There’s a reason the Los Angeles prosecutor is re-evaluating the Menendez brothers’ case.

UPDATE (October 24, 2024, 5:30 pm): Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascón said at a news conference Thursday that he will ask the court to resentence Erik and Lyle Menendez and make them eligible for parole “immediately.”

Like millions of Americans, I have been fascinated by “Monsters: The Story of Lyle and Erik Menendez,” the hit Netflix series about the two Beverly Hills brothers who murdered their parents in 1989. Some of showrunner Ryan Murphy’s work is a little too cheesy for my taste, but he pulled it off this time, helped by a terrific cast led by Javier Bardem (José Menéndez, an executive entertainment). ) and Chloë Sevigny (his aimless wife, Kitty).

The series also seems to have a fan in George Gascón, the Los Angeles district attorney. Earlier this month, the 70-year-old prosecutor announced was reviewing Menéndez’s convictionswho saw them sentenced to life imprisonment in 1996. “Under the circumstances, I don’t think they deserve to be in prison until they die.” he has said.

The brothers could be released or face a lighter sentence. I’m not sure if that’s the right decision, but I have the uncomfortable feeling that Gascón is just using the Menéndez case as a last-ditch effort to escape. defeat on election day.

It must be recognized that Gascón has supervised 14 exonerations of unjustly convicted people. I just don’t think that’s happening here. Instead, a troubled politician is exploiting a tragedy. And make no mistake, Gascón is in big problems, behind law and order candidate Nathan Hochman by 30%, according to a recent survey carried out by the UC Berkeley Institute of Government Studies and the Los Angeles Times (with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points).

Hochman has said that the “timing is incredibly suspicious.” Yes, he also has a political interest here, like Gascón. And that’s what makes this whole thing so unseemly: the district attorney has turned the troubled brothers into a political prop.

An opportunity to change the narrative

Enter the Menendez case.

Last year, the brothers’ lawyers filed a writ of habeas corpus in which they stated that the murder was an act of “imperfect self-defense, after a lifetime of physical and sexual abuse by their parents.” They also presented new evidence, including a letter that Erik, then 13, wrote to a cousin: “Every night I stay awake thinking I might get in.” The petition also includes an accusation from Roy Rosselló, a former member of the boy band Menudo, that “he was anally raped twice and orally copulated by José Menéndez.”

Gascon announced his renewed interest in the Menéndez case on October 3. As Kathy Cady, lawyer for Kitty Menéndez’s brother, gradesThat same day, the Los Angeles Times published a new story about Shanice Amanda Dyer, a member of the Crips who had killed two people, apparently at random, when she was 17 years old. Gascón judged her as a minor, in accordance with his progressive philosophy. A short stint in prison and Dyer was out. He will soon be arrested for an alleged murder in Pomona.

Gascón’s office told me that he “has the legal right to request that the court resentence the brothers to a lesser sentence if they have been rehabilitated.” But for Cady, who says the prosecution has kept his client in the dark, this is yet another example of Gascón’s “callous disregard” for crime victims.

The Menendez brothers have developed a large online fan base in recent yearsand Gascón is clearly playing to a social media audience, as if his electorate were entirely in cyberspace. In an embarrassing TikTok clipraves about Sabrina Carpenter’s soundtrack. Some of the comments are quite revealing. “I have never been so involved in California politics until now,” wrote a user who said she was from Mississippi. There are many heart emojis and the like, without questioning their motives. At least online, Gascón has gotten the reaction he was looking for. The real world is another matter.

From Los Angeles to cop and the best cop in Los Angeles

Gascón used to be a police officer in Los Angeles, then became police chief in Mesa, Arizona, and finally became district attorney of San Francisco (a position vacated by now-Vice President Kamala Harris, who had been elected attorney general of California at that time). ). Then in 2019, Gascón announced that he would be moving to Los Angeles. where he would run for district attorney on a progressive platform.

My own opinion is that criminal justice reform is inherently at odds with the role of the prosecutor — is like asking the waiter to preach sobriety. Progressive prosecutors set themselves up for failure by radically changing the priorities of an office that most people expect to charge alleged criminals with crimes. And they often forget to explain their policies in a jargon-free manner.

Gascón never alleviated the anxieties of his critics, but instead provided them with more and more evidence, such as charge some serious crime suspects with misdemeanors or recommending Mental health treatment instead of prison. for offenders with a history of violence.

Well, you’re thinking, it’s entirely possible that Gascón is a deeply flawed prosecutor and politician. Still, it could still be right about the Menéndez case. Winning a second term could be the price we have to pay for the brothers to finally get the fair hearing they have long deserved. (Though there is no indication at this time that the Menéndez case has boosted Gascón’s poll numbers.)

Except there’s no reason to believe it was a miscarriage of justice. There is no doubt who killed Kitty and José Menéndez while they were watching television on a summer Sunday night. The cops didn’t take samples of the brothers’ gunpowder residue, as they should have, but there was no incompetence of the kind that would mark OJ Simpson’s impending trial.

Alan Abrahamson covered Menendez’s first trial (which allowed abuse allegations to be aired and ended in a hung jury; they were convinced in a second trial, which was more limited in scope) for the Los Angeles Times and concluded that “The brothers are skilled liars who prey on the emotions of those who do not understand the presence of evil in our world,” as he recently wrote in The Free Press.

Yes, we see the case differently than 30 years ago, when our ears were not so attentive to the abuse of boys and men. But the brothers were not condemned for considering themselves rich kids, which was the prevailing perception of them at the time. They went to prison for killing their parents. With shotguns. In cold blood. That was true then and it is true now.

During their two trials, the Menendez brothers told their story with practiced eloquence and seemingly genuine emotion. They were represented by some of the most talented defense attorneys available in Los Angeles. The jury heard the defendants and found them guilty. The case was closed. By cynically reopening it, Gascón is impugning the work of the very criminal justice system he supposedly represents. Angelenos deserve better.

This article was originally published in MSNBC.com