Disorder in the Court as Trial Starts : Media: Lurid details in the case against Erik and Lyle Menendez attract a mob of journalists, true crime writers, screenwriters and voyeurs when proceedings commence.

The trial of the Menendez brothers had not even started Tuesday and already things were getting ugly in the media center near the courtroom, a converted children’s playroom where the walls are covered with fanciful paintings of mermaids.

Refusing to give up the table he was sitting on, distinguished NBC correspondent George Lewis argued with technicians from rival network ABC, who picked up the table they wanted and dropped the red-faced reporter to the floor.

“I’m sitting here and they throw my equipment down,” said Lewis, a veteran of the 1989 Tien An Men uprising in Beijing.

Decorum was not always the order of the day as more than 60 TV and radio reporters, producers, sound technicians and newspaper reporters descended on the Van Nuys courthouse Tuesday to cover one of the year’s most lurid and sensational trials: that of Lyle and Erik Menendez, accused of killing their parents in their Beverly Hills mansion in 1989.

The trial’s opening day attracted a dizzying assortment of journalists, true-life crime writers, screenwriters and voyeurs, each hoping to catch a glimpse of the brothers.

“Two kids on top of the world threw it all away for greed,” said Richard Brassner, one of about 30 people waiting in line for a prized courtroom seat. “It’s an absolute travesty of human life.”

Vanity Fair correspondent Dominick Dunne, a dapper New Yorker wearing wire-rimmed glasses, reveled in the details: Two pampered and handsome young men, an execution-style killing and the brothers’ lavish spending habits in the weeks after the killings.

“I think we’re going to be shocked by what we’re about to hear,” he said moments before the opening statements began. “I love covering trials.”

For others, stepping in the courtroom was a bit like walking into a 90-minute, made-for-television drama. Indeed, the story of the Menendez family is so gripping, the facts of the case so tawdry, that it was easy for many to forget for a moment that real people are involved.

“I hear this is a great movie,” said Burbank resident Cyndi Newton, 35, as she prepared to enter the courtroom, “It’s high drama.”

A few people in line were working on television and film scripts. Matt Tabak of Hollywood said he was attending the first day of the trial to “soak up atmosphere for a courtroom thriller I’m writing for Island Pictures.”

The presence of at least two people working on books about the case did not sit well with the dozen or so newspaper reporters denied access to the small courtroom.

“We’re pissed off because those authors are in there,” said Elka Worner of United Press International.

Worner and most of the other reporters had to watch the proceedings at the media center, half a block away. They gathered around a TV monitor to watch the opening statements, captured by a remote-control camera.

The reporters quickly discovered that trying to describe the events inside the courtroom by watching a monitor wasn’t going to be easy. What color, they wondered, was Lyle’s sweater?

“It’s white,” said one reporter, squinting at the television as he tapped at his laptop computer.

“No, it’s pink,” said another.

“Erik’s tie, it’s a paisley, isn’t it?” asked a third. “It’s a really bad tie.”

“Lyle’s wearing a pink shirt and a white cotton sweater,” one reporter said confidently.

“How can you tell it’s cotton?”

“Trust me.”

Later, it became apparent that the reporters had missed some key details. The camera didn’t capture Lyle’s tears as his attorney, Jill Lansing, delivered an emotional opening argument that described the years of abuse Lyle allegedly suffered at the hands of his father.

Tabak, the scriptwriter, saw the tears. From his second-row seat, he focused intensely on the two defendants. “What impressed me the most was how pale they are,” Tabak said of the brothers, who have been imprisoned since 1990. “I guess it’s from being in jail so long. They were like cadavers.”

Outside the courthouse, a dozen TV reporters and camera crews gathered near the front entrance, hoping to corral a Menendez relative, defense attorney or prosecutor for a quick, on-the-run interview. Their jobs were not made any easier by Superior Court officials, who banished the reporters from the front steps.

“The judge doesn’t want you trooping around the entrance,” Jerrianne Hayslett, a public information officer for the Superior Court, told the reporters. “It bothers the jury.”

KNBC reporter Laurel Erickson shot back: “What’s the difference between that and saying ‘Don’t cover the trial?’ We’re just doing our jobs.”

The debate might have continued a while longer, but two friends of the Menendez family appeared in the building’s courtyard. The assembled press corps turned from the court officials and swarmed toward the two relatives.

The couple, a man and a woman with a Cuban accent, declined to identify themselves. The reporters peppered them with questions anyway. What did they think about the child abuse charges, the reporters asked. Had they talked to the boys?

“I love the boys and I’m very confident they are OK,” the woman said. “I love them and I want them out of jail.”

Jostling for position, the camera crews inched forward, forcing the couple to take two steps back. A few seconds later they slipped around the reporters and escaped into the courthouse.