New Menendez Scenario Suggested : Courts: Private pathologist testifies for prosecution and says the brothers shot their parents in the legs to make it look like a gangland killing.

Erik Menendez hung his head, Lyle Menendez averted his gaze and some of their supporters ate candy in court Monday as jurors were shown dozens of gruesome photographs of the shotgunned bodies of parents Jose and Kitty Menendez.

So began the final phase of the prosecution’s case in the retrial of the Beverly Hills brothers, accused of murdering their parents in the den of the family’s mansion six years ago.

Deputy Dist. Atty. David P. Conn called private pathologist Robert D. Lawrence to the witness stand, bypassing the Los Angeles County deputy coroner who performed the autopsies and who had testified during the brothers’ first trial.

That trial ended last year with jurors deadlocked between murder and manslaughter convictions.

Lawrence’s testimony signaled the prosecution’s revised scenario for the crime scene: The brothers executed their parents, prosecutors say, then shot them in the legs to suggest organized crime involvement, thereby deflecting suspicion from themselves.

Erik and Lyle Menendez, now 24 and 27, respectively, admit shooting their parents, but claim they fired in a blind panic out of fear that their parents would kill them first. The defense is expected to call mental health experts to contend that the brothers suffered from “battered person syndrome” that distorted their perception of danger.

Using wooden mannequins pierced with metal rods to demonstrate his conclusions about the angles of the shotgun blasts, Lawrence testified that Jose Menendez was struck four times, while Kitty Menendez was hit with nine shotgun blasts.

The wooden models clearly demonstrate that the couple were shot in the head and extremities but suffered no wounds to their torsos.

Lawrence also told the jury that Jose Menendez was seated on the sofa when he was shot, and that a shotgun wound to the thigh was inflicted after Menendez had died. The fatal shot, he said, was fired at point-blank range into the back of Jose Menendez’s head.

Most of the shots to Kitty Menendez occurred when she was lying on the floor, and some shots to her arms, hand and shoulder indicate she may have been cowering, Lawrence said.

Testimony during the first trial indicated that Jose Menendez was struck six times and Kitty Menendez 10 times. Deputy Coroner Irwin L. Golden, who performed the autopsies, said during the first trial that he couldn’t determine how many shots were fired, their sequence or whether the brothers reloaded.

Lawrence was called to lay a medical foundation for the prosecution’s high-tech reconstruction by Failure Analysis Associates, a Silicon Valley firm, which could begin today.