Analysis Shows Menendezes Planned Killing, Prosecutors Say

Six years after Jose and Kitty Menendez were shotgunned to death by their sons, prosecutors say a new high-tech analysis of more than 500 crime scene photographs taken at the couple’s Beverly Hills mansion shows the sons fired methodically and with premeditation.

The sons, Lyle and Erik, who stood to inherit $14 million, have admitted on the witness stand that they pulled the triggers.

But just as “why” was the dominant issue of the first trial, “how” seems destined to be a central issue of their second trial, for which jury selection began Wednesday.

At the 1993 trial, which ended with hung juries, the brothers claimed they blasted away randomly at their parents in a panic--a point the original prosecution team did little to refute. The brothers testified that they feared their parents were going to kill them for threatening to expose the sexual, physical and psychological abuse they endured.

Deputy Dist. Atty. David Conn told reporters that prosecutors hope to disprove the brothers’ version using the results of a reconstruction by Failure Analysis Associates, Inc., a Menlo Park firm that usually creates computer reconstructions of accidents.

While reluctant to disclose details, Conn said Roger McCarthy would testify that the parents were killed with premeditation, based on analyses by his company’s engineers of photographs of the Menendez parents’ fatal wounds, the angle at which the pellets entered their bodies and the sequence of shots.

But defense attorneys were skeptical and said they would fight the reconstruction.

Charles Gessler, attorney for Lyle Menendez, said outside court that computer enhancements should be viewed with skepticism, pointing out that similar technology can also be used to mislead.

Superior Court Judge Stanley M. Weisberg has yet to rule on whether the prosecution can use the reconstruction during the trial.