said.
Two days later, said lyle, he and his father
Had another argument about the abuse,
After which lyle said his parents went into the den
And shut the door, and... - I thought they were
Going ahead with their plan to kill us.
- Remember, josé and kitty kept two rifles in the house.
- So what did you do?
- I ran upstairs to tell my brother that
It was happening now. - They ran out to the car,
Loaded their guns, and burst through the den door.
- I was just firing as I went into the room.
I just started firing.
- In what direction? - In front of me.
- What was in front of you?
- My parents.
- At some point, was your gun empty?
- Yes. I could see somebody, uh,
Moving-- seemed like moving in the direction
Of where my brother should be.
- Lyle said he returned to the car, reloaded,
And ran back into the house.
- And what did you do after you reloaded?
- I ran around and shot my mom.
- So, did they act while in the mistaken belief
They were defending their own lives?
Yes, said the defense.
A classic case of imperfect self-defense.
Perfect nonsense, said the prosecutor.
She grilled lyle on cross-examination.
- When you put the shotgun up against her left cheek
And you pulled the trigger, did you love your mother?
- Yes.
- And was that an act of love, mr. Menendez?
- It was confusion and fear.
- You were afraid of her at that point?
- They slaughtered their mother in a way that was so cruel.
She got up to run, and they went out
And they reloaded, and they put the gun
Up to her cheek and blew her brains out.
I'm sorry-- that is the height of cruelty.
- What's more, observed reporter alan abrahamson...
- Let's count how many seconds
It might take to go out to the car.
Walk, walk, walk, walk, walk.
Grab the shotgun shell, put the shotgun shell in,
Run back in.
Remember, time is ticking, time is ticking.
You put the barrel of that shotgun
Against her cheek, and you pull.
That is intent.
No doubt about it.
- The prosecution believed the brothers were
Flat-out lying about the abuse
And the events leading up to the murders.
And as it turned out,
Their testimony gave the state a big opening.
- They offered their mental state
As a defense.
And when you offer your mental state as a defense,
You have waived your psychiatric patient privilege.
- The oziel tape-- remember that?
By testifying, the brothers have put their mental state
On center stage,
Meaning the tape was now fair game.
The defense played the tape to take the sting out of it.
- Detective zoeller, remember, had never heard the tape before,
And he was dumbfounded.
This was supposed to be a candid confession tape,
But on it, the brothers never once mentioned
The issue that was now the very core of their defense.
- Why did you ever murder your parents?
"oh, because they were sexually molesting us."
That never came out.
Why wouldn't he tell his therapist?
- Big deal? The prosecution thought so.
But by then, the jury had already heard many hours
Of tearful testimony about abuse.
And that is when, in December 1993,
They retired to consider a verdict.
- Well, we made a mistake right off the bat.
- Hazel thornton was on erik's jury.
- We took a show of hands
As to what level of guilt we thought they were.
And it became immediate that it was men against women,
Murder versus man-manslaughter.
- The main issue, said hazel,
Was the brothers' story of the abuse.
The women believed them.
The men did not.
Did discussions get heated? - Oh, yes.
The public thinks that the women were emotional
In the trial.
It was the men who were emotional.
They pounded their fists on the table,
They called us names, they yelled at us.
- Those tumultuous deliberations carried on into the new year.
And then,
A massive 6.7 earthquake shook southern california.
The backdrop against which the juries would deliver
A decision that shocked the world.
- On the heels of that deadly earthquake,
Another stunner is about to alter the course
Of the menendez case.
Coming up, oj simpson.
That explosive case is about to cast a shadow
Over this one.
When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- The court finds--
- After six months of trial, two juries, one result.
- Therefore,
I find that the jury is hopelessly deadlocked,
And, uh, the court declares a mistrial.
- The juries couldn't make up their minds.
Nearly half of them on each panel
Voted for manslaughter.
Da gil garcetti vowed to retry the case.
- We have an ethical, a professional,
And moral responsibility to go forward with this case
As a first degree murder case.
- But before that second trial could begin,
Oj happened,
And suddenly, the stakes were even bigger.
- When oj simpson went home at the end of his trial,
It was very hard on the da's office.
We were, you know, nationally considered
To be kind of losers.
- The second menendez trial
Began just eight days after oj's acquittal,
With judge weisberg presiding again.
The same judge, the same case.
But this time, the trial was fundamentally different.
- The first major ruling judge weisberg made
Was no tv camera in the courtroom.
- This time, one jury for both brothers.
Judge weisberg also scaled back testimony
About the brothers' alleged physical and sexual abuse.
Cousin diane, for example, was able to testify--
Just not about lyle telling her that his father
Was molesting him.
One reason that couldn't come in
Was because this time around,
Lyle didn't take the stand
To lay the foundation about abuse in the first place.
- In between the two trials,
There were allegations that he was asking people
To fabricate testimony.
- Letters surfaced after the first trial
In which lyle was alleged to have encouraged people
To lie for the defense. - So the defense decided
They couldn't put him on the witness stand,
So erik menendez had to carry the ball
For both brothers.
And he was a good witness, but he was not as strong
As lyle menendez had been at the first trial.
- And that expert testimony about the impact
Of the alleged abuse on the brothers' state of mind--
Judge weisberg severely limited the number of experts
Because he felt their testimony was repetitive.
One not allowed to testify was dr. Vicary.
- I was shocked.
I said, "well, they've gutted the defense."
I mean, the-the-there is no defense without that.
- That specific ruling
Was in large part due to the objections
Raised by the new prosecutor
Leading the people's case, deputy da david conn.
- One thing that we have asked the judge to do
Is to limit the so-called abuse excuse.
- The, uh, approach that the prosecutor, david conn,
Took was to attack at every-- at every turn
And not give any free, uh, passes there.
- Andrew wolfberg is a lawyer today.
Back then, he was the youngest member
Of the menendez retrial jury.
- At the time,
The defense attorney was saying this was a family
That was win at all costs, the ends justify the means.
To say that their parents had abused them
Was almost like the ends justified the means.
"let's make up this story about abuse."
- But one thing jurors figured
Was not made up was that confession tape.
This time, the prosecution got to use that wildcard
The way they wanted to-- as their smoking gun.
And they highlighted a section where the brothers seemed
To have no remorse about what they had done.
- That really, just was, like, a punch in the gut.
- And then, just before the jury went out,
Judge weisberg's last ruling, and quite possibly,
The most important one of all.
- The jurors would not be allowed
To consider an imperfect self defense.
- Judge weisberg, basing his ruling
On a california supreme court decision
That came down after the first menendez trial,
Said imperfect self-defense didn't apply
Because the brothers initiated the confrontation
With their parents.
Do you think, in retrospect, had you been offered
Imperfect self-defense,
That you might've maybe started in a different place
Or come to a different conclusion?
- I'm pretty confident that we would not have
Because we literally started from first degree murder,
And when every element was satisfied,
We were done.
- This time around,
The deliberations were quicker, more congenial,
And certain.
- The verdict was-was guilty on all counts
With special circumstances.
- Guilty of first degree murder.
But the fates of lyle and eric menendez
Were not the only headline.
More came in the penalty phase.
Dr. Vicary finally got to testify
And under oath, he had to admit something.
- The drama involves this man,
Defense psychiatrist william vicary,
Who has disclosed that he deleted dozens of portions
Of his notes
Because quote, "leslie abramson
"told me this has to come out."
- What did it feel like to be you in that particular
Circumstance of your life?
- Well, it was very traumatic.
- Traumatic indeed.
The doctor said leslie abramson asked him
To delete notes she felt could be viewed as evidence
Of premeditation
And reluctantly, he said, he agreed.
The california medical board punished vicary--
34 months probation.
Abramson disputed vicary's version of events
And after an investigation, the state bar, years later,
Cited insufficient evidence of violations
And closed her case.
In the end, all her efforts did not spare
The menendez brothers from a life sentence.
- I think this fairness has been drained
Outta the system.
- Decades later, that question,
Whether the second trial was fair,
Is still being debated.
- It's a tale of two trials.
The trials couldn't have been more different.
- Cliff gardner was the attorney appointed
To handle lyle's appeal.
- So it was sort of a one-two-three punch.
No source evidence, no lay-- no expert testimony,
And then your defense doesn't go to the jury.
- But that was the same judge in both trials.
- It was the same judge.
- So what's the explanation for the difference?
- It's, uh, it-it's a very good question.
I don't have an answer to it.
- In this audio of lyle's federal appeal hearing,
A judge also questioned why so many key rulings changed
In trial number two?
- Grounds to vacate their convictions?
And what did the brothers have to say
All these years later?
We'll ask lyle menendez, next.
- Coming up...
- The outside world saw
What they thought was evidence of premeditation.
- I'd have to say keep it.
It's just not really entirely accurate.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪ - welcome back.
Lyle and erik menendez were serving life sentences
For the double murder
Of their parents, jose and kitty.
But neither brother was budging from their story,
Insisting they feared for their own lives.
Would years in prison soften that stance?
We got a rare chance to interview lyle,
Asking him about that deadly night
And what still haunted him.
Here's keith morrison with the conclusion
Of "unthinkable: The menendez murders."
- In 2005, after years of failed appeals,
The menendez brothers' case went to the federal court.
It was their last chance. The court denied it,
Maintaining the state court made reasonable rulings
In light of the facts
And did not violate federal law.
Lyle menendez was 49 years old,
And had spent nearly half his life in prison
When he agreed to talk to us.
Hello? - Hello.
- So, here we are, all these years later.
We spoke with lyle menendez for more than two hours.
He was confident, articulate,
And 28 years later, still eager to explain
Why he and his brother killed their parents.
He shared intimate details about his childhood
And the betrayal he said he felt
When erik confided to him days before the murders
That their father was still molesting him.
- My father's rapes, I said nothing.
And I just feel like part of that pact I had
With my dad, and I'm-I'm keeping this secret.
And for you to have done this to my brother, it was like,
I kept my part of that sort of devil's pact,
And you didn't. You know, and-and my mother
To-- you know, you let your children
Wake up in the home of a child molester every day?
- Lyle testified in the trial that not only
Did his mother cover for her husband's actions,
She also sexually abused him.
More than a quarter century after the murders,
Those feelings of anger and hurt were
Still close to the surface. - My mother was very cruel.
- Really? - Uh, I believe--
She just very much resented, uh, my brother and I
From early-early on. - As if you and erik
Had come between her and your father?
- Yes, exactly.
- We reminded him of what his prosecutors
Still say about him.
"that lyle is still trying to avoid some level
"of responsibility by blaming abuse
"when the abuse doesn't appear to have been so bad as to--
"as to cause a person to do that."
- I would trade my entire defense
For a 30 second video of my father, uh, raping me.
I-I would trade my case for it
Because I think it's so sanitized
And so easy to use the word abuse.
"oh, abuse, the abuse wasn't so bad."
- Let's get down to the incident itself.
When did you and erik decide to kill your parents?
- Uh, we didn't decide to do it.
Uh, it was, uh, we finally, uh, just kinda
Got overwhelmed with this panic and emotion,
And-and made a decision to-to run in that room.
- The outside world saw what they thought
Was evidence of a lot of premeditation.
Um, using a friend's drivers license to, you know,
Hide the fact that you went to san diego
And got weapons. - I'd have to say, keith,
That there is-- you know, it's just not
Really entirely accurate.
I didn't have a california I.D.,
So there was no way to purchase a weapon.
Uh, and-- other than my brother using this other kid's I.D.
- But no disputing it, they did buy guns in advance
With a stolen I.D., and there was
This irrefutable fact the prosecutor pointed out.
Lyle reloaded and fired that final shot
At his mother's face while she was still alive
And crawling desperately to get away.
- They saw that as the evidence
Of premeditation and cruelty.
- I certainly in the room wasn't making kind of decisions
In the chaotic situation like that.
But, you know, reflecting afterwards, you know,
Uh, it haunts me. It-it does haunt me.
- The other, uh, comment that would come up was,
"well, they-- you know, they could've just gone out
"and got in the car and driven away.
"you know, they-they didn't have to do this."
- A person like my father is not going to allow you
To just take something that will ruin his life
That he has so carefully crafted.
He's not going to. He's not going to. I mean--
- No, but-but-but you could've left,
That's the point I'm trying to make.
- But leave and do what? Leave and just wait for
Yourself to be killed in a parking lot, I mean--
- You really thought that would happen?
- Leave and tell who? - They didn't believe
Anyone would help them, said lyle.
Not even the police. Speaking of which,
That 9-1-1 call lyle made...
- You were so, uh, you know, um, grief stricken
On that call,
And lying at the same time.
- Yeah, I-- what hap-- uh, I don't think
I was grief stricken. I think I was just
Absolutely broken down with stress.
Both of us were just in such a state of trauma
That I just-- it just poured through on that call
And made it very easy to make that call, really.
- You know, but you could've told them.
Instead you mislead them. Why-why that?
- Well, I-I mean, I don't think, uh, I was going to
Tell the beverly hills police department that,
Uh, you know, I killed my parents
And here's why, and they were gonna go,
"okay, go back home."
So, just self preservation at that point.
- Lyle strongly denied the prosecution's claim
That he and erik killed their parents for money.
Furthermore, he said he didn't think
Their case should've even gone to trial.
- This case should've been settled.
Uh, there are like 200 to 300 patricide cases
A year where a parent is killed by a child,
And they are almost all related to abuse,
And they are almost all settled.
This case they picked out as different.
- Yeah, but, lyle, it was different.
Guys like you in places like you lived
And acts like you committed, I mean, this-- it's--
This is a big splashy deal.
- Exactly, and I think that it was very easy
Because it was beverly hills-- my father had
A lot of money-- to sort of sell this headline
That these brothers killed for money.
- You haven't seen erik in how long?
- Wow... 1996.
- Hmm. Getting to be a long time.
- Yeah. I miss my brother every day.
- Erik menendez declined our interview request.
At the time, he'd been married for 18 years,
Lyle for 14.
And remember, erik had said both he and his brother
Wanted to pursue careers in politics.
In a highly unusual way, they've done it...
Sort of. Erik started a life care
And hospice program for inmates
At the richard donovan correctional facility
Near san diego. And 500 miles north,
Lyle was president of the inmate government
At mule creek state prison.
- I know it's going to be, uh, a suffering for me,
But I feel like, uh, I can find
Some purpose here.
- Then, in February 2018, a reunion of sorts.
Lyle was moved to the same facility
Where erik was serving his sentence.
They were even housed in the same unit.
Lyle's former appellate attorney told us
If the brothers can produce new evidence of the abuse,
It would be the first step toward perhaps
Getting a third trial.
Even he admits it's a long shot,
But if it did happen,
Two people surely wouldn't be there.
Defense attorney leslie abramson
Is retired from law
And did not respond to our interview request.
And as for prosecutor pam bozanich...
You really think that this kind of wrecked your career?
- Oh, it did. Of course it did,
But it's okay because if I'd won the case
I probably never would've been a mother.
I probably would've gone on some book tour or something
And I wouldn't be natalie's mom.
And so, it does have a happy ending.
- Before she left the d.A.'s office,
Pam bozanich took something with her...
A picture of kitty. Not this one, no.
She took one from the crime scene.
- She had blue eyes, and one little blue eye is open
And the other one's gone.
You might think I'm a little crazy
To keep that picture, but it's a reminder
Of what those horrible children did to her.
Can you imagine giving birth
And then giving everything you have to these two kids,
And they kill you?
- The menendez brothers have supporters
Who hope they get out of prison one day.
When we last checked, lyle's facebook followers
Numbered in the thousands.
Fair to say pam bozanich is not one of them.
- Life in prison for those two is just fine.
I hope they live a long, long life.
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow. Thank you for watching.