Expert Says Menendez Scene Indicates Fear Led to Slayings : Trial: Barrage of random shots signifies ‘a high degree of emotion,’ FBI analyst testifies.

The killers of Jose and Kitty Menendez had “a high degree of emotion,” including fear, and engaged in “overkill,” according to testimony Friday by an expert who has studied homicide scenes for the FBI.

Ann Burgess, a professor of psychiatric nursing at the University of Pennsylvania, said her analysis of the Menendez shooting scene showed that it was disorganized, as if little planning had gone into the shotgun slayings.

Erik Menendez, 22, and his 25-year-old brother, Lyle, are charged with first-degree murder in the August, 1989, deaths of their parents. They could be sentenced to death if convicted.

Burgess said the large number of shots--15 in all--were random, not aimed at any one part of the body, which is symptomatic of “overkill” and a range of emotions by the killers.

“A large number more shots were fired than were necessary,” Burgess said. “That usually indicates a high degree of emotion.”

In her FBI research, she said, she established that shots fired at one part of the body, such as the sexual organs or face, indicate specific anger or rage.

“In this particular case, what analysis did you come up with?” defense attorney Leslie Abramson asked.

“My analysis is, the injuries were random,” she said. “They were to all parts of the body. There was not one area singled out.”

“And what conclusion could be drawn?” Abramson asked.

“That would speak to a more pervasive emotion than just one emotion such as anger or rage,” she said. “It would speak to a wider aspect such as fear.”

The Menendez brothers claim that they feared for their lives and killed in self-defense. The prosecution says they killed out of greed and hatred.

Burgess, the second defense expert to testify in the murder trial, said she began analyzing crime scenes for the FBI in 1980 as principal investigator on the bureau’s Crime Classification Project.

Burgess also said she is a nationally recognized expert in child sexual abuse and rape who, with another scientist, coined the phrase “rape trauma syndrome.” She is seen as key to the defense case.

Burgess testified for both juries in the dual murder trial after another expert, Ann Tyler, concluded her testimony before Erik Menendez’s jury.

Tyler testified Friday that Erik Menendez told her he believed his tormented childhood was “normal” and that other children experienced similar treatment.

“He thought that his interaction with his parents was the way other children interacted with their parents,” she said.

In an attack on her motives for testifying, Deputy Dist. Atty. Pamela Bozanich asked Tyler, a Utah psychologist, whether she was being paid in excess of $100,000 to testify.

“Oh, goodness no!” Tyler said, laughing. “I’m not getting paid very much. I’d make more money if I stayed home.”

Tyler, who was the subject of angry cross-examination Thursday, said under Abramson’s inquiry that she cut her usual fee in half for evaluating the Menendez case. She had said she was paid $50 an hour for travel and $100 an hour for her work in the case.

“Do you make more money in your clinical practice than you are making here?” Abramson asked.

“Yes,” Tyler said. “And I sleep better.”