Menendez Therapist Insisted Police Listen to Disputed Tapes, Court Told

A psychotherapist who treated two brothers charged in their millionaire parents’ murders was described in court Wednesday as shaking, frightened and demanding that police officers serving a search warrant listen to tapes he said would prove he was in danger.

Therapist Jerome Oziel has been the focus of defense efforts to suppress tape recordings in the case of Erik and Lyle Menendez. They are accused in the 1989 slayings of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez.

Oziel has said he was frightened, but Wednesday’s testimony from attorney Gary Mogil was the first graphic description of Oziel’s frantic demeanor when authorities served a search warrant on his home in early 1990.

Mogil said Oziel volunteered to take police to the bank where he had placed in his safe deposit box numerous tapes, including four dealing with psychotherapy sessions in which the brothers allegedly confessed to killing their parents.

Mogil, who had been appointed as “special master” to seize items listed in a search warrant, said he was accompanied by a prosecutor and two police officers who went with him and Oziel to the bank, then returned to Oziel’s home.

“When we went back to his home, Jerome Oziel insisted we play the tapes,” Mogil testified. He said that Oziel did not invoke the psychotherapist-patient privilege and instead began to play the tapes for everyone present.

“If Dr. Oziel had said these were confidential, we would have stopped,” said Mogil. “Quite the contrary, he demanded we play them. He said, ‘I want you to hear these so you will understand why I’m afraid for my life.’ ”