A timeline of Erik and Lyle Menendez’s case over the last three decades

<p>Lyle Menendez will face parole board a day after brother Erik was denied release. Follow every key event from arrest to parole hearings 35 years later</p><p>Erik Menendez was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/21/erik-menendez-parole">denied parole</a> on Thursday after serving decades in prison for killing his parents. Lyle Menendez, his brother, will be next to get a chance to plead his case in front of a panel of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/california">California</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/21/menendez-brothers-parole-hearings">state parole board</a> commissioners.</p><p>Erik and Lyle Menendez were sentenced in 1996 to life in prison for killing their father, José Menendez, and mother, Kitty Menendez, in their Beverly Hills mansion in 1989. They were 18 and 21 at the time. Defense attorneys argued the brothers acted out of self-defense after years of sexual abuse by their father, while prosecutors said the brothers killed their parents for a multimillion-dollar inheritance.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/22/erik-lyle-menendez-timeline">Continue reading...</a>