Los hermanos Menendez

Like many people I'm sure, I came to this off the back off the recent Netflix drama 'Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story' and I wanted to know more on the factual side behind the case. While the latter was well made and entertaining (if that's the right word, when the details are considered), I wish I'd just gone straight to this as there's none of the keep you guessing ambiguity of the drama which given what's at stake and having now seen both, seems quite unfair to the brothers. There's nothing fancy here, it's a meat and potatoes crime documentary of the like we've all seen many times before. But it gets the facts across and conveys the injustice of the 2nd court case well.

Netflix allowing the brothers to do an in-depth interview about the events of not only that night but their lives prior to that was much needed. It's so refreshing to hear their voices after so many years. After watching this I am convinced that the abuse happened. Mainly because of how they killed their mother. They slaughtered her like a wild animal according to the prosecutor. You wouldn't kill your mother the way they did with so many bullets if you didn't hate her to your core. I began to think of how many men will actually do you serious bodily harm if you talk about their mothers. No matter how bad of a mother she is most men would go so far as attempted murder to protect their mother. So the fact that as she tried to flee they layered her with bullets mean that she was intensely hated. And you can only hate your mother that intensely if she failed to protect you from something or abused you. In this case it was both.

If you murder your mother for money you'd do so in a less rageful way such as poisoning. The menendez brothers were telling the truth and now that they have a hearing coming up i would love to see a follow up documentary on their lives after release. I gave this documentary 9 stars because I wish that Leslie Abramson, jill Lansing and Dr. Oziel would have at least spoken on camera.

I've known about this case for years, but recently watched the Monsters TV series based on the case, which is basically a lightly fictionalized docuseries.

This instead is a documentary, with footage of the real trial, and with the brothers' narration. I recommend watching this documentary after watching the Monsters TV series, to get a more complete picture of the dynamics.

In this documentary, they want you to be more inclined to believe the siblings' abuse, and they succeed at doing it. I can't say whether I believe in the abuse or not, there is evidence that it happened, and at the same time there is evidence that they lied and pretended about many things, one thing does not exclude the other. But one thing is certain, both in this documentary and in the Monsters series, the second trial was not done correctly, it was not carried out guaranteeing a fair and impartial trial, it was carried out starting a priori that the only possible output would be the life imprisonment.

The Menendez brothers killed two people, and for this they deserve to serve a long sentence, but they do not deserve to be deprived of the right to a fair trial.

If their trial had taken place today, they would probably have already finished serving their sentence.

Having watched the other Netflix show on the Menendez Brother in Monsters, I walked away still feeling like I wasn't sure what really happened. We can all have an opinion but I hope not everyone watches that show and thinks they can without a doubt know what happened because they filled in so many wholes with speculation it's marred the true facts.

This documentary was very good in hearing from the brothers as well as other important figures during the trials. It also highlights without a doubt that the second trial was a farce and that the brothers deserve in the very least an appeal. I believe they were both sexually abused and although this is no means a reason to murder your parents, I feel if they had of had a fair second trial, they would have received a manslaughter conviction. This means, and I agree, they have paid their dues to society and should be released. This is my opinion but the law must make a decision on their outcome, which is in discussion now. I hope this time they hear all the testimonial evidence from the relatives and finally give these boys a fair hearing.

It is bewildering that complex PTSD is still not recognised as a disorder in the DSM-V in 2024, let alone be taken into consideration in the Menendez trials when the concept was in its infancy. This documentary presents a comprehensive overview of the salient details of the Menendez brothers' case from the origins of the killings to the current TikTok movement to emancipate the brothers after 34 years of incarceration and counting, including advances in public awareness of sexual abuse of boys committed overwhelmingly by the men to whom the powerless boys were entrusted.

Supported by the testimonies of family members and forensic criminal experts in the first trial, it was established that both Lyle and Erik endured years of grooming and violence (physical, emotional and sexual) by their father, while the mother, herself lacking a moral compass, abetted the father through her passivity and silence. She was more distraught over his affairs with other women than his grotesque tampering with her own flesh-and-blood. Also fact was that the prosecution could not obtain character witnesses for either parent because they were such deplorable human beings.

In the 1990s, trial by media was the new sensation, Judge Weisberg had presided over the acquittal of four police officers of a hate crime (arising in the 1992 LA riots), the six male jurors in the first trial insisted on murder (to exculpate the father and themselves) while the women pressed for manslaughter, and OJ Simpson got off scot-free for murder due to his celebrity status. So Weisberg prevented crucial information from being fairly presented in the second trial to engineer a much-needed win for the DA's office, leading to a 12-0 ruling for first-degree murder within just a week.

As an outsider in Australia, I find the justice system in America bizarre. There is no neutrality when prosecutors like Bozanich and judges like Weisberg have a huge incentive to pursue certain convictions in order to further their public careers. Bozanich is so blind to her own self-righteousness that she doesn't recognise the hypocrisy when she says of the TikTokers, "their beliefs are not facts". She herself remains convinced of the brothers' intent to murder their parents out of greed despite all evidence presented by the defence. "They were just these dumb jock killers", she says of her first impression of them. She claims that she only agreed to participate in this documentary to show up for the slain mother, but it's a feeble disguise for her self-serving motivations. People like her don't care about justice, only themselves.