After recently visiting the controversial Menendez Brothers in prison, reality TV star Kim Kardashian penned an essay demanding Erik and Lyle, who were convicted of killing their parents in 1996, be freed. Kardashian wrote the essay for NBC News, Variety reported. "We are all products of our experiences.
They shape who we were, who we are, and who we will be. Physiologically and psychologically, time changes us, and I doubt anyone would claim to be the same person they were at 18. I know I'm not," she said.
Advocating for a re-evaluation of their life sentences, Kim argued that the Menendez Brothers are not 'monsters'. She said: "You think you know the story of Lyle and Erik Menendez. I certainly thought I did: In 1989, the brothers, aged 21 and 18, respectively, viciously shot and killed their parents in their Beverly Hills home.
In 1996, after two trials, they were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. As is often the case, this story is much more complex than it appears on the surface. Both brothers said they had been sexually, physically and emotionally abused for years by their parents.
According to Lyle, the abuse started when he was just 6 years old, and Erik said he was raped by his father for more than a decade. Following years of abuse and a real fear for their lives, Erik and Lyle chose what they thought at the time was their only way out - an unimaginable way to escape their living nightmare," she continued. ALSO READ: Kim Kardashian, Mons.