In prison will remain Eric and Lyle Menendez, the brothers convicted of killing their parents in Beverly Hills in 1989.

Yesterday, Friday, the California parole board, denied Lyle Menendez,‘s request to be released on parole. A similar decision was made Thursday for Eric. The Menendez brothers will be able to reapply in three years.

In 1996, they were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for killing their parents, Hoshe and Kitty Menendez, with a shotgun in their luxury mansion in Beverly Hills in 1989. In May a judge reduced their sentences, paving the way for them to seek their release on parole under California law because they were under 26 at the time they committed the crime.

Their trial was one of the first to be broadcast live on television, and their story was brought back into the public eye thanks to a television series and documentary released last year.

They insist they acted in self-defence

The brothers Menendez claim they acted in self-defense after suffering years of physical, emotional and sexual abuse at the hands of their parents.

After the emergence of the #MeToo movement, the sexual abuse allegations they had made against their father were viewed in a different light. Moreover, more than 35 years after the crime, an online movement for their release was launched, supported by the Menendez sisters’ family and well-known celebrities such as Kim Kardashian.

However, the committee responsible for granting the paroles assessed that 54-year-old Eric and 57-year-old Lyle still pose a danger to society.

“Contrary to what your supporters believe, you have not been a model prisoner and frankly we find that a little troubling,” Robert Barton one of the committee members commented Thursday, addressing 54-year-old Eric.

“Not two people in the family were lost, but four”

The committee met for nearly 10 hours before coming to that decision. “We probably spent four times as much time as we usually take,” Barton noted. “It’s a tragic case. I agree that we didn’t lose two people from the family, but four.”

According to him, Eric Menendez used drugs and alcohol in prison, engaged in illegal drug trafficking, used illegal cell phones, had inappropriate behavior toward visitors and was involved in violent incidents in 1997 and 2011. For similar reasons, the committee rejected Lyle’s request.

“Falsely claiming they were in self-defense”

On Thursday night, Los Angeles District AttorneyNathan Hawkman welcomed the committee’s decision to keep Eric in jail, saying it “vindicates Jose and Kitty Menendez.”

“For more than three decades Eric and Lyle Menendez have falsely claimed they were in self-defense,” Hockman noted, hailing the committee “for not giving in to pressure or participating in public spectacle” despite the fact that the case has been in the public eye.

The committee’s positive decision was seen as the best chance for the Menendez brothers to get out of jail, but their hopes have not been dashed as California Governor Gavin Newsome may reduce their sentence.

Meanwhile, their lawyers are pushing for a new trial, citing the discovery of new evidence in recent years: an old letter Eric sent to a cousin before the murders in which he refers to sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of his father and the testimony of a former singer who alleged that in the 1980s Jose Menendez drugged and raped him.