Erik and Lyle Menendez are now eligible for parole after spending 35 years behind bars for after murdering both of their parents.
The brothers appeared in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Tuesday, where Judge Michael Jesic reduced their sentences from life without parole to 50 years to life.
The change means they’re immediately eligible to apply for parole under California‘s youthful offender law because they committed the crime under the age of 26.
The brothers were ordered in 1996 to spend the rest of their lives in prison for fatally shooting their entertainment executive father, Jose Menendez, and mother, Kitty Menendez, in their Beverly Hills home.
The brothers were 18 and 21 at the time of the killings.
Defense attorneys argued the brothers acted out of self-defense after years of sexual abuse by their father, while prosecutors said the brothers killed their parents for a multimillion-dollar inheritance.
The state parole board must still decide whether to release them from prison.
‘I’m not saying they should be released, it’s not for me to decide,’ Jesic said. ‘I do believe they’ve done enough in the past