TRUE CRIMELyle and Erik Menendez's Mom Kitty 'Knew All Along' About Their Father Jose's Sexual Abuse, Her Sister Reveals: 'She Didn't Protect Them'
Kitty Menendez's sister said the mom-of-two was 'aware' of her husband Jose's sexual abuse 'all along.'
Lyle and Erik Menendez's mother, Kitty, may have been aware of the alleged sexual abuse her husband, Jose, put her sons through prior to the boys murdering their parents in 1989.
During a recent guest appearance on Chris Cuomo's nightly NewsNation show, Cuomo, Kitty's sister, Joan VanderMolen, and Erik and Lyle's two cousins Karen VanderMolen-Copley and Tamara Goodell opened up about their knowledge of abuse in the Menendez household while advocating for the infamous siblings to be released from prison.
Kitty Menendez's sister, Joan VanderMolen, and Erik and Lyle's two cousins Karen VanderMolen-Copley and Tamara Goodell are advocating for the brothers' freedom.
Erik and Lyle are currently serving a lifetime behind bars at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego, Calif., after they were convicted in 1996 of their parents' double murder. While the brothers said they killed their parents in an effort to escape the alleged sexual molestation their father put them through for years, skeptics still argue the Beverly Hills natives slayed their mom and dad out of greed.
According to Joan, "Kitty said she knew all along" about Jose's sexual abuse of his sons — which reportedly dated back to when Lyle was 6 years old.
"It's just, it's beyond anything we can even describe right now, because it's hurt…it's so painful, and to think what the… Eric says now, it started when he was 6 years old and he was 18 before he before he got out of it, but that's a long time," Kitty's sister explained.
As for why Kitty would continue to allow the abuse to happen if she was aware of the inhumane acts, Joan explained: "I think that she was getting used to the money coming in and fame and fortune, and I guess her kids were not enough of a sacrifice for her. I don't know what else to say, because she, my, the Kitty I grew up with would never have allowed that to happen in her home. This was something she had to learn from Jose."
Lyle and Eric Menendez were 21 and 19, respectively, when they murdered their allegedly abusive parents in 1989.
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However, it wasn't just Kitty who knew Erik and Lyle were being assaulted by their father, according to their cousin Karen.
"We really did know that there was abuse at gut level, but as time goes on and, and we all talked to each other more and more, and it validates the fears and the gut level reactions that we had that solidify the knowledge that the sexual abuse actually did occur, because that's not something you want to believe," she confessed.
Lyle (left) and Erik (right) Menendez are currently serving life in prison for the 1989 murders of their parents, Jose and Kitty.
One of the main arguments made against Erik and Lyle surround their apparent lack of remorse in the days and months following their parents' murder.
When asked how the family views the brothers' behavior, Tamara noted, "if you look at how much pain that they endured, how much torture that they endured, how much abuse that they survived through, that came out in the way that they committed the act that they did, and at that point, given the status of where the family was at, my understanding of the behaviors and the actions after the act, was that it was learned behavior of what they knew what to do."
Lyle and Erik Menendez's case is being revisited with new evidence to potentially prove the sexual abuse they endured from their father.
Overall, Erik and Lyle's loved ones simply want one thing: for the Menendez brothers' sentence to be reduced to time already served.
"24 of us here today, all with our own stories and our own support for Erik and Lyle to be released. And all of us have different stories about the abuse at the hands of Jose and unfortunately, how Kitty did not protect them from her husband's abuse," Karen declared. "We spent some time today talking to the resentencing DA’s, and we are hoping, you know, hoping that they will be released soon, but we don't know."
