The California Attorney General's Office has urged the judge hearing the Erik and Lyle Menendez case to reject a request from the defense attorneys to bar the entire LA County District Attorney's Office from participating in a resentencing proceeding because of an alleged bias against the brothers.
In an opposition filed this week, the AG's office said the Menendez defense attorneys have failed to present evidence that meets the "stringent standards" for an office-wide recusal of the DA and dismissed each of the defense allegations as falling far short of showing a demonstrated bias or a conflict of interest.
Stream Los Angeles News for free, 24/7, wherever you are.
WATCH HERE"As such, defendants have failed to identify a disqualifying conflict that demonstrates a reasonable possibility that the assigned prosecutors may not exercise discretionary functions in an evenhanded manner, nor have they established that any alleged conflict is so grave as to render it more likely than not they will not receive unfair treatment if the case continues to be handled by the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office," the filing said.
Last week, the DA's Office filed its own opposition to the removal motion and made many similar arguments, calling the defense's push "desperate and drastic."
Get top local stories in Southern California delivered to you every morning with NBC LA's News Headlines newsletter.
SIGN UP "The entire defense argument over recusal boils down to the defense not being happy with the current District Attorney's position on resentencing," case prosecutors Habib Balian, Ethan Milius and Seth Carmack wrote in the filing. "This desperate argument may work in a press interview but fails in a court of law based on an adversarial system of justice."
The demand to exclude or recuse the office arose midway through a hearing last month when Menendez defense attorney Mark Geragos first connected a series of events that he said in total amounted to what he suspected would be unfair treatment of the brothers during a resentencing hearing.
Geragos said elected DA Nathan Hochman's unsuccessful attempt to withdraw the resentencing motion, Hochman's decision to transfer and remove the deputies who wrote the motion in favor of resentencing and Hochman's decision to rehire a former prosecutor who represented a Menendez family member opposed to resentencing were evidence of an office-wide bias that could only be cured by exclusion of the entire DA's staff.
LA Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic has scheduled a hearing for Friday, May 9 to consider the recusal motion and the admissibility of new risk assessment reports that describe the brothers' suitability for release into society.
Separate from the resentencing attempt in LA County, Erik and Lyle Menendez, who are seeking other legal pathways to freedom after serving nearly three decades in prison for their parents’ murders, are expected to appear in front of the California Board of Parole Hearing in June.
The independent risk assessment, in which a group of experts and psychologists examine whether the brothers pose any danger to the public, will be concluded on June 13, according Gov. Gavin Newsom.
