Menendez Juries’ Job Complex, Prolonged : Courts: Deliberations have gone on for 14 and 16 days. But attorneys in the case say they are not surprised.

After a 22-week trial, it took a Los Angeles jury 29 hours to acquit John DeLorean of 15 counts, including racketeering, fraud and tax evasion.

The Menendez brothers’ murder trial also took 22 weeks. But today is Day 16 of deliberations for the Lyle Menendez jury, and Day 14 for the separate jury weighing the fate of younger brother Erik Menendez at the Van Nuys courthouse.

And there is no indication that a verdict is near--in a case that’s not even a whodunit. The brothers concede that they shot their wealthy parents Aug. 20, 1989, in the TV room of the family’s Beverly Hills home.

But the wait has not really been so long for such a big case, according to lawyers in the case and outside experts.

The lawyers said they expected long deliberations. Many of the facts in the case are in dispute. And the case pits the emotional pull of the defense--the brothers’ assertions that years of child abuse fed a fear that led them to kill--against the prosecution’s charges that hatred and greed inspired the killings.

The juries also have to measure the credibility of 101 witnesses and analyze hundreds of exhibits. That takes time and focus--something hard to muster with the distractions of the Christmas and New Year’s holidays.

In fact, court veterans said, the Menendez case affirms the only absolute truth when it comes to figuring out how long is long enough for jury deliberations:

There is no rule. Every case stands on its own.

“People who sit on juries look upon it as a real responsibility, maybe the most important job they’re ever going to have so far as a public responsibility is concerned,” said Warren L. Ettinger, a former municipal judge in private practice in Los Angeles.

“So I don’t think it’s any big deal that it’s taking this long,” he added. “Now if you call me back and the juries are in their 23rd week, I’ll say I’m a little puzzled.”

The longest deliberations in a California murder trial were just months ago--in the case of Dorothea Montalvo Puente, the Sacramento landlady accused of killing nine boarders.

In August, after a 10-month trial and 24 days of deliberations, jurors convicted her of three murders and deadlocked on six counts.

That broke the record set in the 1989 “Night Stalker” trial, in which the jury deliberated 22 days before finding Richard Ramirez guilty of 13 murders.

Some non-murder cases, however, have taken a lot longer. Deliberations in the first McMartin Pre-School molestation case went on for nine weeks, producing an acquittal on most counts but a deadlock on others.

And some have taken a lot less. Deliberations in the state trial of the four Los Angeles officers charged in the beating of Rodney G. King took seven days. Deliberations in last year’s federal trial of the officers also took seven days, ending in two convictions and two acquittals.

In the Menendez case, deliberations have been interrupted several times.

Judge Stanley M. Weisberg called a closed-door hearing Wednesday to inquire about the “personal problems of an individual juror.” The flu has struck a few jurors. And both juries went home for three-day weekends over the holidays.

Two juries are deciding the case because some evidence was admissible against only one brother. Both panels have asked for large amounts of testimony to be read back--most of it the brothers’ testimony, underscoring what is likely to be the key to deliberations, the believability of Lyle and Erik Menendez.

“It’s a war of credibility,” defense attorney Leslie Abramson told Associated Press. “There are people who will simply choose not to believe them. People hate the idea of child abuse.”

Abramson said she expected jurors to be out at least three weeks.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Pamela Bozanich said prosecutors also were not surprised. “Cases like these often take considerable time,” she said.

Although the brothers admit killing their parents, jurors must decide among four verdicts in each slaying: first-degree or second-degree murder, and voluntary or involuntary manslaughter.

Weisberg ruled that the facts of the case did not warrant giving jurors the option of outright acquittal. But jurors could still ignore the instructions and acquit the brothers.

The complex legal choices almost certainly add to deliberations, experts said.

“It’s not just an up or down, yes or no verdict,” said Gerald Uelmen, dean of the Santa Clara University Law School. “They’re looking at a great number of lesser-included offenses. That takes a great deal more sifting and sorting out.”

“Well, there really is one hard-and-fast rule,” said Howard Weitzman, one of DeLorean’s lawyers. “The hard-and-fast rule is that you can’t tell. You can’t tell anything--even from body language and outward appearance what direction the jury is really going, what the result will be. . . .

“All you can do is wait.”