Justices Delay Hearing for Menendez Brothers : Jurisprudence: State high court says dispute over use of alleged tape-recorded confessions as evidence must be decided first.

The California Supreme Court on Thursday indefinitely postponed a preliminary hearing for two brothers facing murder charges in the shotgun slayings of their multimillionaire parents in Beverly Hills.

The justices ruled that the hearing will not be conducted until the court has decided whether Lyle and Erik Menendez’s alleged confessions, tape-recorded by their psychologist, are admissible evidence against them.

The tapes, seized from therapist Jerome Oziel, are the key prosecution evidence against the brothers, accused of shooting to death their father, entertainment executive Jose Menendez, and their mother, Kitty, as they watched television on the evening of Aug. 20, 1989.

“We feel the issue of the tapes must be resolved before proceeding,” said Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office, which requested the postponement. “We don’t know what’s on those tapes. We feel we need to be able to review the tapes as possible evidentiary material.”

Gibbons said that after first agreeing to postpone the preliminary hearing, defense attorneys now say that want to have it.

Jill Lansing, attorney for Lyle Menendez, acknowledged that the defense had agreed not to go forward with a preliminary hearing until the tape issue was resolved.

“We waived the time for a preliminary hearing in October, 1990, when the issue of the tapes was first before the Supreme Court,” Lansing said. “At that time, the boys understood that the waiver could push their case into 1991.”

But the Supreme Court sent the case back to the Court of Appeal, Lansing said, and Thursday’s ruling means that the tapes issue won’t be decided “until probably seven months to a year.”

Lansing denied a prosecution contention that the defense is attempting to force the prosecution to trial without the tapes.

“They know better,” Lansing said, adding that the defense’s only reason for waiving the hearing is to move the proceeding from Municipal to Superior Court.

In Superior Court, Lansing said, additional motions can be filed and litigated. One such motion, she said, is a defense challenge of the search warrant that led to the seizure of the tapes from Oziel.

“If we can’t have a preliminary hearing, an acceptable alternative would be to set reasonable bail,” Lansing said, adding that Lyle, 23, and Erik Menendez, 20, have been in custody a year and a half.

“What does the defense want out of a preliminary hearing?” she asked. “More adverse publicity?”