what did the menendez brothers parents do to them
One by one, family members testified to the abuse, with a cousin confirming that the boys told them about the sexual abuse years earlier. Police headed east to speak with the businessman, and though he admitted to being connected to the mob, he denied knowing anything about Jos and Kittys murders. The case returned to the spotlight in 2017, when Erik participated in a tell-all for a documentary while serving his sentence, appealing to a new generation navigated by social media and living against the backdrop of the #MeToo movement, according to New York Times journalist Ezra Marcus. Sign up now to learn about This Day in History straight from your inbox. They would high five each other because they pulled it off.. The brothers were tried together, but two juries were assigned to the case since their testimonies could implicate one another. They were sentenced to life without parole. On August 20, 1989, the brothers brutally shot their parents multiple times in the den of their $5 million dollar family home in Beverly Hills, where they staged the murders to look like a mob hit. All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. Investigators looked through the ledger of the second gun store on their list, finding two shotguns were purchased by Donovan Goodreau, a friend of Lyles from New Jersey. Courtesy Brian Anderson After Joseph Lyle Menendez was born in 1968, the family moved to New Jersey, where, Jose was 35 when he became executive vice president at Hertz, a subsidiary of Radio Corporation of America, more commonly known as RCA. On August 19, their parents chartered a yacht and took them shark fishing. He worked as an executive for RCA Records at one point, and later got a job with the film company LIVE Entertainment. They took exotic vacations, too, thinking they had even more money coming to them. The sensationalized trial of Lyle and Erik Menendez during the 1990s continues to be a source of fascination and debate, especially in light of social media and the #MeToo movement. 2023, A&E Television Networks, LLC. What Happened to Kitty and Jose Menendez? 1,964, This story has been shared 1,768 times. Menudo Star Says Jos Menendez Assaulted Him. Lyle and Erik Menendez cited emotional and physical abuse, among other reasons, for the gruesome 1989 killing of their mother and father. Erik bought a Rolex too, and clothes, and lost thousands of dollars gambling. Their sons Lyle and Erik, who were 21 and 18 respectively at the time of the killings, also seemed like the platonic ideal of the Reagan era United States. I still believe that the Menendez brothers did what they did out of fear because they felt that they were gonna be killed, said Delahunt. The brothers, featured on ABC's 20/20 in April of 2021, have a new generation of defenders - on Instagram and TikTok. The brothers during one of the court hearings You could hear things breaking and you could hear the ringing noises from the booms, Lyle testified. The investigation eventually turned to Lyle and Erik. In a preview for the docuseries that aired on, , Rossell points to an image of Jose Menendez and says, Thats the man here that raped me.. 1,516, This story has been shared 1,358 times. Get the Daily Beast's biggest scoops and scandals delivered right to your inbox. Oxygen Insider is your all-access pass to never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more. Lyle and Erik continue serving life sentences, regularly leading therapy groups behind bars. After a merger with a Minnesota-based record company, IVE became known as Live Entertainment and is now known as Artisan Entertainment. Once they moved to California, Erik began to run with some teenage delinquents, getting himself in trouble for a string of burglaries. Its not unfathomable, then, to think that in the present climate, Lyle and Eriks charges would have sounded more plausible than they did at the timeand that no judge would have dared limit testimony about their alleged sexual abuse, as was the case in their second trial, when they were found guilty. Erik was playing tennis in Israel at the time but came home voluntarily, and was arrested on March 11. She added: My mom is a person that says like, You know, they killed their parents, and thats wrong.'. The officers who responded to the 911 call found Erik sobbing on the lawn before entering the crime scene. During one of those visits, Roy says he saw Erik and Lyle, after which he was drugged and assaultedand he implies that this crime took place as an implicit means of sealing Menudos RCA deal. He was a sexual predator, Roy says about Jos at the outset of Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed, thereby supporting Lyle and Eriks story about the cruelty they suffered at their dads hands. On August 20, 1989, the brothers brutally shot their parents multiple times in the den of their $5 million dollar family home in Beverly Hills, where they staged the murders to look like a mob hit. U kunt uw keuzes te allen tijde wijzigen door te klikken op de links 'Privacydashboard' op onze sites en in onze apps. On August 24, 1989, the day before his parents funeral, Lyle dropped over $15,000 on three Rolex watches, as witnesses and he would later testify. Jose turned the struggling International Video Entertainment Inc. (IVE), a video distributor into profitability,according to People. He wooed and married Kitty, a beauty pageant queen, and then rose from washing dishes to becoming a successful young entertainment executive. A jury convicted Erik and Lyle Menendez in 1996 of murdering their parents, Mary Louise "Kitty" and music executive Jose Menendez, in 1989. Ex-Menudo Singer Makes Shock Claim About Menendez Brothers Dad. Years later, a cousin told ABC News that she believed his story because hed told her similar things when he was a child. READ MORE: Why the Menendez Brothers Killed Their Parentsa Look Inside Their Murder Case. Jose was also protective of the family name. Ive Been a True Crime Buff Since I Was Old Enough to Read. Lyle was 21 and Erik was 18 at the time of the double murder. Well. The night of the murders, the brothers told police theyd gone out that night to see a movie but had to make a pitstop to retrieve Eriks ID. Stream It Or Skip It: 'Tom Jones' On PBS, A Romance-Focused Adaptation Of Henry Fielding's Novel, Stream It or Skip It: 'Spring Breakthrough' on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Proves We Need More Keesha Sharp, Stream It or Skip It: 'Hearts in the Game' on Hallmark Just Might Be the Network's Movie of the Year. Of course, there are people from America, but I also met people from Hungary, and from France, she told the newspaper. It was hard not to notice the money trail that led from the crime scene a $5 million estate that Elton John and Michael Jackson had each once called home to the brothers, who spent as much as. [The Menendez trial] probably had the effect, maybe good, maybe bad, of demonstrating that, even if you didnt have a celebrity, if the circumstances were dramatic enough, people will be captivated, Steve Brill, the founder of Court TV, told Rolling Stone in 2017. The story of .css-gegin5{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-decoration-thickness:0.0625rem;text-decoration-color:inherit;text-underline-offset:0.25rem;color:#9a0500;-webkit-transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;}.css-gegin5:hover{color:#595959;text-decoration-color:border-link-body-hover;}Eric and Lyle Menendez is one of the most notorious true-crime sagas in American history, and the thirst for more and more depictions of the saga cannot be sated. The Abuse of Erik and Lyle Menendez was carried out by their parents, Jose and Kitty. In a particularly dark October 1993 sketch, Saturday Night Live imitated their smoothly flat voices and the way their faces would crumple into crocodile tears. On August 20, 1989, a seemingly hysterical Lyle Menendez, then 21, called 911. Their father was a child molester. Figuring out whether the tapes with the confessions fell under doctor-patient privilege or were admissible as evidence in court took two full years, with lawsuits and appeals flying back and forth between the prosecution and the Menendezs lawyers. Oziel confided in his mistress, Judalon Smyth, who would ultimately play a big part in the case. Over three decades later, some TikTok users believe that they were actually the victims. Lyle was arrested near their home on March 8, 1990, while Lyle, then competing in a tennis match in Israel, was arrested at LAX airport upon his attorney-arranged return to the United States. Jos spent the early 80s as the head of RCA Records and had a hand in the signing of bands such as Duran Duran and The Eurythmics. Lyles hysterical whine of Someone killed our parents! in his 911 call would later be lampooned in a Jim Carrey movie. The men said the boys were lying; the women believed totally different we were hopelessly deadlocked.. Jos, they said, had molested them since childhood, a claim filled with graphic descriptions that shocked the nation and split friends and family members. The brothers were taken in for questioning but were outwardly distraught. alleges that Jos Menendez, who was an executive at RCA Records at the time. Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed thus plays like the tip of a potential iceberg that has yet to be fully assessed. The story was impossible to corroborate because the alleged villain was dead. Close your eyes and conjure the Menendez brothers, and theyre wearing matching sweaters the vivid, unnatural colors of jelly beans. It will take you to the life that was experienced by Lyle Menendez and his brother as they grew up.. They were shot multiple times at close range with a shotgun and rendered unrecognizable. Lyle and Erik Menendez claimed that they killed their parents in 1989 because they feared for their safety following a lifetime of sexual abuse perpetrated by their father, Jos, an RCA Records executive, and condoned by their mother, Kitty. Despite being a reputed difficult man and abusive husband and father, Jos Menendez had built a cushy life for himself and his family. During the pandemic, the trial was streamed on Court TV, and with the new sets of eyes belonging to a generation more compassionate toward sex abuse victims, many voiced their opinion that Lyle and Erik should have been charged with manslaughter. After riding in a limo with Diaz and Jos, who looked like he wanted to devour me, and then being served wine that he now assumes was laced with a narcotic, Roys memory goes hazy and then outright blank. All Rights Reserved. The Menendez brothers' documentary and paper headlines dwelled on the concept of greedy rich kids who killed their parents for money. Instead, they acted like two guys who had just won the lottery. He moved his family to California, eventually settling into a Beverly Hills mansion, But Jose also had to negotiate with some less savory business associates,. Thats when they discovered the murder.. Articles with the HISTORY.com Editors byline have been written or edited by the HISTORY.com editors, including Amanda Onion, Missy Sullivan and Matt Mullen. The 55-year-old criminal and his 52-year-old brother were just 21 and 19, respectively, when they brutally murdered their parents, Jose and Mary Louise Menendez, in their Beverly Hills mansion on .
