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Good Evening, a successful entertainment executive making two million a year his former beauty queen wife. They are two sons on the fast track to success, but it was all a facade. The Menendez saga has captivated the American public nineteen eighty nine, the killing of Ose and Kitty Menendez on a quiet Sunday evening in Beverly Hills didn't make the cover of People magazine until the arrest of their sons seven months later, when the case developed an intense
cult following. By the time the first Menendez trial began in July nineteen ninety three, the public was convinced that Lyle and Eric were a pair of greedy, rich kids who had killed loving, devoted parents. The real story remained buried beneath years of dark secrets, A culmination of more
than thirty years of journalist Robert Rand's relentless reporting. This updated edition of The Menendez Murders shares these intimate breakthrough findings, including a deeply disturbing history of child abuse and sexual molestation in the man Menendez family going back generations, as well as exclusive new revelations linking the nineteen eighties boy
band Menudo and the Menendez family. Journalist and author Robert Rand has followed the Menendez murders from the beginning and is the only reporter who covered the original investigation as well as both trials with the unique vantage and unparalleled access to the Menendez family and their history, including interviews with both brothers before and after their arrest and to
this day. In twenty twenty three, Rand uncovered extraordinary material evidence that would certainly have changed the fate of the brother's first degree murder conviction in nineteen ninety six. He and the Menendez family hoped his discoveries would give the
brothers new hope for reopening the case. The Netflix film series Monsters was released September nineteenth with over twenty million viewers and much controversy, with Netflix also releasing their documentary The Menendez Brothers featuring Robert Rand to be released October seventh. On October third, Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon made an announcement that his office is reviewing the convictions of the Menendez brothers to determine whether they should be resentenced
and potentially released. A hearing has been scheduled for November twenty sixth. Journalist and author Robert Rand joins me to discuss the Menendez Murder's updated edition, Netflix's Monsters and the Menendez Brothers documentary, and his incredible role in the historic Menendez murder case. Welcome back to the program, and thank you very much for this interview. Robert Rand, Hell, Dan Good,
Josh here again. Thank you so much. It's thank you for this interview, especially in the incredible timing of everything that's gone on in the Menedez case so far.
Well, it's been a very exciting, too much.
On the updated we're talking about the updated edition of The Menendez Murders, and on the back cover you're write, discover the updated edition of the definitive book on the Menendez case and the disquieting true story behind Netflix Monsters, the Lylan Eric Menendez story, and you're write the new evidence that you've uncovered gives the brothers hope for reopening the case. Now that hope is a hearing November twenty sixth,
thanks to you and Marta Cano. But before, let's go back, Before we go to the groundbreaking evidence you were able to discover and the Netflix hit film Monsters and the just released Menendez Brothers documentary, and also your involvement with the docu series Menendez and Minudo, Let's go back to August twenty first, nineteen eighty nine and a phone call
from Stephen Apple Video Insider magazine. Who were you and where were you professionally as a writer at that time, and tell us about that faithful phone call.
I was a freelance and a freelance writer for the Sunday magazine, the late Great propic magazine at the Miami Herald.
On I was twenty first, nineteen eighty nine. I was in the Miami Herald newsroom about ten in the morning, and my good friend Stephen Apple, a good friend going back to college, actually happened to be the editor of a trade magazine for the home video business called Video Insider, and I had just spent two months doing reporting about the home video business, and I was about to write a major investigative story for the Miami Herald Sunday magazine, and I got a phone call from Steve Abbel and
what he told me was that a high profile home video executive and his wife had been killed the night before in Beverly Hills. I remember he either told me or I found out within a few minutes that Jose Menendez was Cuban American, and so that made it of potential interest to people in Miami, which has the large Cuban American community. Also, you know, I had this two months of reporting I just completed it about the home video business. So I was primed and ready to get
into this story. And within ten days I found out that Jose Mendez had a sister, march Cano, who lived
in West Palm Beach, Florida, so near Miami. So using the nineteen eighty nine technology, I got out the phone book for West Palm and I looked up Marx Cano and she was listed, and I called her up five percent to make a condolence call and ninety five percent to possibly hit on her for a story, and she within a few minutes of our talking, she immediately invited me to come to her home that afternoon, which was about ninety minutes away from Miami, and we spent the
entire afternoon not talking about the mers which had happened ten days earlier, but we were talking about the Menendas family history, which was quite an interesting story. The family had started in Spain, they were poor, they became wealthy, and then when Franco came into power, they lost everything and immigrated to Cuba, and once again they started out very poor. They became wealthy all over again, and then Castro came into power and once again the family lost
all of their assets. So their next move was to come to the States in the early nineteen sixties, and once again they had nothing, and once again they became wealthy.
The family had a very interesting story. And then the most interesting thing that march Can shared with me that first day was that Jose Menendez had a five year plan to retire from the entertainment business and he wanted to buy a family compound for the whole family live in in Miami, and Jose wanted to run for the US Senate and aust Castro from Cuba, the man who had ended his country club lifestyle in Havana and forced him to live in the attic of relatives in northeast Pennsylvania,
where he was penniless, and this happened overnight to him when he was sixteen. So the title of that first story that I wrote, which by the way, I was not assigned to write a story about the murder investigation, because there were seven months between the killing of Hussey and Kitty Menanzas and the rest of Lyle and Eric Menuzus, who were charged with killing them. So all of the initial media speculation was that this was some kind of
mob hit related to the home video business. And I had just finished two months of reporting about the home edy business, so I was very well sourced in that area. And I immediately reached out to everybody I had talked to in home video, and they told me, we don't think this has anything to do with the homebody business. They said, people do lots of things in Hollywood to get even, but they usually don't kill you. They may do who knows what to get even if you've crossed them, but
they don't kill you. And so everybody, one of my home video sources told me, we don't think this has anything to do with the home video business. As I said, I went and met march Caano about ten days after the killings, and she told me what was a really fascinating family history Spain to keep it to the States, to Jose planning to retire from the entertainment business and
run for the US Senate in Florida. And so you know, the title of my initial article that appeared in christ Received nineteen eighty nine, about three months before Eric Lele Nandus were wrestled. The title of our story was who killed the next US Senator from Florida.
Right at that time, Marta insisted that to really understand the Menendez family, you would have to interview Eric and Lyle. Now tell us about this planned interview and what happened.
Well, along with the Eric and Lyle, you know, Marche had some other people who worked at Jose Live Entertainment that she wanted me to interview. You know, I was doing a biography Rag Suritius immigrant saga ends in a terrible tragedy, and so I came out to La for two weeks in late October of nineteen eighty nine, two months of the killings, five months before the brothers rusted,
and I interviewed many people at Live Entertainment. I spoke with some of my sources in the Home of New Business, and I also had an interview planned with Eric and Lyles, and they canceled on me two or three times. And I was finally at a point where I had to come home to Miami, and I called Marta in Florida and said, I really would like to talk to Eric Lyle, but they've canceled on me two or three times. Can you call them and tell them they have to sit
down with me? And she did, and they agreed to meet me on a Friday afternoon. And so I showed up at the mansion in Beverly Hills where jose and kiddyman and were killed and knocked on the door and the brothers weren't home. One of their girlfriends answered the door and said, oh, they're up playing tennis, but they'll be here soon. Would you like tour the house? And so I said sure, and so for forty five minutes.
It was a very large, eight thousand square foot mansion, and there was also a guest house on the property, a two story guest house behind the main house. And we walked all around the property for forty five minutes and We kept walking by the room where the killings actually took place, and I remember thinking to myself, I mean, I really fell a chill every time we walked by that room. And I remember thinking to myself, boy, if my parents had been brutally murdered in this house, I
don't know if I'd be living here right. And I just kept having that feeling every time we walked by that room. One of the things that I saw as we were walking around the house was I saw the upstairs closets of Jsse and Kitty Menanaz. There were two rifles in the closet of Kiddy Menendez that I later found out were loaded on the night of the that they were killed.
You talked also the investigators Less Zohler and Tom Lenahan and talked about potential suspects in this, didn't you.
We did. Even though my assignment was not to write about the murder investigation, I certainly called the lead Beverly Hills detectives Less Solar and Tom Lanahan, and they agreed to have lunch for me, and we spent the entire lunch. They were totally blowing smoke at me. We were comparing you know, Columbian mob hits that I was used to living in Miami and covering the news there to Italian
mob hits, and you know what, did you know? They were asking me, what did I think this was a columbiing hit or an Italian hit, And they were totally blowing smoke at me. They within ten days after the killing of Saying Kitty, they had a phone call from a lawyer representing the mother of one of their school friends. This lawyer told the detectives, you really should look carefully at eric Lyle menendous. So in other words, they had a tip and they took it very seriously. So they
were investigating the brothers within two weeks. Of course, none of that was public. When I had lunch with them in late October of eighty nine, they didn't give me a hint that the brothers were involved in anyway. Going back to the first Sam met Eric Lyle within about forty five minutes after our appointment time of three o'clock, they came bouncing in the front door. They were laughing and smiling. They were wearing tennis whites. You know, they
looked like they didn't have care in the world. You know, we're in a good mood, and so the three of us went into a breakfast the room off the kitchen and sat down, and I pulled out a tape recorder and a notepad, and Lyle Menandez said, actually, we don't want to do the interview today, so please, no notes, no recording. We just wanted to get to know you. And that first day we were together for about ninety minutes,
Lyle did the ninety percent of the talking. He told me, you know, how great their parents were, what an incredible man their father was, just you know, saying, you know, very nice things. Eric did very little talking that day. When Eric did talk, he would look over to Lyle as if you know, am I doing okay? Is everything all right? So it was just, you know, it was a normal conversation. The brothers were not suspects publicly. I
had no reason to be suspicious of them. So at the end of the ninety minutes, we agreed that we would meet on noon on Sunday and we would do the formal interview. And I explained to them that I've been out in LA for two weeks and we had to do that interview on Sunday because I had to go back to Miami on Monday, and everybody agreed. So what I did on purpose, I actually switched hotels over the weekend on Saturday, and I didn't want them to know how to find me because I didn't want them
to cancelog me again. And so I just showed up at the mansion on Sunday at noon. The brother's grandmother, Maria answered the door, and I said, you know, I'm Bob Rand from the Miami Herald. I'm here to talk with Eric and Lyle. And the grandmother Maria told me Lyle had to go to New Jersey. The night before, he took a red eye to New York because he had a problem with the chicken ring restaurant he had bought in Princeton, where he was going to school. She said, well,
Eric is asleep upstairs. Do you want me to wake him up? And I said, well, I'm sorry, but yes, I do want you to wake him up, because you know, it's my last say in California and I have to speak with him. And so fifteen minutes later, Eric came down, just out of the shower with wet hair. We sat for about three and a half hours in the formal
living room of the mansion. You know, I had to tape a corner with me, and I have a recording of that entire interview, and most of the time he was telling me very loving, caring stories about how wonderful his parents were, that he missed them. You know that both he and Lyle were very sad. They couldn't imagine
life without their parents. And at one point I said, look, I'm not you know, about two hours in, I said, I'm not doing a story about the murder investigation, but I have to ask you a couple of questions about the night you came home and found your parents' bodies.
And so for the next twelve minutes we talked about that, and Eric answered questions again in nineteen eighty nine technology the tape on my audio CASSIP player ran out after about twelve minutes, and Eric was crying softly at this point, and he said, can we stop talking about this? It's very hard for me to go back and you know, relived that night. And I said, of course. And so we never talked about the the killings after that, but
I have about twelve minutes that are quite interesting. Some of them it is in my book The Mendus murders. That's how that went. And so at the end of three and a half hours of doing a formal interview, Eric actually volunteered to spend more time with me, and he said, would you like to go out to cal Vasas about thirty five forty minutes away and see the dream house my parents were remodeling. And I said, sure,
I would love to go out and see it. And so Eric and grandmother Maria and I jumped into his cheap and we went out to cal Vasas and he walked me all around this house. And so basically we
spent another two hours together. And so one would think somebody who you know, has just finished a three and a half hour interview with a reporter, and if he wanted to get away, you know, or stop being with the reporter, he would have said goodbye, you know, when we finished the interview, But he volunteered to spend more time with me, you know. Then I drove them back to Beverly Hills, and nine days after Eric spent three and a half hours telling me how much he loved
his parents and how wonderful they were. Eric went to doctor Jerome Mosille, a therapist in Beverly Hills and confessed that he and Lyle were responsible for killing their parents. And I always wondered what impact did that three and a half hour interview have on him that may have
motivated him to go to a therapist. Then I found out that he had been really doing very poorly, And this is one of the biggest You know, there are a number of inaccurate scenes in Monsters, the Netflix scripted series aboutcase, but one of them that really sticks out in episode one is you know, they had the brothers part being like crazy, you know, you know, dancing and snorting lines coke and all that set And first of all, friends and brothers tell me they were straight out or jux.
Eric Lahmanns were nationally reged tennis players in the fall of eighty nine. Apparently they never did drugs, is what all of the fronts unanimously told me. And Le's favorite drink was Shila Sunrise. You also liked drinking the wine coolers at parties. Those scenes where you see them partying like mad in Monsters are totally false.
Robert, Let's just use this as an opportunity to stop to hear these messages. You spoke about Eric going to doctor o'zill. You talked about you write about Eric being suicidal and then confessing the infamous confession to doctor Roseille. Let's just fast forward a little bit to how it became that the client privilege rule had this exception. What was the exception to that privilege that allowed this evidence of the confession to be in both trials?
Okay, so now let's pass forward from the crime was in August nineteen eighty nine, and Eric Lahmanandas were arrested in charged with murder in March of nineteen ninety. Normally, you would have a privilege with the therapist for anything
that you share with the therapist. Under California law, there's something called the tearsoft rule which lays out several exceptions to the privilege law, and some of them are, you know, if you tell the therapists I'm going to go murder my girlfriend tomorrow, the therapist is obligated to go to law. If you threaten your therapists and you say I'm going to hurt you, I'm going to hurt your family, I'm going to hurt other people around you, the therapist can
also break the privilege. So what happened was that there's a side story with the therapist, doctor Jerome Oziel, and doctor Ozil was married to another therapist at that time named Laurel Ozel. And also doctor Ozel had a mistress on the side whose name was Judelan Smith. And so Judelan Smith plays kind of a key role in the whole case because she claimed that she had been in doctor Rozel's waiting room and overheard the confession of the brothers.
You know, she in early news reports said, I heard with my own ears, I heard their voices that they had killed their parents. And I don't believe she was ever there. What I believe is that doctor Ozel gosped with his girlfriend and told her about the confession. He was so excited that, you know, that these clients that were fairly high profile had told them about a confession,
and he got with his girlfriend. And so there was a drama over a period of several months where Julan Smith started threatening to go to the police as her relationship with o'zeild sowurd and so incredible as it sounds, Jerry o'zeal and Laura o'zel moved Judelan Smith into their house with their two young daughters eight and ten years old, and they were trying to keep the lid on her
from going to the police. So she lived in their guest room for about three or four months, and finally one night they came home and found a smith talking to their daughters and saying I'm going to be your new mommy, and so they immediately kicked her out of the house and the next day she went to the Beverly Hills police and said Eric lelmanandus killed the parents.
Doctor Jero Moziel has audio tapes in a safe class box in German Oaks that led to a Beverly Hills police search war the next day of a Joziel's house in Saint Flaster Box. Loomanendez was arrested within a few hours, and Eric Menandas was actually playing in a test tournament in Israel and he flew to London and got out of Israel before Interpool. Police came to arrest him within a few hours, but he was gone and so they
had no idea where he was. And he was actually hiding out in a hotel with his test coach in London and attorney Robert Shapiro, who we know from the oj case arranged for him to come back and surrender in Los Angeles, and if Eric Menandez had just walked into any police session in London, it would have been a condition of his extradition that he not be eligible for the death ely because Britain does not have the
death Bellys. So instead, Robert Shapiro made him eligible for the death Elite by having him surrender in Los Angeles. Eric left London, met his aunt March Keno and his cousin Andy Keno, who he was close with. Andy is March Canon's daughter son sorry mar Andy and Eric all flew from Miami to LA and the Beverly HS police detections were there, lax says, the plane land and they arrested Eric.
Mnun's when you originally spoke to Eric Menendez regarding any talk of sexual abuse, you had no hint till the trial that there was any sexual abuse, except that there was one telling conversation in retrospect, I guess that talked about Jose showering with the two grown sons.
Well. In the course of a three hour, three and a half hour interview, Eric Menanda said a couple things that in hindsight became very important, and one of them was that he and Lyle used to shower with their father. But I did you know, that was just a remark in passing. I didn't think that much of it, because when I was a little boy, like three or four years old, I'd take showers with my dad. After we I would go to the gym with him. You know,
I loved going to the gym. We'd get all hot and sweaty, and you know, come home and take shower together. So I didn't think anything about that comment because that was my experience. There was another comment that Eric made, and then an initial interview in which he told me that his father was very close to a man named Edgardo Diaz, who was the manager and creator of Menudo,
the Latin boy band. And Eric told me that Edgar to Diaz was so grateful that Jose had Simon Ull to a thirty million dollar contract when he was at RCAE records, that Edgara wanted to buy Jose A Ferrari as a gift. Wow. That again, that just you know, went right by me. You know, it didn't mean anything. I didn't know who Edgar to Deal was. I'd heard
of the band, venew before. But again I didn't think anything about those comments until many years later, when each comment became you know, very significant.
Now about the sexual abuse there with doctor ozil regarding sexual abuse in that confession. There aren't any real details of sexual abuse by Jose, but there is physical abuse and intimidation and domination.
I would say, but.
The idea of sexual abuse comes up as a defense because it's necessitated because of these confession tapes that you consider was just a blackmail effort by doctor roseil Well.
The defense actually, defense journeys Lesie Amerson and Jill Lansing actually accused Ozell of blackmailing the brothers during the first trial because after you know, the initial confession and you know, the brothers just calming down and seen o'zeal again, o'ceal told them at one point, according to the defense journeys, that he was going schedule five appointments a week for each brother, so in other words, two old appointments to day. And he said, I'm going to be billing your relatives
back east for these therapy appointments. And o'zell said to them, I don't care if you ever show up, And so the relatives in Florida and New Jersey were getting these large bills every week from doctor Oziel. You know, they called Eric Lytle at one point and said, why is doctor Rozil billing you for so much therapy? You know, why were we getting these enormous bills. One of them was ten thousand dollars a week. And Eric Lytle told them,
please just pay the bills. The therapy is really helping us. And the reality is they never showed up. They never went to any therapy sessions, except they did have a therapy session. On a so called therapy session on December eleventh,
nineteen eighty nine, doctor Oziel recorded the hour. And the story that's not really well known is that actually a very high profile criminal defense journey in La Gerald Chalib was representing book Brothers at that time and he negotiated for forty five minutes with doctor about what was going to happen during the so called recorded therapy session, so that actually that was negotiated before they ever turned on the tapeword of that day, and the brothers never said
a word about sexual abuse. They talked about other problems they had with their parents, but they didn't say a word about sexual abuse. And one key fact to know is that in the fall of nineteen ninety, the brothers finally admitted to their family immediate family members that they were responsible for their parents' deaths. But air k Lauman Anddus told the defense journeys, we never want to go on the witness stand and talk about our family secrets. You know, we just don't. We will never do that.
The defense attorneys said to them, well, you know, you have to. You have to work with us here because if you don't talk about what really happened in the family, you could be put to death. This was a death heavily case, and so over time the defense journeys were able to convince the brothers that they had talked about the abuse. So Eric and Lyell Nendus never wanted to reveal these family secrets, even though they were facing the Deathly.
Let's talk about Leslie Abramson, her fierce battle at trial and introducing this sexual abuse as evidence in this trial to mitigate these charges, and to beyond mitigate these charges, to have these charges gone. Let's talk about though that evidence its result, because we've got to get to the story of how we get to the second trial and that same information that was crucial at the first trial is limited or if not totally eliminated from the trial.
Sure well, Lessie Aberson is an incredible force of nature, amazing power an attorney. That is like watching her in court, it's like watching great theater. She is so strong, so powerful, effective in what she does. And so she made a tact cold decision that she wouldn't go public until two weeks before the first trial with the defense story that the brothers had been severely sexually molested in their entire lives.
You know, the public for three years has heard the prosecution version the story, which was really rich kids kill Ozzie and Harriet on Sunday at Beverly Hills. So when two weeks before the first trial, Leslie Aberson does a couple interviews with AP and the other times, and she says, actually, Eric Laumananz were sexual abuse victims. That's why, you know,
this family was falling apart, this functional family. They had a series of competitions in the weeks in the week before the killings, and it ended in this terrible tragedy. And so in the first trial, the defense, led by Abramson and Jill Lanson, put on over fifty witnesses, teachers, coaches, family friends, relatives who told bits and pieces of a puzzle. It was really kind of a complete story when you
put this puzzle together. And so at the end of the first trial, half of the jurors actually there were two juries, one for each brother because some of the evidence only applied to one brother or the other brother, and half the jurors on each jury, all the women voted for manslaughter, All the men voted for murder. And I interviewed all twenty four jurors after the first trial, and all the men told me some version of well, a father would never do that to his sons, so
we didn't believe that story. The women obviously had a different point of view. Over fifty defense witnesses that presented bits and pieces of a puzzle made an impact on them, and they voted for manslaughter. And if there had been a manslaughter conviction, which is how I believe the first trial should have ended, the brothers would have been sentenced to twenty two years, and now they've been in jail
for thirty four years and six months. So in other words, Eric Lahmnandez would have been released twelve years ago and instead they're still incultrated.
But Jesus has an opportunity to stop to hear these messages. Now, let's discuss how this is a hung jury, so there's a mistrial. So we get to the second trial. Just briefly explain how on earth it is that they don't use the same witnesses. They're not able to use the same witnesses, and they're not able to put forth the same sexual abuse defense.
So in the second menendous trial, it was the same trial Judge Tanley Weisberg as first trial. But the first thing he did was he hicked the TV camera out of the courtroom. The first trial was carried live gavel by court TV. Judge Weisberg knew that kicking the TV camera out of the courtroom would cut way down on the media coverage of the case, which was huge in the first trial, and he was right. That did cut
way down on the coverage. And then Judge Weishner proceeded ruling by ruling to reverse almost all of his evidence rulings that he had made in the first trial. So basically he severely limited the defense. He cut the heart
out of the defense by reversing these evidence rulings. The defense was not allowed to put on almost all of their witnesses from the first trial, and the witnesses that were allowed to satisfy were severely limited in what they could say because basically Wesberg ruled whether Eric Leilemnendez were abused or not, that has no impact on this murder case. So therefore it has no relevance. Then therefore we're not
going to allow the jury to hear that evidence. So I don't blame the second trial jury for voting the way they did. They heard a completely different set of evidence than the first trial jury. The final stake in the heart part of the defense came on the last state trial when Judge Weisberg told the defense attorneys that they would not be allowed to argue in perfect self defense in their closing eyes arguments, and again that was part of the heart of their defense arguments in the
first trial. Basically, the defense was just cut off at every way they turned. In the end, the jury was only allowed to vote for first or secondary murder as verdicts. They came back with a first three murder conviction at the end of the second trial, and then following that conviction, then they held after the guilt phase of the trial, they held the penalty phase, and that was three weeks in April twenty April nineteen ninety six, and the jury
then had only two decisions. They could vote for life without parole or they could vote for the death only. So in that penalty phase, the judge did allow the defense to put on all these witnesses that the first trial juries had heard during the guilt phase of the trial. At the end of the penalty faced the second trial jury voted for life without parole.
And you say that you understand. The reason why they voted for life without parole was part of the reason of the sexual abuse, which ordinarily would have been in the trial itself.
Well, it was such a ludicrous moment when David Kahn, the lead prosecutor in the second trial, said, in his closing argument in the second trial, you've heard absolutely no evidence about sexual abuse in this trial. And it was so ludicrous of him to say that, because the reason the jury had never heard any evidence of sexual abuse was that he had opposed any evidence being allowed in And as I said, it was just a joke, you
know what he was doing. What was very interesting was the brothers have exhausted all their state and federal appeals. In their last federal appeal in front of the Ninth Circuit here in Pasadena in two thousand and five, one of the Justices, Alex Kazinski, actually said during the hearing,
which anybody can hear online can hear the audio. Justice Kazinsky said that he believed the second trial had been rigged and there had been collusion between the DA's office and the trial judge to conduct the brothers in the second trial. And part of this whole story is the politics that were going on in LA over the years late eighties, early nineties, and if you remember the DA's office,
they were losing all the high profile trials. Started with the McMartin Precho McMartin preschool trial in the late age, then the Rodney King beating trial where four laped officers were acquitted, and that set off the LA riots in ninety two, and then they Lostnendus one, and then they lost OJ. OJ was quitted in ninety five, and then the second Mendas trial had the misfortune and the bad timing to start about a week after the OJ acquittal. So in addition to the DA's office, the general public
was like, you know what's wrong here? You know, can this DA's office ever convict anybody anything in these high profol trial cases. So everything was really weighed heavily against the men's brothers in the second trial.
Needless to say, people know what happened, and they were imprisoned, and they were given life without the possibility of parole, and as you mentioned, all their federal and all their appeals were exhausted. Let's talk about your book, the Menendez murders when it came out before we talk about this new evidence you uncovered and the time they elapsed over that period and what the Menendez brothers, separated in different prisons did with their time.
Okay, well, so Eric lahmannendas were actually sent to separate perissons, even though they'd have to be placed at the same facility, and the other county Promotion Comport had recommended they'd be sent to the same facility. And on the day they were sentenced July second, nineteen ninety six, the Beverly Hills Police filed a last man in motion and they said the brothers had been coached conspirators in a crime, so they should be sent to separate facilities. Because they might
conspire to commit a crime in the future. And so for twenty two years, Eric and Lahomanendez never saw each other, never talk to each other. It was, you know, really a sad situation for them because they were extremely close. Then in April of twenty eighteen, they were reunited. There now for since then they've been at the same prison, r J down in prison near San Diego. And my book came out originally in September twenty eighteen, and then it was re released a few weeks ago on September tenth,
twenty twenty four. And we have new evidence from the documentary. I was co EP and co creator of Menandus plus Menudo Boys Betrayed, and part of that new evidence is the connection between Jose Menendez and the Latin boy band Menudo, and a former member of Menudo, Roy Roussello, was the primary character in our documentary, and he came forward for the first time and talked about how he had been raped by Jose Menendez when he was fourteen years old and in the band.
Let's get to the circumstances in which you were in contact with Marta Cano and this incredible discovery of a letter to Andy.
So the second piece of major evidence that I discovered besides the news story. In March twenty eighteen, I was on the final deadline from my book and I was spending a few days interviewing March Cano at her home in Florida and her son, Andy had sadly passed away from an accidental sleeping bill overdose in two thousand and three, and his bedroom had been untouched since he died, and she told me she had an addresser full of his personal papers, and I wanted to go through it, and
I was welcome to it. Within fifteen minutes, I found a that was written in late nineteen eighty eight, about nine months before the murders. And Eric Mannus wrote this letter to Andy Cano, and in the it was about five pages long. It talked about all kinds of things, but in the second page there's a key paragraph where he's complaining about the ongoing sexual abuse by his father
that was still going on. And so as soon as I saw the letter, I realized immediately this could be a major piece of hard evidence that could have a serious impact on the case. And so we actually held a book another month and I was able to write a new chapter about The letter was the closing chapter of the book, and I hand carried that letter myself on a plane from West brom Beach to Oakland to see the appellate attorney Cliff Gartner, and Cliff Gardner locked
a letter in his safe. And now the brothers through their televison journeys at Governor and Mark Ercros while the rit of Habeas corpus the day after our documentary Menezes Meneu came out in May of twenty three, and the habeas position the purpose is to vacate the brother's nineteen ninety six convictions based on new evidence that was not available at the time Eric Delile were on trial in nineteen nineties.
Now let's get to Netflix's Monsters and a Newsweek article that just happened, just occurred a few days ago, and it's entitled Menendez Brothers Reporter slams Monsters fictionalized Inaccuracies. So let's get to the major inaccuracies that are portrayed in Netflix Monsters and your opinion about Ryan Murphy and his inclusion of some of these fictional laws things that are part a major part of this film series.
Well again, Monsters is a scripted fictionalized series very loosely based on real facts. But there are some really egregious scenes in that TV show, And the problem is that most people, most viewers actually don't know the difference between a TV show, a scripted series, and a documentary that goes with the facts. And so the problem with Monsters. The most outrageous scene is that Eric Lahman and has had an ancestuous relationship that is false. That never happened.
I know that never happened. You know, it might have come from a rumor from Dominic toun, but Ryan Murby said that he relied on the reporting and the articles of Dominic Gunn and those articles were full of rumors and innuendo and falsehoods. So get let me give you two examples of things that were totally false in that series,
the opening two scenes. The opening scene has Eric Lyle writing in a limo on the way to a memorial service at the Director's Guild on the Sunset Strip in la and Lyle is talking about that he's wearing his father's shoes and he's flexing a pair of brown test and loafers, And in reality, that was based on the testimony of a woman named Margie Eisberg, who was Jose's personal assistant at Live Entertainment, And I found out that I was working for one of the local LA's TV
stations covering the second trial, and I found a videotape and it showed Lyle walking into the DGA memorial service and he was wearing a pair of green cowboy boots. So, in other words, I believe Margie Ice were totally made up that whole story about I'm wearing my father's shoes. You know, I've grown into it, you know, I you know,
that's what I'm doing. The second scene in the series was about Eric is watching a TV movie about the Billionaire Voice Club and he actually says gee, and Lyle walks in the room and Eric says, Gee, why don't we come our parents like the guys in the Billionaire
Voice Club movie? And the only problem with that is the Billionaire Voice Club mini series ran on two nights in April July of nineteen eighty nine, and I found out that onloadch two nights, Eric Lyle were actually at a tennis camp in Tampa, Florida, and I interviewed the director of the tennis camp and he told me that everybody camp had to be in their rooms with their lights out at nine o'clock every night. So the Billionaire bots Plumb mini series ran from nine to eleven PM
on NBC Network nationally on those two nights. So in other words, there's no way that the brothers saw that movie. And so that's about as inaccurate as you can get. And that's actually in my book. What you might think that the writers from Monsters probably read my book. I know that some of the actors, did you know those are just I mean, that's the opening two scenes of
the series, and they're dead wrong. So I actually binge the entire nine hour series the night it became available here in la I have a legal pad full of notes, you know that about the inaccurate scenes in the series. But once again, it's a scripted series, so they're under no obligation to tell a truthful story, and they didn't. They took just outrageous liberties, and what you see in that series, more than half of it is false.
It's also the utter portrayal of their again utter remorselessness over this crime, and it shows all kinds of scenes where you can only conclude that the portrayal is that they're brilliant actors, these two boys, including all of the testimony at trials at the first trial, but also that they are just remorseless, cunning, pre medic state killers.
That they are monsters. Well exactly. I think the actors Cooper Cutch and Nicholas Chavez are wonderful actors. I highly recommend episode five of the series, which is a solo camera and Cooper Cutch for thirty or five minutes where he's talking about the you see endured and he's talking to Leslie Abramson and the camera is focused in on Cooper Cutch and it is aemy worthy material. So there are moments in Monsters that are incredible, but overall it's
just a joke. It's a fantasy. Most of the scenes never really happened. And that's the problem is that people don't know the difference scripted series versus documentary, and so people see things, you know, on a TV series and they just assume that that's the truth those events really happened.
Now to counter that, Netflix has this practice of I don't know if the counter it, but Netflix has released October seventh.
This interview is.
October eighth, October seventh, they released the companion, the Netflix documentary called The Menendez Brothers and you have you're featured prominently in this documentary. What about that documentary? What do you think people that take the time to watch this documentary, what will they think?
Well, I believe that people that watch Monsters first and then they watch the Bananda's documentary are going to have whiplesh because they're going to go from one extreme to the other, you know, from Ryan Murphy's interpretation of the story based on you know, rumors and falsehoods to hearing the facts from the Vennis brothers. I shot a six hour interview for the documentary, and so I haven't seen
it yet, but I know that I'm in it. I know the brothers talking to I've certainly seen all the posts on social media in the past couple of days. I believe it's an accurate telling of their story. So how strange that the same network and Netflix would have this, you know, bizarre scripture series come out September nineteenth, and then several weeks later that they would come out with a documentary that totally has a different point of view, But they did.
I think it's ironic that the initial series, which reports are that about over twenty million people have viewed so far, and that's just a released on September nineteenth. You say, ironically the series, that the film series has brought attention to the fact that the brothers were sexually abused despite all of the other fabrications and portrayals that took you know, ample license in that film ironically has brought people to view sexual abuse as legitimate.
Well, that's the silver lighting behind Monsters. That people are talking about Imanen's brothers, not only in the States but all over the world. And that's great because people are trying to Now people are interested in learning the actual facts about the case. There's been a severe backlash two Monsters. Ryan Murphy has been called out by not just me but other people about scenes that are totally inaccurate or
just playing made up. So people are turning to books and documentaries and going back and finding out the facts of this case, and they're learning a very different story than Ryan Murphy.
Per So, now give us the announcement. That must have surprised you because we were scheduled to have this interview on October third, and that was delayed because of the announcement. Tell us about this announcement and what it means to you and what it means to the brothers.
Tell us about it. Well, it's incredible that La County DA George Gascone had a news conference a few days ago and he announced that his office was seriously reviewing the evidence in the Habeas corporate petition that was filed in May twenty twenty three, the day after Menetta's plus Maneuver Boys Betrayed came out. Basically, George Gascone said, my office is carefully reviewing the new evidence. We may have a decision at the end of November about what we're
going to do about this case. Now, the Menna's appellant attorneys are hoping that the brothers there will never be a third NN's trial. It's thirty years later, half the witnesses are dead or have to mention, Do the La County taxpayers really want to spend twenty twenty five million dollars to reconstruct a thirty year old case if you can even do that, of course not so. What the apoliticans journeys they're hoping for is that the brothers will be resentenced to time served and that they will be
let out of prison. You know, it's been thirty four years and six months. That's more time than many people serve for committing horrible crimes against strangers in California. And I believe Eric and Lyolmanendez killed their lifelong abusers. So it's time to send them home. It's time to let them out, and I hope that that happens soon.
It seems from the announcement though, that Gascon is talking about that for the conditions for them to be released also included proof of their rehabilitation behind bars, and as you write in this book, they have exemplified model inmates in prison and have done things to benefit others in prison and have a absolutely impeccable record behind bars.
Well, Eric and Letelmanendez have become really valuable members of
their inmate community. They teach classes. They are involved in what's called the Green Space Project, where they are painting an incredible, incredibly large mural on the walls of their prison yard at Echo at RJ Downan, and they're also constructing a garden all from the donated materials in the center of this prison yard which used to be brown dirt, and it's going to be like an oasis with fountains and greenery, and the prison officials have told me the
Grin Space project has not only had a positive impact impact on the inmates, but it's also having a positive impact on the prison step, the guards and the staff at the prison, and so also both brothers are counseling other inmates in their prison community who have our survivors of sexual abuse when they were kids, and so Eric Lahmanand's have devoted their life to helping other people. And it's amazing what they've done. And I think it's an example of what will happen if they are let out
that I believe they will. They will to devote their lives to helping other people. When I met them, they were eighteen twenty one. Now they're fifty three and fifty six. As I said a moment ago, it's time to let them out, set them free, let them go home to their families, and they are still going to have very productive lives and still be of service and helping people.
Yes, so I think you and Lyle and Eric and the family that's been supportive of the brothers will be highly anticipating the decision November twenty six. I want to Thank you so much for coming on and talking about the Menendez murders, your updated edition, the shocking, untold story of the Menendez family and the killings that stunned the nation, including your incredible brucial evidence that has been the catalyst
for this new hearing. I believe, Robert. Can you tell us about your website and if you can do any social media for people that want to find out more about this case and your work.
Sure. I have a website title is url is Menendez Murders dot com. I'm on Twitter, my handle is at Menendez Rand. I'm on Instagram and TikTok at. I'm Robert Rand. I post daily on Instagram and I'm very active on Twitter. But I basically do a blog daily about the latest in the case. So people are welcome to follow me on social media and keep up on, you know, inside information and the latest on the case. That sounds great.
Thank you so much, Robert Rand for coming on and talking about the Menendez murders, updated edition, the shocking, untold story of the Menendez family and the killings the stunn the nation. Thank you so much for this interview, and you have a great evening and good night.
Thank you for having me on. I appreciate it, Ben, thank you so much. Good Night, good night,