Developments in the retrial of Lyle and Erik Menendez from October 30 - November 3.
OCTOBER 30
Amir Eslaminia, the former high school classmate of Erik Menendez, concluded his testimony.
Eslaminia underwent a brief cross-examination by defense lawyer Charles Gessler, who pointed out that Lyle Menendez did not go through with the plot to have Eslaminia lie on the witness stand. Lyle Menendez allegedly asked him to testify falsely that the brothers asked for a handgun for protection from their parents.
Eslaminia did not testify during the first trial because prosecutors did not learn about the letter until after the trial ended.
Meanwhile, defense attorney Leslie Abramson tried to show that Erik Menendez had nothing to do with the plan.
She also attacked Eslaminia's credibility, pointing out that he said in a police interview that he would "lie like a dog," and had been convicted of petty theft. Abramson also recalled that Eslaminia told a Menendez relative that in the months after the killings, he was so convinced of the brothers' innocence that he offered to engineer a helicopter jailbreak. After learning that the brothers were the killers, his relationship with them cooled, Eslaminia said.
OCTOBER 31
Lyle Menendez told a friend about tape recorded sessions with therapist Jerome Oziel where he talks about the murder of his parents.
'If the police get their hands on those tapes, I'm f....d," Menendez allegedly told Glenn Stevens, the latest prosecution witness to testify about the brothers' spending habits after the killings.
Stevens said that Lyle Menendez told him at his parents' New Jersey wake that he and his brother had inherited the couple's entire multimillion dollar estate.
On a flight from New Jersey to California, Menendez gave Steven $1,400 to bail him out if he was arrested, Stevens said. They also talked about the restaurant Menendez bought after killing his parents.
Under cross-examination, Stevens admitted that he stole money from Menendez's restaurant, where he worked. He also said he spent the money given him for bail and sold one of Menendez's Rolex watches.
NOVEMBER 1
The former fiance of Lyle Menendez testified that he offered her money to lie on the witness stand.
Jamie Pisarcik said Lyle wanted her to say that Jose Menendez raped her. She refused the bribe and told prosecutors about it.
"He was asking me to get up on the stand and say his father had done something to me that he hadn't done," Jamie Pisarcik, 32, testified.
Prosecutors maintain that Pisarcik's testimony supports their theory that the brothers fabricated their defense.
Defense attorney Terri Towery cross-examined Pisarcik for five hours in an attempt to show inconsistencies from her testimony during the brothers' first trial. The defense sought to discredit Pisarcik as an opportunist who called off her engagement with Lyle Menendez once she learned that her fiance would not inherit his parents' money.
Pisarcik also told jurors that Lyle Menendez tearfully confessed to killing his parents when she visited him in jail after his March 1990 arrest. She said he claimed that the killings occurred because Kitty Menendez had sexually abused him, and her husband was abusing Erik.
NOVEMBER 2
The uncle of Lyle and Erik Menendez told jurors that the brothers' father was angry about his elder son's spending habits just two weeks before his slaying.
"I've got to have a major conversation with my son Lyle. He's got to get the message we're not going to be supporting them for the rest of their lives," Brian Andersen said, quoting brother-in-law Jose Menendez.
Andersen, the older brother of Kitty Menendez, was among the few relatives to testify for the prosecution at the brothers' first trial.
In his testimony, Andersen offered new and potentially damaging evidence against the brothers. He said that in the week after the August 20, 1989 slayings, Lyle Menendez insisted that his parents' safe and safety deposit box be opened in the sole presence of him and his younger brother.
"He said that he was concerned there may be some things in the safe that could be embarrassing for his parents," Andersen said.
The prosecution claims the brothers really feared that their parents had written a new will disinheriting them and might have intended to destroy such a document. A new will was not found.
During cross-examination, defense lawyers tried to show that Andersen himself had financial motives for his testimony, pointing to a probate dispute involving his side of the family over the Menendez estate. The estate is now not worth anything.
The defense claims Andersen fabricated details - including a claim that Erik Menendez said he had received a threatening phone call from the Mafia - so that the brothers will be found guilty.
"You made this story up recently to get (the brothers) - didn't you, Mr. Andersen?" said Leslie Abramson.
NOVEMBER 3
Jose Menendez's secretary testified about Lyle Menendez's behavior on the day of his parents' funeral.
At the funeral, Lyle Menendez, who was wearing his father's shoes, said, "See, who says I can't fill my father's shoes. These are his shoes."
Prosecutors are trying to show through Marzi Eisenberg's testimony that Lyle Menendez showed little remorse at the death of his parents.
