Lyle and Erik Menendez have 'shared purpose' for future if released from jail

Lyle and Erik Menendez have told of their “shared purpose” that they hope to follow if they are released from .

The brothers for killing their parents at their Beverly Hills home in 1989. They then infamously went on a shopping spree where they spent more than half a million pounds.

In court they were given life sentences without parole and now as they bid to have their sentences overturned, due to abuse from their father, the brothers have shed light on what they would do if they were free.

Speaking from prison Lyle talked about the work they have done inside where they have discussed trauma and healing, and he hopes to continue that.

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"We have pretty much a shared purpose," Lyle told "In terms of the victims community, we have for decades been involved with and a lot of our joy, a lot of our grief has come from that community."

And he continued: "We have a phrase we call 'speaking shame', it's helping people find their voice in their trauma. And we think that there's a hunger for that in the country and we would love to be a part of that and heal in that way." While in prison Lyle has studied sociology and received a bachelor’s degree from UC Irvine in 2024.

And his brother Erik has similar hopes if he is released from jail, where he says his aim is to help those with childhood trauma. "There are people that the system is failing and I want to help the people that the system is failing," Erik said. 

"Lyle and I aren't talking about leaving prison, should we be able to get out, and not looking back. Our lives will be spent working with the prison and doing the work we're doing in here out there."

The two brothers shot dead their parents Jose and Kitty Menendez on August 20, 1989, in their Beverly Hills mansion. Lyle was the one who called 911, with the brothers initially claiming the killing was Mafia-related or connected to their father’s business dealings.

Two months later, Erik told his psychologist, Jerome Oziel, that he and his brother killed their parents. They were eventually arrested and charged in their parents’ deaths.

The murder case captured the public’s attention. Coming on the heels of the trial, the nation was hungry for true crime TV. The brothers’ first trial was one of the first to be almost entirely televised on Court TV.

The Menendez’s first trial took place in 1993 with separate juries. Prosecutors argued they killed their parents for financial gain. The brothers’ attorneys never disputed the pair killed their parents, but argued that they acted out of self-defence after years of emotional and sexual abuse by their father.

Both trials resulted in a hung jury on all three counts for the killing of Jose and Kitty Menendez, and the conspiracy to commit murder. The juries were split over murder and manslaughter convictions.

At the second trial in 1995, the judge excluded a substantial amount of evidence presented in the first trial, including testimony from several family members who witnessed or heard about the abuse. Prosecutors doubled down on their claim that no abuse happened. A single jury convicted both brothers of three counts, including first-degree murder, plus lying in-wait and special circumstance allegations. They were sentenced to life without parole in 1996.

They are hoping for a resentencing hearing where a judge could reduce their sentences as they maintain they were sexually abused by their father and their mother enabled it. “My brother and I are cautiously hopeful,” Lyle told TMZ.