The 57-page court motion filed by the district attorney’s office, obtained by BBC News, includes a timeline of the case, an argument for why the Menendez brothers should be resentenced and details of their time behind bars.
The filing includes glowing recommendations from prison officials and various programmes the brothers launched behind bars that aimed to help other inmates, including those who were victims of childhood trauma and disabled or elderly inmates. It also includes the educational degrees both brothers received while serving their sentences.
All of this was done, the report notes, “without any expectation or hope of ever being released”.
It also includes the 30-year discipline records for both Erik Menendez and Lyle Menendez. Both brothers were cited for possessing a mobile phone in a cell they shared with other inmates.
Erik Menendez had several other violations, including two fights, in 2011 and 1997.
It notes that Lyle Menendez was never cited for any fights and had to be moved from the general population to the “special needs” area of the prison in 1997 because “he wouldn’t fight back when attacked”. He was cited twice for contraband – a lighter in 2013 and a new pair of Adidas sneakers in 1998 that a “female visitor brought him”.
“While incarcerated, Erik and Lyle Menendez have transformed and taken advantage of meaningful opportunities to mature, move beyond criminal thinking, repent, and become a productive community members,” the filing states, adding they are “ready to reenter society”.
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