Menendez killings – two brothers locked in anger

Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story has shot to the top of Netflix’s streaming chart despite (or maybe cause of) criticism that it is “in the worst possible taste.” Other reviews describe it as a “messy, salacious slog”; and “a retelling of unspeakable abuses and gruesome crimes.”

  Erik and Lyle Mendendez were found guilty of shooting their father on 20 August 1989 in Beverly Hills. Initially they said they came home to find their parents dead, but later claimed  the murders were in self defence after years of alleged physical, emotional and sexual abuse. After a deadlocked first trial, they were both found guilty  after the judge excluded evidence of their abuse and the prosecution argued they wanted to kill their parents to inherit their money. They were both given life without parole.

 Lyle, 10 January 1968 12.10 pm New York, has his Capricorn Sun and Mercury sitting on his Midheaven trine a 5th house Pluto Uranus in Virgo, sextile a 7^th house Neptune. His Taurus Moon opposes his Neptune; and his 8th house intense Venus squares onto a Mars opposition Jupiter. He looks ambitious and attention-seeking.

 Erik, 27 November 1970 11.23 pm Livington, New Jersey,  has a 4^th house Sun Neptune conjunction in Sagittarius with Mars and Uranus in his financial 2^nd house – less robust but keen on money.

  Their father Jose, 6 May 1944, Havana Cuba, was a confident and stubborn Sun Taurus square Jupiter with an influential/controlling Uranus trine Neptune sextile Pluto North Node in Leo.

 None of the charts themselves looks particularly brutal or abusive. Though the relationship charts do depict a good deal of anger and what could be cruelty. Jose with Lyle has a composite Mars Saturn square Uranus; and Jose with Erik has an even worse composite Mars Pluto square Saturn.  So both boys would harbour deep resentment towards their father.

 What was always odd was that the relationship chart between the two brothers is, if anything, more stressed than between each of them and their father. They have a composite Sun Mars conjunction square Pluto; with a yod of Pluto sextile Neptune Venus inconjunct Saturn. I can’t even begin to decipher the twisted psychology that lies behind all of that. Sun Mars plus Pluto = angry, competitive, locked in a do-or-die struggle for power. A delusional yod born out of extreme frustration at being chained together in a situation of hardship and deprivation. With another yod of composite Moon sextile Saturn inconjunct Pluto. The power play within the dyad must have been intense – with Lyle undoubtedly having the upper hand.

 The shootings took place on 20 August 1989 when the triple conjunction of Uranus, Neptune, Saturn in Capricorn was in place.