Created by Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is a scripted Netflix series depicting the lives, crimes, and traumas of the Menéndez brothers, as well as the people who were impacted by their actions.
In case you didn't know, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is a part of the overall Monster anthology franchise created by Murphy on Netflix. Thus, it is the second installment that succeeds 2022's Dahmer -- Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story starring Evan Peters as the titular character.
The Menéndez brothers at the center of Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story are portrayed by Nicholas Alexander Chavez (Lyle Menéndez) and out gay actor Cooper Koch (Erik Menéndez). The cast also includes Javier Bardem as their father, José Enrique Menéndez; Chloë Sevigny as their mother, Mary Louise "Kitty" Menéndez; Ari Graynor as their lead defense attorney, Leslie Abramson; and Nathan Lane as the high-profile journalist Dominick Dunne.
While the plot of this Netflix show is contained within nine episodes, many people involved in this case are still alive -- such as the Menéndez brothers themselves. And as a result of this being a hit series with a global reach, audiences have a renewed interest and curiosity about the real-life people portrayed in it.
Keep scrolling to read the full timeline and latest updates on the Menéndez brothers and the other real-life individuals who were fictionalized on Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, which is streaming on Netflix.
Editor's note: This article was updated on August 22, 2025 to include new reporting and updated information. The original story was published on October 4, 2024.
Lyle and Erik Menéndez murdered their parents, Kitty and José Menéndez, on the evening of August 20, 1989.
The brothers reportedly "loaded and reloaded their 12-gauge Mossberg shotguns 14 times in the TV room of the family mansion" in Beverly Hills (via The Wrap). José and Kitty Menéndez were watching The Spy Who Loved Me -- the 10th film (starring Roger Moore playing the 007 agent) in the James Bond series of movies.
Per CBS News, the Menéndez brothers reportedly called 911 and claimed that they arrived home to find that their parents had already been murdered. It wasn't until March 8, 1990 that Lyle and Erik Menéndez were arrested for the murders.
Kypros/Getty Images
(L-R) Erik Menéndez's mug shot from August 2002; Joseph Lyle Menéndez's mug shot from July 2003.
Yes, Lyle Menéndez and Erik Menéndez are together at the same prison in California: the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility (RJD), which is located near San Diego. However, they weren't always allowed to live under the same prison unit.
Given that they were considered partners in crime, the Menéndez brothers were "deliberately kept apart" at different facilities, as reported by BBC News. They had one last chance to see each other in 1996, but were subsequently kept in completely different prison facilities for the 22 years that followed.
The Menéndez brothers only reunited at the same prison in 2018, when they "reportedly 'burst into tears' upon their first meeting" each other at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, which was reported by ABC News at the time.
California Department of Corrections via Getty Images
Erik Menéndez appears before the parole board via teleconference at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility on August 21, 2025, in San Diego.
No, Erik Menéndez was denied parole on Thursday, August 21, 2025, as reported by ABC News. Erik, who's now 54 years old, has been in prison for 36 years since he and his brother, Lyle Menéndez, killed their parents.
Erik Menéndez was denied parole after two commissioners determined that he had "violated prison rules" and still "questioned him about why he committed the crime" of murdering his parents, The Guardian reports.
"Two things can be true: They can love and forgive you, and you can still be found unsuitable for parole," Robert Barton, one of two commissioners, explained. Barton added that Erik's "behavior in prison" was the main reason why he was not freed from prison.
No, Lyle Menéndez was denied parole on Friday, August 22, 2025, as reported by BBC News. Lyle was denied parole just one day after his younger brother, Erik Menéndez, was told the same thing.
Lyle and Erik Menéndez can reapply for parole in three years -- which, in their cases, means 2028. According to KTLA, this "three-year denial [is] considered a minimal term under parole standards."
Yes, the Menéndez brothers have two other legal paths to being freed. For one, there is a "clemency petition put before Gov. Gavin Newsom of California," The New York Times reports.
Otherwise, the publication outlines: "Lawyers for the brothers have filed what is known as a habeas petition, a vehicle for challenging unlawful detentions. Under the habeas petition, the brothers are arguing that two pieces of evidence discovered in recent years would have changed the outcome of the trials that led to their conviction."
Lyle Menéndez is currently 57 years old.
Born on January 10, 1968 in New York City, Lyle is three years older than his brother, Erik Menéndez.
Erik Menéndez is currently 54 years old.
Born on November 27, 1970 in Blackwood, New Jersey, Erik is three years younger than his brother, Lyle Menéndez.
Ronald L. Soble / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Erik and Lyle Menéndez in November 1989.
On October 3, 2024, former Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón said that he and his team were "reviewing new evidence and will make a decision on whether it warrants a resentencing" (via CNN).
Gascón referenced "new evidence that the brothers were molested, a move that could lead to their resentencing," as reported by the Los Angeles Times. While evidence of the Menéndez brothers being molested was presented during their first trial in 1993, the district attorney (DA) questioned if those findings were taken into consideration by the jury.
Gascón also noted that evidence of the Menéndez brothers being molested was "largely withheld during their second trial" in 1995.
"We're not ready to believe or not believe that information," the then-DA reportedly said. "But we're here to tell you that we have a moral and ethical obligation to review what is being presented to us and make a determination."
AP News reported on another layer related to the Menéndez brothers' case:
"Gascón, who is seeking reelection, noted that more than 300 people have been resentenced during his term, and only four have gone on to commit a crime again."
George Gascón -- who publicly supported a new hearing for the Menéndez brothers' case -- was defeated by Nathan Hochman. ABC7 reported that Hochman "campaigned for district attorney espousing a 'hard middle approach' to battling crime and scored a resounding victory over progressive incumbent George Gascón."
On December 3, 2024, the official Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office website announced that Hochman had been sworn in as the new DA and was focused on "eliminating former DA Gascón's special directives that prohibited or strictly limited the filing of certain charges and sentencing enhancements."
As a result, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic postponed the new hearing from December 11, 2024 to January 30, 2025 -- noting that he "rescheduled the hearing to give the new district attorney [Hochman] time to review the case," CNN reported.
Lyle and Erik Menéndez's new hearing date, set for January 30, was also not fulfilled. This time, the hearing was delayed due to the Los Angeles fires that ravaged through the city during most of January.
On February 21, 2025, a Menéndez brothers press conference was held by District Attorney Nathan Hochman to declare that he opposed the petition filed by Lyle and Erik Menéndez seeking a new trial, as reported by NBC News.
Specifically, Hochman argued that the "critical piece of evidence" added to the petition by the Menéndez brothers' lawyer "did not appear credible." For context, this new piece of evidence was a letter in which Erik seemingly confirmed he was sexually molested by his father in the months leading up to the murder of the Menéndez parents.
As outlined by CBS News, Hochman formally "asked a judge to deny the Menéndez brothers' court petition requesting a vacating of their convictions and a new trial -- one of three possible tracks to early release."
José Enrique Menéndez was 45 years of age when he was murdered. He was three years younger than his wife, Mary Louise "Kitty" Menéndez, who was also killed in their Beverly Hills home's family room in 1989.
According to The Today Show, José Enrique Menéndez was born in Havana, Cuba in 1944. He subsequently moved to the United States as a teenager to live with relatives in Pennsylvania. José Enrique went to Southern Illinois University on a swimming scholarship, and met his eventual wife, Mary Louise a.k.a. "Kitty," while in college.
The parents of the Menéndez brothers got married on July 8, 1963. However, they didn't have their first child, Joseph Lyle Menéndez, until 1968.
Mary Louise "Kitty" Menéndez was reportedly 47 years old at the time when she was killed. Though she definitely kept a lower profile than her husband, it's been widely reported over the years that she was born in 1941.
Lyle Menéndez and Erik Menéndez were arrested in March 1990 -- six months after their parents' murders.
As outlined by CBS News, the Menéndez arrests happened after the Beverly Hills Police Department was tipped off by a very "unlikely source": Judalon Smith, described as "the girlfriend of a psychologist who Lyle and Erik Menéndez had been talking to."
Lyle Menéndez, who was in Los Angeles living in the Menéndez family's Beverly Hills home, was promptly arrested on March 8, 1990.
In turn, Erik Menéndez had been at a tennis tournament in Israel at the time, so his arrest only took place on March 10, 1990 (two days after Lyle). As noted by ABC7 Los Angeles, Erik was surrendered at the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) as soon as he landed back in L.A.
Ted Soqui/Sygma via Getty Images
Erik Menéndez and Joseph Lyle Menéndez on trial.
The Menéndez brothers' first trial occurred between July 20, 1993 and January 28, 1994.
Lyle Menéndez was the first brother to testify in the trial, claiming that he was "sexually abused by his mother and father."
According to CBS News, Lyle explained that "his father began sexually abusing him when he was only 6 years old" and only "stopped sexually abusing him when he was 8."
When Erik Menéndez testified, he claimed that their father's sexual abuse "never ended for him." Once he turned 18, Erik finally opened up to Lyle about their father's lifelong abuse.
It's worth noting that the Menéndez brothers "were tried together but had separate juries to determine their sentences," as written on Forbes.
At the end of that first trial, however, "the judge declared a mistrial" given that "the jurors couldn't agree on whether the brothers should be convicted of manslaughter because of the alleged abuse, or [convicted of] first-degree murder."
The second trial for Lyle Menéndez and Erik Menéndez started on October 11, 1995.
Kim Kulish/Sygma via Getty Images
Judge Stanley Weisberg during the Lyle and Erik Menéndez trial.
The Menéndez brothers' second trial took place over the course of five months and was presided over by Judge Stanley Weisberg. Furthermore, as reported by Time magazine, Weisberg took a very different approach to this trial.
Firstly, the judge "brought in only one jury to decide the brothers' fate." Secondly, he didn't allow the trial to be televised. Thirdly, Weisberg limited the number of testimonies related to claims that the Menéndez brothers had been victims of sexual abuse. Last but not least, the judge reportedly "prohibited the jury from voting on manslaughter charges instead of murder charges."
Lyle Menéndez and Erik Menéndez were convicted of murdering their parents on March 21, 1996, which was reported by The New York Times.
A subsequent NYT report from July 3, 1996 explained that the Menéndez brothers were "sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole." In his sentencing, Judge Weisberg expressed that he "believed" that Lyle and Erik "carefully decided to kill both parents."
Many reports on Judge Stanley Weisberg described his rulings as "controversial, as outsiders continued to criticize his legal decisions" (via Us Weekly), underscoring that he also presided over the polarizing case of Rodney King's beating by police officers in 1991.
According to In Touch Weekly, Weisberg retired in 2008 after "more than 20 years of service" and started living a life away from any media attention.
MIKE NELSON/AFP via Getty Images
(L-R) Joseph Lyle Menéndez, Erik Menéndez, and attorney Leslie Abramson on trial.
Leslie Abramson, the criminal defense attorney who represented Lyle and Erik Menéndez on trial, is turning 81 years old as of October 6, 2024.
Abramson became a high-profile lawyer following her time defending the Menéndez brothers. She actually even wrote a book, The Defense Is Ready: Life in the Trenches of Criminal Law, released in 1997 under the Simon & Schuster publishing company.
People reports that Abramson "defended more than 50 people accused of murder" over the course of her career. And, according to the State Bar of California website, she held an active legal license in the state until 2023.
Abramson, at age 81, no longer lives the life of a public person. Therefore, it's hard to determine if she did or did not keep in touch with the Menéndez brothers in recent years.
Dominick Dunne passed away on August 26, 2009 at 83 years of age. Over the course of his life, however, Dunne remained a very popular and successful writer, as noted in his obituary published in The New York Times.
Besides covering various high-profile criminal cases involving people such as O. J. Simpson, William Kennedy Smith, and Michael Skakel, Dunne was known for producing the 1970 gay film The Boys in the Band -- which received a new version in 2020 by Ryan Murphy and was released on Netflix -- and the 1971 award-winning movie The Panic in Needle Park.
Dunne also became a frequent contributor to Vanity Fair and made several TV appearances to discuss criminal cases that he had covered. A documentary film titled Dominick Dunne: After the Party was released in 2008 and is available for streaming on Prime Video as of this writing.
This article originally appeared on Out: Menéndez brothers & the real people of 'Monsters': Where are they now?