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Lyle and Erik Menendez continue to serve life sentences in prison for the brutal murders of their parents on August 20, 1989, when the brothers — then 21 and 18 — shot and killed them in their family’s Beverly Hills mansion. Thirty-five years later, Ryan Murphy‘s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story rekindled interest in the Menendez brothers. The 10-episode season aims to explore whether the siblings were cold-blooded killers seeking to inherit their family’s fortune, as the prosecution argued, or victims of a lifetime of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of their parents, as high-profile defense attorney Leslie Abramson claimed and the brothers continue to maintain.
Here’s everything to know about Abramson.
(Photo by Kim Kulish/Sygma via Getty Images)
Abramson Was Erik Menendez’s Defense Lawyer
Abramson took on Erik’s case roughly six months after the murder of his parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez. She defended the then-21-year-old Erik during his murder trial, which began in 1993.
“I’ve represented people charged with murder for 27 years, and these guys just don’t measure up to anybody else I’ve ever represented,” she told the Washington Post. “These are not murderers. These are troubled kids in a very difficult and grotesque home environment, and they cracked.”
As a fierce and fiery lawyer, she tried to convince jurors that Erik was not guilty of first-degree murder, despite his confession to killing both parents with his brother Lyle in 1989. This resulted in a mistrial, and the case returned to court in 1996. Although she fought tirelessly against the prosecution, both Erik and Lyle were ultimately sentenced to life in prison without parole. However, she succeeded in saving Erik from the death penalty.
The Washington Post didn’t hold back when writing about the tenacious lawyer in 1996, describing her as a “fire-eating, mud-slinging, nuclear-strength pain in the legal butt,” and noting her “frizzy yellow mess” of hair. At just “4-foot-11,” her “vintage, visceral eruption and wrath” captivated viewers on Court TV during the trial.
(Photo by Ted Soqui/Sygma via Getty Images)
Abramson Almost Lost Her License After the Menendez Case
Abramson faced an inquiry by the state bar after it was revealed during the trial that she asked Erik’s psychiatrist, Dr. William Vicary, to delete material she claimed was privileged from his notes. In February 1999, the State Bar of California closed its investigation of Abramson due to insufficient evidence, and she was found not guilty.
Abramson Was Twice Named Trial Lawyer of the Year
Abramson passed the bar in 1970 after earning her JD at UCLA. Her first job was at the Los Angeles County Public Defender’s Office, where she developed a reputation as a tough fighter for her clients. This reputation earned her the Trial Lawyer of the Year award from the L.A. Criminal Courts Bar Association — twice.
Abramson Published a Memoir
Available on Amazon, Abramson’s tell-all memoir, The Defense Is Ready: Life in the Trenches of Criminal Law, was published in 1997. The New York Times called it “a fascinating and infuriating chronicle of her most notorious murder trials,” in which she detailed her experiences with several infamous clients.
