Menendez Trial Turns Contentious for Expert : Courts: Prosecutors try to shake psychologist testifying for the defense. She contends that Erik Menendez has no reason to lie about being abused.

Prosecutors on Thursday challenged a defense expert’s insistence that Erik Menendez has “no reason to lie” about being molested as a child, even though he lied repeatedly to authorities and is now on trial for his life.

That “doesn’t affect my opinion,” Salt Lake City-based psychologist Ann H. Tyler said during a lively cross-examination in Van Nuys Superior Court.

“The fact that he lied about not being involved in killing his parents doesn’t mean his whole life is a lie, or that the abuse is a lie,” Tyler said as Erik Menendez, sitting next to his lawyers, dropped his head on his chest.

Erik, 22, and Lyle Menendez, 25, are charged with first-degree murder in the Aug. 20, 1989, shotgun slayings of Jose Menendez, 45, a wealthy entertainment executive, and Kitty Menendez, 47. The brothers say they lashed out in self-defense after years of abuse.

Tyler spent Thursday morning completing her clinical answering of defense attorney Leslie Abramson’s questions about the “psychological maltreatment” of Erik Menendez.

She gave her own interpretation of many incidents described earlier by the brothers, such as how Kitty Menendez would wake her younger son from nightmares by placing him in a tub and running cold water over him. Tyler called that “actively terrorizing” the boy.

In the afternoon, Tyler faced the sharp questioning of Deputy Dist. Atty. Pamela Bozanich and soon was shouting her answers into the microphone.

Tyler said she had been paid $13,000 to testify--at $100 per hour--not counting the time she had put in the past 10 days. The fees are paid by taxpayers under state law that funds certain experts for defendants in capital cases.

Bozanich challenged the psychologist’s assertion, under defense questioning, that Erik Menendez had been denied “medical . . . and educational attention.”

Presenting Tyler with Erik Menendez’s childhood medical records, the prosecutor pointed out that someone had taken him to the doctor over and over again--even for an infected ingrown toenail.

“He wasn’t taken for psychological things,” Tyler said.

“But he was taken to Dr. Oziel,” Bozanich said, referring to Beverly Hills psychologist L. Jerome Oziel.

Erik Menendez began seeing Oziel after being involved in two burglaries in Calabasas in 1988 that netted about $100,000 in property--all of which was returned or paid for by his father.

Bozanich asked if Tyler considered the burglaries significant. Tyler called them “adolescent acting-out behavior.”

Pressing, Bozanich asked if they were criminal behavior. Tyler said: “I saw that as a plea for help.”

On Oct. 31 and Nov. 2, 1989, two months after the killings, both brothers confessed to Oziel. He was a key prosecution witness, testifying for six days.

As Bozanich kept peppering Tyler with questions, and Tyler’s answers kept getting louder, defense lawyer Abramson joined the fray: “I would object to counsel referring to Dr. Tyler as ‘ma’am.’ It’s disrespectful.”

“Overruled,” Judge Stanley M. Weisberg said.

Bozanich asked if abuse “excuses criminal conduct.”

“I don’t know what you’re referring to as criminal conduct.”

Killing one’s parents, Bozanich replied, adding: “In this case, do you think child abuse excuses criminal conduct?”

“The jury is here to make that determination,” Tyler said.

“You’re saying you won’t answer my question?”

“I can’t answer that question because I think it’s not right,” Tyler said.