Dominick Dunne Now: The Menendez brothers’ case was the top headline in all the news channels in America back in 1996 when they killed their parents with shotguns in their Beverly Hills house. Josephy Lyle Menendez, the elder brother, born on 10th January 1968, and was 21 years old when he, along with his younger brother Erik, murdered his parents. Erik Galen Menendez was 3 years younger than Lyle an was born on 27th Nov, 1970.
The incident shook the Americans as this was the highest extent of crime committed in American history. In 1996, both brothers were convicted for killing Jose and Kitty Menendez and sent for lifetime imprisonment with the possibility of payroll. During the trial, both brothers kept on stating that they killed their parents with the fear of getting killed by their parents when they threatened them to expose the sexual abuse going on within the house.
As per Lyle’s claim, since he was 6 years old, his father started sexually abusing him which kept on getting to higher levels as time passed. When he was 7 years old, he didn’t feel it right and asked his father to stop doing it. This is the time Jose stopped abusing Lyle but then he started doing it with the younger son, Erik.
Both of them were constantly humiliated by their parents even till they grew as an adults. One day when Lyle got to know, that Erik is still being sexually abused by his father, he couldn’t bear it anymore. He immediately went to him and threatened him to stop, or else he would expose him in front of everyone. This is the moment they both felt that their parents might kill them as their mother, Mary Louise Kitty was also aware of the sexual abuse happening in the house by their father.
Story: The Menedez Brothers’ Case Details
Finally, they both decided to kill the parents before they could do so with them and shot in the face multiple times with shotguns and then planned it in such a way that there was no evidence about the killer.
For many weeks police were trying hard to gather some clues to get to the killer but there was no progress. Erik wasn’t able to bear the thought that they had killed their parents so he went to confess the same with his therapist, Dr Oziel.
This is the time when things turn against the brothers when police find out about the confession audio recordings and charge them with murders. This whole story was followed by many people in America and Dominick Dunne played an important role as a journalist who covered the entire Menendez brothers’ trial.
Dominick John Dunner, born in 29th Oct, 1925 and died in 26th Aug, 2009 was an American writer, producer as well as an investigative journalist. Back then, Vanity Fair was an American monthly magazine covering popular fashion, culture and current affairs. Dominick was a regular contributor to Vanity Fair magazine who also appeared on television to discuss crime cases.
In Netflix’s show, ‘Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story’, the character of Dominick is played by Nathan Lane, a Vanity Fair journalist covering the murder trial. Nathan is an American actor who generally plays comedy or drama roles and has performed in over 25 films including this one.
He made his professional debut in 1978 in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’. Out of 6 times being nominated for Tony Award, he has won three it.
