Kim Kardashian believes the Menendez brothers should be freed from prison.
The reality star is the latest to weigh in on the controversial pair of convicted murderers.
Prosecutor in Los Angeles Reviewing new evidence The city’s district attorney said Thursday that a hearing is underway to determine whether the siblings should serve life sentences for murdering their parents in a Beverly Hills mansion more than 35 years ago.
The case is being highlighted in a new scripted series from Netflix and an upcoming documentary.
An undated photo of the Menendez family shown during a panel at CrimeCon 2024 in Nashville, Tennessee, on Sunday, June 2. Brothers Lyle and Eric were convicted of fatally shooting both their parents in 1989. (Michael Ruiz/Fox News Digital)
“You think you know Lyle and Eric Menendez’s story,” Kardashian wrote. Opinion Essay For NBC News, published Thursday. “I certainly thought I did.”
“In 1989, brothers, ages 21 and 18, respectively, shot and killed their parents in their Beverly Hills home,” he wrote. “In 1996, after two trials, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. As is often the case, this story is more complex than it appears on the surface.”
Kim Kardashian believes the Menendez brothers should be freed from prison. (Rodin Eckenroth/WireImage/Getty; Reuters)
Kardashian is a prison reform advocate who previously Worked with Trump White House To reduce the sentences of many convicts found guilty of non-violent crimes. He too spoke at the white house About criminal justice earlier this year.
The mother of four’s arguments in her essay mainly focused on the brothers’ claims that their parents abused them emotionally, physically and sexually and that they feared for their lives.
Menendez brother who shot parents criticizes new show for ‘dishonest depiction’
Kardashian wrote, “After years of abuse and in literal fear of their lives, Eric and Lyle chose what they thought was their only way out at the time – an unimaginable way to escape their living nightmare.”
He said that after the jury deadlocked in his first trial, the judge decided that many of his claims of abuse were inadmissible in the second trial.
Kim Kardashian spoke at the White House in June 2019 on the importance of criminal justice reform. He also spoke at the Biden White House earlier this year. (Sarah Silbiger/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“His only way out of prison now is death,” Kardashian said, adding that his first televised trial became “entertainment for the nation” and that he was portrayed by the media as a “monster and sensational eye candy.” “Two egotistical, rich kids from Beverly Hills who killed their parents because of greed.”
“There was no room for sympathy, let alone sympathy,” he said.
“After years of abuse and genuine fear for their lives, Eric and Lyle chose what they thought at the time was their only way out – an unimaginable way to escape their living nightmare.”
Do the Menendez brothers have a chance at freedom?
“Against this backdrop Eric and Lyle had no chance of a fair trial,” the 43-year-old claimed. She also said that there was a stigma against male victims of sexual abuse at the time.
“Can anyone honestly deny that the justice system might have treated the Menendez sisters more leniently?” He added, “Many people believe that the crimes committed by the brothers are unforgivable – but what about the decades of alleged abuse they suffered as children?”
See ‘Menendez Brothers: Monsters or Misunderstood?’ exclusively on fox nation
He said he had recently spent time with the brothers, whom he said had “exemplary disciplinary records” in prison.
He argued, “They are not monsters. They are kind, intelligent and honest men.”
Kardashian also said that one of the prison wardens told her he would be comfortable having the brothers as neighbors.
While Kardashian called her parents’ murders “inexcusable”, she said the brothers were treated more like “serial killers” than two men who “endured years of sexual abuse by people who They loved and trusted.”
She added, “I do not believe that spending his entire natural life in prison was the appropriate punishment for this complex case. Had this crime been committed and been tried today, I believe the outcome would have been dramatically different.” Would.
“I also strongly believe that they were denied a fair second trial and that the exclusion of significant abuse evidence did not give Eric and Lyle the opportunity to fully present their case, thereby undermining the fairness of their sentencing.” Went.”
However, not everyone agrees with Kardashian’s assessment.
The Menendez brothers were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder of their parents in 1996. (Ted Socqui/Sigma/Getty Images)
“If he were brought to trial again today, he would be found guilty,” Clark Fogg, a retired senior forensic specialist for the Beverly Hills Police Department who investigated the murders, told Fox News Digital this week.
Believes in the Fogg brothers’ motive murders It had to do with “greed and money”.
Listen to the Menendez Brothers Jailhouse Phone Call:
“Why did he have to kill his mother first?” Fogg said. “If you killed Mr. Menendez separately from him, he would get the inheritance, right? So to get the inheritance he would have to kill both of them.”
Fogg investigated the case of the Menendez brothers in 1989. He took photographs and preserved evidence at the crime scene, participated in autopsies, and took the stand during both trials.
Eric Menendez, left, and brother Lyle, in front of their Beverly Hills home. He is the prime suspect in his parents’ murder. (Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Speaking to Fox News Digital, he presented a horrifying picture of the crime scene.
“One of the detectives actually had to hold a golf umbrella over my head when I was taking pictures because, sometimes, things would fall off the roof,” Fogg said.
Defense attorney Barry Levin (left) pats double murder defendant Eric Menendez (C) on the back as attorney Leslie Abrahamson (right) listens as Eric and Lyle were found guilty of first-degree murder with special circumstances is, at a second trial on March 20 in the 1989 shotgun murders of his parents Jose and Kitty Menendez. (Reuters)
“This boils down to one thing. The reason he is in jail is that he brutally killed his mother and father, not by poisoning them, but by shooting them to such an extent that they fell completely off the roof. Went. … This is how he was brutally murdered.”
Fogg said it appeared his mother was trying to flee when she was murdered because there was blood on the soles of her shoes.
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“Even at that time, they kept hitting him with bullets one after another,” he told Fox News Digital.
Fox News Digital’s Molly Markowitz and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
