it just wasn t real. they re sociopaths and pretty big ones. now almost 30 years later chilling new details. evidence never broadcast before! a letter, hinting at secrets too dark to imagine. this is so outside of the norm something is 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. tonight, hear from the brothers themselves. people were afraid of him. let s go through this bit by bit. there was no way he was gonna let this secret get out. silence destroyed our whole family. here it was the shining symbol of their success. here, finally, an address worthy of their long struggle their amazing rise. beverly hills, california. beverly hills emergency. careful what you wish for. someone killed my parents! 28 years later it s still the case that has the power to shock. it s beverly hills. it s the movie bus
to take the sting out active. what erik and i did took a courage beyond belief. detective zoller, remember, had never heard the tape before and he was dumbfounded. this was supposedly 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. we made a mistake, right off the bat. hazel thornton was on erik k 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 manslaughter. the main issue, said hazel, was the brothers story of abuse. the women believed them. the men did not. did