Lyle Menendez, the 56-year-old convicted of murdering his parents along with his younger brother Erik Menendez in 1989, married his second wife, Rebecca Sneed, in 2003.
The 56-year-old has been married twice while serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole since 1996 for the murders of Jose and Kitty Menendez, and his younger brother has been married to Tammi Menendez since 1999.
But Sneed announced in a Facebook post on Nov. 21 that she and Lyle Menendez have been separated “for a while.”
“Guys! This is NOT a cheating scandal. Lyle and I have been divorced for a while, but remain best friends and family,” Sneed wrote in a message to an account she manages for her husband. “I continue to manage his Facebook pages, with input from him, and I am forever committed to the continued fight for Lyle and Erik’s freedom as has become so evident over the years.”
Sneed asked those who followed her Facebook page to continue focusing on “supporting abuse survivors,” which she said is what Lyle Menendez wants the page to be about.
“I will continue to update you all on the progress of the case as I believe we all have the common goal of seeing the boys walk free!” she said. “I will never stop fighting for them.”
A representative for Lyle Menendez did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the divorce from TODAY.com
Here’s what you need to know about Lyle Menendez’s first and second wives.
Rebecca Sneed
According to NBC News, Lyle Menendez married Sneed in 2003.
The couple exchanged vows at Mule Creek State Prison outside Sacramento, California, as about a dozen of their friends and family watched from a maximum-security visiting room, KXTV-TV in Sacramento reported.
A prison spokesman told the Associated Press in 2003 that Sneed and Lyle Menendez had known each other for about a decade, although inmates serving life sentences in California are not allowed to receive conjugal visits.
Lyle Menendez spoke about his marriage to Sneed in an interview with ABC News in 2017.
“One thing I’ve learned is that your physical comfort is much less important than your connection with the people around you,” he said. “I have discovered that I can have a healthy marriage that is complicated and built around conversations and finding creative ways to communicate and share, without all the props that normally come with marriage, like going out to dinner and having as many intimate have time. together, and so on.”
He also gave People a glimpse into his wedding in 2017.
“Our interactions are usually distraction-free and we probably have more intimate conversations than most married spouses, who are distracted by life’s events,” he said.
“We try to make phone calls every day, sometimes several times a day,” he added. “I have a very stable, committed marriage and that gives me strength and brings a lot of peace and joy. It is a counterbalance to the unpredictable, highly stressful environment here.”
He said he “feels guilty” about what his wife has to endure.
“People are judgmental and she has to put up with a lot,” he said. “But she has the courage to deal with the obstacles. It would be easier to leave, but I’m extremely grateful she doesn’t.
Anna Eriksson
Lyle Menendez married his first wife, Anna Eriksson, in 1996, the same year he was convicted of murder.
The couple met when Chicago native Eriksson wrote Lyle Menendez a letter telling him to “hang in there” during his first trial, she told People in 1996.
The couple’s 1996 wedding took place over the telephone in what Leslie Abramson, Erik Menendez’s attorney, called a “proxy wedding,” according to the book “The Menendez Murders” by Robert Rand, a journalist who was present at the wedding ceremony and spoke extensively about the wedding ceremony. covered up the brothers’ case.
“Since you’re not here in Leslie’s office in person right now, I’m going to say that at a future date you’re going to place the wedding band on Anna’s ring finger, and you, Anna, will place the band on the ring finger. Lyle’s ring finger,” Abramson’s girlfriend, Supreme Court Justice Nancy Brown, said, according to the book.
Abramson put the ring on Eriksson’s hand and Lyle Menendez said it was the best day of his life, according to the book.
The couple separated in 1997, the same year Lyle Menendez’s marital status was investigated by the California Department of Corrections.
Christine May, a spokesperson for the California Department of Corrections, told the Los Angeles Times in 1997 that the department “did not recognize the wedding.”
“Our determination was that it was not a legal marriage,” May said.
Jamison McDermott played Ericksson in the recent Netflix series “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.”
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
