Menendezes Waive Right to Hearing : Slayings: Brothers’ attorneys say there is enough evidence to warrant a trial in parents’ deaths.

Lawyers for two Beverly Hills brothers accused of murdering their wealthy parents conceded Tuesday that there is enough evidence against their clients to warrant a trial and said the defendants would waive their rights to a preliminary hearing.

“We’d like to get this case moving,” said attorney Jill Lansing, co-counsel for Lyle Menendez. “These boys have been held in jail for 16 months without bail, and we’ve had no opportunity to tell our side of the story in court.”

Attorney Leslie Abramson, who represents Erik Menendez, concurred.

“We don’t expect this case to be dismissed at the preliminary hearing,” she said.

But prosecutors opposed the move, citing “legal and tactical reasons” for wanting a full preliminary hearing and noting that a decision on the admissibility of key evidence--tape recordings made by the brothers’ psychologist--is pending before the California Supreme Court.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Pam Ferrero told Beverly Hills Municipal Judge Charles Rubin she feared that the brothers would exercise their right to a speedy trial after skipping the preliminary proceeding, thereby forcing prosecutors to try the case without the crucial tapes.

District attorney’s office spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons said, “We want to have an opportunity to hear our evidence (the disputed tapes)” before deciding how to prosecute the case. And meanwhile, she said, “we do oppose the granting of bail.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Lester Kuriyama said the state high court is unlikely to decide the tape issue before October.

But Lansing, saying that the defense wants to get started on pretrial motions unrelated to the tapes, said the process “could well take until 1992.”

“Our position is that that would be a violation of due process,” she said, because the defendants are being held in the County Jail with neither bail nor a determination of their guilt or innocence.

Lyle Menendez, 23, and Erik Menendez, 20, were arrested in March, 1990, more than six months after the shotgun slayings of their parents, Carolco entertainment executive Jose Menendez, 45, and his wife, Kitty, 47. The couple were shotgunned repeatedly at close range in their Beverly Hills mansion as they relaxed in sweat suits, watching television and eating ice cream.

The brothers could be sentenced to death if convicted.

Rubin tentatively scheduled the preliminary hearing for Aug. 12.

But prosecutors said outside the courtroom that they will ask the state Supreme Court to issue a stay halting all proceedings until the tape issue is resolved.

Two lower courts have ruled that usually confidential conversations between therapist and patient are not protected in this case because the Menendez brothers allegedly threatened the psychologist, Jerome Oziel, and he subsequently revealed the communications to his wife and lover.

One tape contains the voices of both Menendez brothers; the remainder are notes dictated by Oziel of their alleged “confession” that they killed out of hatred for their hard-driving Cuban immigrant father.

The audiotapes are considered critical evidence, although prosecutors also have gun purchase records and communications between the brothers and others that allegedly incriminate them.

Sources close to the case say that the defense strategy is likely to center on contentions that the brothers were the victims of child abuse.