Relatives Say Menendez 2 Are Innocent

An uncle of Lyle and Erik Menendez said Saturday that he and other relatives believe that the two brothers have been wrongly accused of brutally murdering their wealthy parents in their Beverly Hills mansion last August.

“We don’t think in the least circumstance that they are guilty of what they have been accused,” said Carlos Baralt, a New Jersey businessman who also is the executor of the Menendez family’s $14-million estate. “We are behind the boys 100%.”

He said he had heard there was circumstantial evidence pointing toward Lyle and Erik as suspects, but said he is confident that there is evidence pointing in other directions as well. “I really, really believe that the whole situation with the kids is something (police) have fallen into for lack of a better lead,” he said. “I feel they acted, perhaps, precipitously.

“The police don’t know these kids like I do,” Baralt said.

Lyle, 22, was arrested Thursday and is scheduled to be arraigned on Monday. His younger brother, Erik, 19, had been playing in a professional tennis tournament in Israel, but was reported heading back to the United States to surrender.

Beverly Hills police said Saturday that they had no information on when or where a surrender might occur. Lyle Menendez’s attorney, Gerald Chaleff, said that Erik wanted to accomplish the surrender with “a little dignity.”

Jose Menendez, 45, chief executive of Live Entertainment Inc. of Van Nuys, a video and music distributor, and his wife Kitty, 44, were slain in a barrage of shotgun blasts at close range as they watched television in the first-floor library of their Elm Drive home last Aug. 20. Their sons said they found the bodies when they returned from a night out.

Police said they had considered the brothers suspects for some time but only recently did they find “the glue” that brought the case together, an apparent reference to the seizure of tape-recorded conversations between the brothers and a psychologist that occurred after the murders.

Lyle and Erik are the sole heirs of their parents’ estate, valued at $14 million.

Baralt said he heard from Erik late Thursday night. According to the uncle, Erik had telephoned a roommate in California, learned of his brother’s arrest earlier in the day, and then called Baralt, the uncle said.

“I told him the best thing he could do was to turn himself in,” Baralt said Saturday.

He said Erik immediately agreed. He said he was not sure how the surrender would take place, but that it was being worked out through “a third party.”

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Correction

Mary Louise (Kitty) Menendez was 47 when she died, not 44.

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