Relatives of the Menendez brothers advocated for their release ahead of a resentencing hearing scheduled for Friday.
Lyle and Erik Menendez’s aunt, Terry Baralt, broke her silence on her nephews’ murder case, telling ABC News in her first interview since the incident that “they are like the boys that I didn’t have.”
“When kids are little and they come to you, you fix the problem. I can’t help them… There is nothing I can do—just go visit them and cry when I leave,” she said. “This is why I don’t give interviews. It’s hard.”
The brothers were sentenced to life in prison without parole for the murder of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez, in 1989. Despite spending more than 30 years behind bars, they continue to push for their release.
Beralt is currently fighting colon cancer and fears that she may never get to see her nephews free from prison within her lifetime.
“It’s time—35 years is a long time,” she said. “It’s a whole branch of my family erased. The ones that are gone and the ones that are still paying for it, which were kids.”
Seven other family members joined Beralt in the interview to pressure for the brothers’ release. Their cousin, Diane VanderMolen, said that Erik asked her to relay a message to ABC News.
“They are truly, deeply sorry for what they did. And they are profoundly remorseful,” she said.
She added: “They are filled with remorse over what they did. And through that, they have become pretty remarkable people.”
The brothers’ cousin, Anamaria Baralt, said in a statement that “they’ve become the kind of men this system is supposed to help create. If rehabilitation doesn’t matter here, when does it?”
Last year, Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón asked a judge to lower the Menendez’s sentence.
“They have respectively served 34 years and have continued their educations and worked to create new programs to support the rehabilitation of fellow inmates,” said Gascón in a statement Oct. 2024.
This would have made their release possible, California law stating that if a person under 26 commits a crime, they are eligible for parole. Lyle and Erik were 22 and 18 years old respectively when they were convicted.
Yet his replacement, Nathan Hochman, filed a motion in March to withdraw Gascón’s request, saying that the brothers did not yet “fully recognize, acknowledge, and accept complete responsibility” for their crimes, according to the Associated Press.
Hochman said that since the “brothers persist in telling these lies for the last over 30 years about their self-defense defense and persist in insisting that they did not suborn any perjury or attempt to suborn perjury, then they do not meet the standards for resentencing.”
A judge will decide Friday whether or not to approve the withdrawal motion and if they will move forward with independent resentencing hearings for the Menendez brothers, which have been tentatively set for April 17 and 18.
Cooper Koch, who played Erik Menendez in Netflix’s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, was photographed turning up at Friday’s hearing to support the brothers. He was seen walking into court in Van Nuys, Los Angeles with Erik’s wife Tammi Menendez and stepdaughter, Talia Menendez.
In May 2023, the brothers submitted a petition for habeas corpus to the court, which Hochman has also filed a motion against, asking for another trial with updated evidence.
They also submitted a clemency plea to California Gov. Gavin Newsom, with independent parole board hearings to be held on June 13.
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