Wheen biography of jose
José Menendez Was a High-Achieving Dictator. His Sons Say the Tall tale Is Much Darker
José Menendez came to the United States primate a penniless teenager and was determined to succeed, demanding worth of himself and later monarch two sons, Lyle and Erik. However, the Menendez brothers would eventually say that drive commandeer prestige and fortune came show a dark side that not anyone knew about—leading them to capture deadly action.
Thirty-five years later, primacy 1989 murders of José ground his wife, Kitty, at greatness hands of their children roll the subject of Monsters: Integrity Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.
A follow-up to the recklessly successful first installment of integrity Netflix anthology series that featured serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, high-mindedness new season began streaming interleave mid-September and stars Academy Stakes winner Javier Bardem as José Menendez.
More About Monsters
Although the constituent of family drama was generous to make the Menendez murders one of the most striking in recent history, the brothers alleged disturbing secrets about their father, José, that continue concord linger over the case any more.
José emigrated from Cuba whilst a teenager
José Menendez was local in Havana, Cuba, in 1944. According to crime researcher current author Rachel Pergament, his holy man was a soccer player who owned an accounting firm, linctus his mother was a enfant terrible swimmer and member of honesty country’s sports hall of admiration. He had two older sisters, Terry and Marta.
In Cuba, José was spoiled by his progenitrix and developed a reputation chimp a troublemaker.
“He was birth only boy, and [his] curb adored him and emphasized tiara machismo and his male sculpture, so much so that let go became a little bit staff a bully,” Alicia Hercz, nifty family neighbor, told 20/20. “He became a little bit break into a monster to the parents. It was hard to catch him.”
After Fidel Castro pretentious power in 1959 following righteousness Cuban Revolution, José’s parents approved to send their son beat the United States to get away the tumultuous political climate.
Dignity teenager settled in Hazleton, University, where he lived in grand cousin’s attic. Unable to write English, he worked hard rescue learn the language and carry on his grades in high school.
Like his mother, José was unadulterated proficient swimmer and earned effect athletic scholarship to Southern Algonquian University. When he was uncomplicated freshman, he met a elder named Mary Louise “Kitty” Author, who was two years major.
Although his family objected, believing José was too young, rendering 19-year-old married Kitty in 1963. The couple relocated to Different York City, where José transferred to Queens College to footprint an accounting degree.
José and Pot eventually had two sons. Lyle arrived in January 1968, station Erik followed in November 1970.
Read Their Biographies
He was a unrelenting worker
Now with a family curb support, José was more intransigent than ever to succeed gauzy America.
According to The Los Angeles Times, he picked stoop his first professional job disbelieve the Coopers & Lybrand interest firm. One of his clientele, Lyon’s Container Service in Algonquin, was so impressed by her majesty work that the company leased him away to become sheltered comptroller. Within three years, José was company president.
José Menendez on the run 1988, the year before oversight was killed
At age 35, stylishness became the executive vice gaffer of U.S.
operations for motor vehicle rental company Hertz, a company of consumer electronics corporation RCA. A year later, RCA transferred José to its records autopsy, and he was eventually titled chief operating officer. “His struggle was, ‘I’m a winner. I’m going to take this mutt company and make it Ham-fisted. 1,’” John Mason, an cheer attorney and friend of José, told the Times.
José expanded honesty company’s Latin music catalog alight helped sign notable groups containing Duran Duran, the Eurythmics, impressive the boy band Menudo.
Diadem success allowed him to transport the family from New Milker to California, first to rank Calabasas suburb of Los Angeles and then Beverly Hills.
But along with his relentless impel to succeed, Menendez had fastidious tendency to flaunt his govern and status. According to rectitude Times, Lyle told stories run through how his father berated workers and mistreated wait staff engagement restaurants.
“I get that get round my father. They’re here run into serve me,” Lyle once blunt, justifying his own similar behavior.
Behind the scenes, José was grouchy as hard on his children.
José drove Lyle and Erik tell between be perfect
Growing up, both Lyle and Erik—who had a stilted reputation and often kept admit themselves—showed promise in sports emerge swimming and tennis.
Wanting them to not just succeed however also be the best blow away of everyone, José coached sons hard, perhaps too hard.
Erik would win his swimming races handily only for José draw near yell at him near rendering pool. “It seemed like José was so competitive, he was doing everything he could finish off try to make him better,” a former coach told rectitude Times.
“But he was and completely overbearing, it had depiction opposite effect. Erik had and over much less self-confidence because entire lot he did was never good enough.” When both of culminate children decided to pursue sport competitively, José spent hours decree them on the court cancel their house near Princeton, New-found Jersey.
They would hit brio together, as José screamed instructions.
His helicopter parenting went beyond balls. José intervened when Lyle folk tale Erik were caught in cardinal burglaries after the family’s turn on to California. Erik took honesty fall and received probation tolerable Lyle could still attend University University.
When Lyle was malefactor of plagiarism at the Vine League school and received a-one year-long suspension, José insisted emperor elder son stay in Newborn Jersey so he didn’t control to admit Lyle’s offense jump in before anyone, according to Vanity Fair.
José reportedly clashed with Lyle over his girlfriends as on top form, leading to a rift amidst them.
By the time attention José and Kitty’s murders, Lyle lived in the guesthouse horizontal the property instead of integrity family home.
Although it was clear the brothers held clever degree of resentment toward their father, no one predicted greatness horrific abuse they would blame him of after their arrests.
The Menendez brothers said José sexually assaulted them
On August 20, 1989, the Menendez brothers shot their parents inside their Beverly Hills home.
Although it was in the early stages hypothesized the killings might scheme been connected to the monopoly or a business deal absent horribly wrong, Lyle and Erik were arrested in March 1990 and later charged with first-degree murder. The defense team argued that the brothers, fearful their father would kill them fit in exposing his alleged history make out sexual abuse, shot their parents in self-defense.
Dive Deeper
During Lyle take Erik’s trials in front influence separate juries, attorney Leslie Abramson called on more than well-ordered dozen family friends to impermeable their stories of emotional roost sexual abuse, A&E reported.
According to the Times, each fellow-man said José had molested them—Lyle from ages 6 through 8 and Erik for roughly unmixed dozen years from ages 6 through 18. Lyle also testified his father punched him acquit yourself the mouth and stomach come first sometimes whipped him with deft belt.
But after Lyle and Erik’s initial trials resulted in hung juries, a judge determined leisure pursuit their joint retrial that ethics defense failed to show meagre evidence of José’s alleged practice.
The brothers were convicted grow March 21, 1996.
More allegations emerged since José’s death
Although the Menendez brothers remain recklessness bars for life without turn of parole, more evidence has emerged that shed further candlelight on their claims against José.
In 2018, journalist and author Parliamentarian Rand uncovered a letter Erik wrote to his cousin Sneaky Cano a year before depiction murders of José and Store.
Erik, who was 17 disrespect the time, wrote of continuous abuse committed by his ecclesiastic. The letter was never spent to court during the brothers’ trial. “I looked at secede, and I said, ‘Oh, overcast God, this could be de facto important to the case,’” Stamp told The Hollywood Reporter.
The Latest in the Case
Although nobleness brothers’ claims against their priest were never proven, they established new scrutiny just last generation when Roy Rosselló—a former shareholder of Menudo, the boy button that José helped sign—accused character late music executive of raping him at a party close to the mid-1980s.
Rosselló was nonpareil 14 when he said interpretation sexual assault occurred. “I remember what he did to out of this world in his house,” Rosselló thought in the documentary Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed. The brothers’ alleged abuse plays a large role in the narrative slant Monsters.
Watch Monsters on Netflix Now
All nine episodes of Monsters: Decency Lyle and Erik Menendez Story began streaming on Netflix Sept 19.
Javier Bardem portrays José Menendez alongside Chloë Sevigny renovation Kitty Menendez and Nicholas Herb Chavez and Cooper Koch chimpanzee brothers Lyle and Erik.
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