trial, voted for manslaughter, and all of the men voted for murder, and when i interviewed jurors after the first trial, several of the men told me, a father would never do that to his sons. is it a victory? no, i don t consider it a victory. a victory would be if my client were free. to me, that would be a victory. i knew early on it was going to hang, and i was hoping it would hang and not be a not guilty. i didn t want them going home. the d.a. s office announced immediately that they were going to retry the brothers. we have an ethical, a professional, and moral responsibility to go forward with this case as a first-degree murder case. we re seeking justice, and that s what we re going to do. gil was angry. they re better actors than even i thought that they were, if they re able to pull it off a second time. so imagine you re gil garcetti, the l.a. county d.a. you ve got one huge high-profile trial that had kind of ended with egg on your face, and right
court of appeals, but now, a new california statute could possibly give lyle and erik one final chance at freedom. penal code 1473. 5 cites jailed abuse victims, who are unable to present their full defense, can, quote, seek a new trial or a reduced sentence. the brothers have until january 1st, 2020 to file. i m hill harper. thanks for watching. - around 400 years ago, a spanish nobleman set sail for the new world. his name lorenzo longoria. around 400 years ago, a spanish nobleman set sail for the new world.
what? that my dad had been molesting me. people were obsessed. people couldn t get enough. i remember one of the court tv employees saying that nbc had called, and they were going to do a skit about the menendez brothers on saturday night live, and it was about erik and lyle on the stand and supposedly blaming everything on their younger twin brothers that apparently nobody knew anything about. is it your testimony that you and your brother, erik, in fact, had nothing do with the murder of your parents, jose and kitty menendez? that s correct. then can you tell the court who did murder your parents? our other two brothers, danny menendez and jose menendez jr. you could see the celebrity aspect of this trial playing out in real time and in real life, and the zaniness of some of the
she was almost, like, rebellious in the courtroom. i m going to object to that answer, your honor. this witness has been trying to do this counsel and you will succeed in not mugging for the jury, not making faces to the audience. you will behave professionally. is that clear? yes, of course. i do not believe any jury will ever convict erik menendez of first-degree murder. leslie, you know, dressed them up in sweaters in court and tried to emphasize how young they were. i remember watching her in court, how she would put her arm around them and rub them and pat them and, like, pick a piece of lint off their sweater, just smooth it down in front of the jury. who could, you know, harm their parents, you know, looking like that? during their trial, the brothers admitted they shot and killed film company executive jose menendez and his wife, kitty, in the den of their $4 million beverly hills home because, they said, of a dark family secret. so in this case the brot
responsibility of the brothers. deliberations began in december. at court tv, we clearly kept viewers updated on what was going on, which was that nothing was going on. what does it say when the deliberations have gone on so many days? and you re saying you still have a chance? they re still deliberating, aren t they? it seems like an eternity because we re, like, you know, on pins and needles. i was driving 30 miles to go sit in my office, waiting. i actually brought in needlepoint to help. three weeks and they haven t budged. it has been our suspicion that there was some deep division. i guess this is as deep as it goes. the deliberations were taking a long time. the judge just kept telling them to go back and keep working on it. i did see, during the trial, that some of the men seemed to really have their minds made up altogether. do you solemnly swear that