On June 27, 2025, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, led by Nathan Hochman, filed a forceful reply brief in the Menendez resentencing matter — a reply that sent ripples through legal and public circles precisely because it explicitly urged the court to weigh honesty, insight, and acceptance of responsibility as determinative factors in sentencing and risk assessment. But that very standard — a standard of accountability and truth — appears to vanish like mist the moment prosecutorial interests turn inward.
In a press release bearing Hochman’s official imprimatur, the DA’s office did not mince words:
“The Court must consider such lack of full insight and lack of acceptance of responsibility for their murderous actions in deciding whether the Menendez brothers pose an unreasonable risk of danger to the community.”
The office continued, affirmatively stating that their motion position was based on
“the current state of the record and the Menendez brothers’ current and continual failure to show full insight and accept full responsibility.”
They even offered that
“If they were to finally come forward and unequivocally and sincerely admit and completely accept responsibility for their lies… then the Court should weigh such new insight… as will the People.”
(LACDA Press Release, June 27, 2025)
These are extraordinary words. A prosecutor publicly acknowledging that truthfulness, contrition, and factual honesty are core considerations in legal evaluation — that is not typical PR rhetoric; that is a public standard of justice. But here’s where the system’s bright mirror suddenly darkens.
In a separate criminal proceeding — People v. Michael Bernard Taylor, Case No. XNEGA111132 — credible evidence was presented to the same DA’s office, multiple times, through email, fax, and direct access to the court file, demonstrating that a PC 730 competency assessment was filed without statutory authorization, contained materially false representations, and was relied upon by the court to suspend proceedings and commit the defendant to a state hospital.
Those facts are not casual allegations or speculative theories. They are documented and attendant to public court records: the 10/2/2023 sealed court order appoints Dr. Pietro D’Ingillo only for diversion evaluation under PC 1001.36, with any resulting reports confidential. The 2/28/24 PC 730 assessment, dated February 22, 2024, explicitly states it was conducted “pursuant to Minute Order dated 10/02/2024” — a minute order that does not exist in the record. The sequence violates the statute, substitutes retroactive authorization, and retroactively attempts to justify the filing after the fact.
And yet — despite being served this evidence — Hochman’s office has not acknowledged receipt, publicly evaluated the factual submissions, issued any reasoned position, or taken any action to investigate or correct the procedural defect. No press release. No public filing. No update. Silence.
This stark difference in prosecutorial posture is not trivial. It is not a harmless oversight. It is a material and documented disparity in how similar factual issues — dishonesty, truthfulness, procedural accuracy — are treated based on who is implicated.
In the Menendez matter, the DA’s office makes honesty a legal pivot point. In Taylor’s matter, the DA’s office treats credible evidence of procedural irregularity and statutory violation as if it were irrelevant, unworthy of engagement.
Legal scholars and civil rights advocates should find this alarming. If the prosecutorial office can discard its own stated standard of honesty when the state’s conduct is under scrutiny, then the rule of law — not just in Los Angeles County — but throughout systems of criminal justice is at risk of becoming selective and self‑protective rather than universal and impartial.
From a constitutional perspective, this disparity points directly at the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Equal protection is violated when two similarly situated situations are treated differently without a rational basis. Here:
In Menendez, the DA demands consideration of honesty and acceptance of responsibility as crucial.
In Taylor, the DA refuses to even respond to evidence of procedural misconduct, even when presented through official channels and supported by the case record.
Both matters involve questions of truth, procedural integrity, and factual accuracy. The difference — in one case, the defendant’s honesty; in the other, the state’s procedural honesty — ought not logically change the need for prosecutorial engagement. And yet it does.
Critics may argue that prosecutorial discretion allows this office latitude. But discretion is not license — it is bounded by fairness, equal application of law, and accountability. The Menendez reply shows the DA does not shy away from publicly advocating for moral and factual standards when it suits the prosecution. The silence in Taylor’s case — where the state itself is implicated in questionable procedural behavior — magnifies the disparity.
The implications are profound:
If prosecutors weigh defendant dishonesty in crafting legal positions, fairness demands they must also weigh state procedural integrity when presented with evidence of violations.
If honesty affects a defendant’s access to sentencing relief, honesty should equally affect a defendant’s right to due process.
If a prosecutor publicly emphasizes accountability, that standard must apply without regard to which party is at fault.
This isn’t a call for revenge or retribution. This is a call for consistency, accountability, and transparency. When the scales of justice are selectively applied, the entire foundation of legal legitimacy tilts — and when that tilt is rooted in silence rather than engagement, public trust erodes.
In this era of hyper‑scrutiny and public demand for fairness, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office should not merely enforce honesty in others — it should be willing to apply it to itself. Anything less is not only legally questionable; it is morally indefensible.
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