SACRAMENTO — A day after his youthful brother was denied launch, Lyle Menendez additionally noticed California parole officers reject his bid for freedom, ruling he’ll stay behind bars for now for the 1989 shotgun murders of his dad and mom.
The parole board grilled Menendez, 57, over his efforts to get witnesses to lie throughout his trials, the lavish buying sprees he and his brother Erik, 54, took after their dad and mom’ killings, and whether or not he felt aid after the murders.
“I felt this shameful interval of these six months of getting to deceive relations who had been grieving,” Menendez advised the board. “I felt the necessity to undergo. That it was no aid.”
Because the elder brother, Menendez mentioned he at occasions felt just like the protector of Erik, however that he quickly realized the murders weren’t the precise means out of sexual abuse they had been allegedly struggling by the hands of their dad and mom.
“I kind of began to really feel like I had not rescued my brother,” he mentioned. “I destroyed his life. I’d rescued no person.”
The carefully watched listening to for Lyle Menendez, probably the most well-known inmates at present within the state’s jail system, was thrown into disarray Friday afternoon after audio of his brother’s parole listening to on Thursday was publicly launched.
The audio, revealed by ABC 7, sparked anger and frustration from the brothers’ relations and their lawyer, who accused the California Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation of leaking the audio and tainting Lyle’s listening to.
A CDCR spokesperson confirmed the audio was “erroneously” issued in response to a report request, however didn’t elaborate or instantly reply to extra questions from The Occasions.
“I’ve protected myself, I’ve stayed out of this, I’ve not had a relationship with two human beings as a result of I used to be afraid, and I got here right here at the moment and I got here right here yesterday and I trusted that this may solely be launched in a transcript,” mentioned Tiffani Lucero-Pastor, a relative of the brothers. “You’ve misled the household.”
Heidi Rummel, Lyle Menendez’s parole lawyer, additionally criticized CDCR, accusing the company of turning the listening to right into a “spectacle.”
“I don’t assume you may presumably perceive the emotion of what this household is experiencing,” she mentioned. “They’ve spent a lot time attempting to guard their privateness and dignity.”
After the audio was revealed, Rummel mentioned members of the family who deliberate to testify determined to not converse in any case, and mentioned she could be trying to seal the transcripts of Friday’s listening to.
Parole Commissioner Julie Garland mentioned rules allowed for audio to be launched underneath the California Public Data Act. Transcripts of parole hearings usually turn into public inside 30 days of a grant or denial, underneath state legislation.
Throughout his first-ever enchantment to the state parole board, Lyle Menendez was questioned over his credibility.
Garland referred to Menendez’s enchantment to get witnesses to lie, plans to flee, and lies to relations concerning the killings as a “sophistication of the online of lies and manipulation you demonstrated.”
Menendez mentioned he had no plan on the time, there was simply “a whole lot of flailing in what was taking place.”
“Though you fooled your whole household about you being a assassin, and also you recruited all these folks that will help you… you don’t assume that’s being liar?” Garland requested.
Menendez mentioned the regret he felt after the crimes maybe helped create a “sturdy perception” he didn’t have something to do with the killings.
Like his brother, Lyle Menendez was denied parole for 3 years, however might be eligible to use for an earlier listening to.
After the choice, which got here on the finish of a marathon 11-hour listening to, members of the parole board famous that Menendez had a robust help system of relations for when he could be launched sooner or later, and in addition counseled the 57-year-old for having no incidents of violence regardless of being in jail for 3 many years.
However Garland mentioned Menendez nonetheless struggled with delinquent character traits, incidents of deception, and rule breaking.
“We discover your regret is real,” Garland mentioned. “In some ways, you appear to be you’ve been a mannequin inmate.”
Garland additionally highlighted what she mentioned was an absence of self-control, impulsiveness and poor decision-making through the crimes — together with the brothers’ “callous” determination to shoot their mom a last time.
Relations of the siblings mentioned they had been disenchanted within the determination, however not discouraged.
“The method for parole is exceptionally rigorous, however we’re extremely happy with how Erik and Lyle confirmed up — with honesty, accountability, and integrity,” relations mentioned in a joint assertion. “This isn’t the tip of the highway. Each will go earlier than the Board once more, and their habeas petition stays underneath overview. Within the meantime, we all know they’ll take time to replicate on the Board’s suggestion and can proceed to guide, mentor, and construct applications that help rehabilitation and hope for others.”
Dmitry Gorin, a former Los Angeles County prosecutor, mentioned the board’s determination denying parole was in keeping with previous selections involving violent crimes.
“Though it is a high-profile case, the parole board rejecting the discharge demonstrates that it seeks to maintain violent offenders locked up as a result of they nonetheless pose a danger to society,” Gorin mentioned. “Traditionally, the parole board doesn’t launch folks convicted of homicide, and this case is not any totally different.
He known as the choice a win for Los Angeles Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman, who has opposed the brothers’ launch.
Gorin additionally characterised the problems with the audio launch.
“They had been promised privateness, they need to count on that the state would honor it,” he mentioned. “Everybody deserves a proper to a good listening to and a proper to privateness in keeping with the state guidelines.”
Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor, mentioned “there aren’t any winners within the Menendez brothers case, when you may have two lifeless dad and mom and two murderers who had been victims of intercourse abuse.”
“Many authorized pundits like myself thought the parole board could be a mere formality and the brothers could be launched in a matter of days or even weeks,” Rahmani mentioned. “However Hochman and his deputy Habib Balian saved their finest argument for final and so they’ll hold the Menendez brothers in jail, not less than for now.”
The brothers had been initially sentenced to life with out the potential of parole for the killings of their dad and mom Jose and Kitty Menendez, however after qualifying for resentencing they gained an opportunity at freedom.
Many members of the family have supported their trigger, however the grotesque crime and the brothers’ conduct behind bars led to pushback towards their launch.
The killings occurred after the brothers bought shotguns in San Diego with a false identification and shot their dad and mom within the household front room.
The bloody crime scene was in contrast by investigators to a gangland execution, the place Jose Menendez was shot 5 occasions, together with as soon as behind the pinnacle. Proof confirmed their mom had crawled, wounded, on the ground earlier than the brothers reloaded and fired a last, deadly blast.
The brothers reported the killings to 911, based on courtroom data. Quickly afterward, prosecutors through the trial famous, the 2 siblings started to spend massive sums of cash, together with shopping for a Porsche and a restaurant, which was bought by Lyle. Erik purchased a Jeep and employed a non-public tennis teacher.
Prosecutors argued it was entry to their multimillion-dollar inheritance that prompted the killing after Jose Menendez shared that he deliberate to disinherit the brothers.
However through the trials, the Menendez brothers and relations testified that the 2 siblings had undergone years of sexual and bodily abuse by the hands of their father.
In distinction to their frenzy round their trial, Thursday and Friday’s parole hearings had been quiet — but sometimes contentious — affairs.
A Occasions journalist was the one member of the general public allowed to view the listening to on a projector display in a room contained in the company’s headquarters outdoors of Sacramento.
In the course of the Friday listening to, the parole board shortly dove into the allegations that the brothers had been sexually assaulted by their father, which Lyle Menendez mentioned confused and “induced a whole lot of disgrace in me.”
“That just about characterised my relationship with my father,” he mentioned, including that the worry of being abused left him in a state of “hyper vigilance,” even after the abuse stopped and his father started to abuse Erik.
“It took me some time to understand that it stopped,” Menendez mentioned. “I believe I used to be nonetheless nervous about it for a very long time.”
Rising up, he mentioned, taking good care of his youthful brother gave him goal, and helped to guard him from “drowning within the spiral of my very own life.”
Menendez alleged his mom additionally sexually abused him, however mentioned he didn’t share it throughout his complete danger evaluation as a result of he “didn’t see it as abuse actually.”
“At present, I see it as sexual abuse,” he mentioned. “After I was 13, I felt like I used to be consenting and my mom was coping with loads and I simply felt like perhaps it wasn’t.”
Board members additionally questioned Lyle Menendez on why he didn’t point out the likelihood they had been faraway from their dad or mum’s will of their submissions to the board, however Menendez contended their inheritance was not a motive within the killings.
As a substitute, he mentioned, it grew to become “an issue afterward” as they nervous they might don’t have any cash after their dad and mom’ deaths.
“I imagine there was a will that disinherited us someplace,” he mentioned.
The results of Thursday’s listening to means Erik can’t search parole once more for 3 years, a choice that left some relations and supporters of the youthful brother surprised.
“How is my dad a menace to society,” Talia Menendez, his stepdaughter, wrote on Instagram shortly after the choice was made. “This has been torture to our household. How for much longer???”
Mates, relations and former cellmates have touted the brothers’ lives behind bars, pointing to applications they’ve spearheaded for inmates, together with courses for anger administration, meditation, and serving to inmates in hospice care.
However members of the board questioned each siblings about their violation of guidelines, zeroing in at occasions about repeated use of contraband cellphones.
In the course of the listening to Friday, Lyle mentioned he generally used cellphones to be in contact with household outdoors the jail. However Deputy Parole Commissioner Patrick Reardon questioned this clarification, and requested why Menendez wanted a cellphone if he might make reputable calls from a prison-issued pill.
The rule violation, board members identified, had resulted in Menendez being barred from household visits for 3 years.
Reardon identified that Menendez pleaded responsible to 2 cellphone violations in November 2024 and in March 2025. Menendez was additionally linked to a few different violations, though one other cellmate of his took duty for these violations.
Menendez mentioned the violations occurred when he lived in a dorm with 5 different inmates, and admitted the usage of cellphones was a “gang-like exercise.” The group, he mentioned, most likely went by means of not less than 5 cellphones.
Rummel, Menendez’s parole lawyer, argued in her closing that regardless of the mobile phone points, Menendez had no violent incidents on his jail report.
“This board goes to say you’re harmful since you used your cell telephones,” she mentioned. “However there’s zero proof that he used it for criminality, that he used it for violence. He didn’t even lie about it.”
However members of the board repeatedly targeted on what gave the impression to be problems with credibility. Reardon mentioned at occasions it felt like Menendez was “two totally different incarcerated folks.”
“You appear to be various things at totally different occasions,” Reardon mentioned through the listening to. “I don’t assume what I see is that you just used a cellphone every now and then. There appears to be a mechanism in place that you just all the time had a cellphone.”
Garland requested Menendez about whether or not he used his place on the Males’s Advisory Council — a gaggle meant to be a liaison on points between inmates and jail directors — to govern others and achieve unfair advantages.
Menendez mentioned the place gave him entry to wall telephones, and used the place to assist him barter or achieve favors.
Garland additionally pointed to an evaluation that discovered Menendez exhibited delinquent traits, entitlement, deception, manipulation and a resistance to simply accept penalties.
Menendez additionally mentioned he didn’t agree with an evaluation Garland introduced up that mentioned he confirmed narcissistic traits.
“They’re not the kind of folks like me self-referring to psychological well being,” he mentioned, including that he felt his father displayed narcissistic tendencies and lack of self-reflection. “I simply felt like that wasn’t me.”
Menendez pointed to his work to assist inmates in jail who’re bullied or mocked.
“I’d by no means name myself a mannequin incarcerated particular person,” he mentioned. “I’d say that I’m particular person, that I spent my time serving to folks. That I’m very open and accepting.”
The parole board applauded Menendez’s work and academic historical past whereas in jail, noting he was engaged on a grasp’s diploma.
Regardless of the violations, Menendez argued he felt he had completed good work in jail.
“My life has been outlined by excessive violence,” he mentioned, tears seen on his face. “I wished to be outlined by one thing else.”
