Kim Kardashian wants Erik and Lyle Menendez’s sentences to be reconsidered: ‘They are not monsters’

Following the release of the controversial, but popular dramatisation of Erik and Lyle Menendez’s crime and subsequent trial in Netflix’s Monsters, Kim Kardashian has called for the Menendez brothers’ sentences to be reconsidered.

Kardashian and the star of Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, Cooper Koch, previously visited the real-life killers at the Richard J Donovan Correctional Facility, in San Diego, California. 

The Menendez brothers were convicted of first-degree murder in 1996 and sentenced to life in prison, without the chance of parole, for shooting their parents in 1989. They have blamed their actions on years of abuse they claimed to have suffered at the hands of their father.

After The Kardashians and criminal justice reform advocate spent time with the brothers, Kardashian urged the legal system to reconsider their life sentences. In a personal essay for NBC News, the reality star said: “I have spent time with Lyle and Erik; they are not monsters. They are kind, intelligent, and honest men.”

Kardashian added that during their time in prison, the brothers “have earned multiple college degrees, worked as caregivers for elderly incarcerated individuals in hospice, and been mentors in college programs — committed to giving back to others”.

“When I visited the prison three weeks ago, one of the wardens told me he would feel comfortable having them as neighbours. Twenty-four family members, including their parents’ siblings, have released statements fully supporting Lyle and Erik and have respectfully requested that the justice system free them,” she wrote.

Kardashian went on to highlight that the murders of their parents “are not excusable”, nor was their behaviour surrounding the timeline of the crime. “But we should not deny who they are today in their 50s… I don’t believe that spending their entire natural lives incarcerated was the right punishment for this complex case.”

She also wrote that the brothers were denied a fair second trial and that the judge’s exclusion of evidence of abuse “denied Erik and Lyle the opportunity to fully present their case”.

The reality star’s essay comes following a report that prosecutors in Los Angeles have reviewed new evidence in the Menendez brothers’ case after their attorneys asked a court to vacate their conviction.