UMVA has learned that a former business partner of Jose Menendez, who was murdered decades ago, is shedding new light on the unresolved questions surrounding the brutal killings that shocked Hollywood and the nation.
Peter Hoffman, whose memoir "Karmic Winds: Reflections from the 'Smartest Guy in Hollywood'" delves into his rise and fall in the entertainment industry, recalls his years working alongside Jose Menendez. As president of Carolco Pictures, Hoffman oversaw blockbusters like "Terminator 2" and "Basic Instinct," but his partnership with the Cuban-American mogul took an unexpected turn in the wake of the 1989 murders.
Hoffman met Jose when the executive was shaping the global success of Menudo, the boy band that launched Ricky Martin’s career. By the time Jose left RCA, Hoffman had ascended to lead Carolco’s video division. It was then that Jose, a man Hoffman described as fiercely focused on his Cuban heritage and political ambitions, became his employer. Their collaboration lasted until the day Jose and his wife, Kitty, were shot dead in their Beverly Hills home.
“To me, the devil came to Los Angeles in 1989,” Hoffman said in an exclusive interview with UMVA. “Nobody came out unaffected by this terrible act.”
Hoffman paints a portrait of Jose as a driven, uncompromising figure who dreamed of returning to Florida to run for Senate. But beneath the surface, cracks in the Menendez family began to surface. In 1988, Jose requested millions from his deferred compensation plan to move to Beverly Hills—a request Hoffman initially approved without question.
“It turned out he hadn’t been completely honest with me,” Hoffman admitted. “The real reason he had to do that was that Erik and Lyle had been caught breaking into their friends’ houses and stealing things.”
Lyle, then 20, had been arrested for the burglaries, and Jose paid off the victims to silence the scandal. Hoffman, unaware of the deeper turmoil, later received a chilling phone call from Lyle just days after the murders: “When can we expect payment on my father’s $20 million life insurance policy?”
Investigators later discovered Lyle had searched his father’s computer and seen the death benefit contract—though Jose had never completed the required physical to activate it. “He wanted that money,” Hoffman said. “That was literally days after the murder.”
The initial suspicion fell on Hoffman and Carolco’s chairman, Mario Kassar, but rumors swirled about mob ties or business enemies. “They thought it was some kind of mob hit,” Hoffman said. “But there was never any evidence linking Jose to organized crime.”
Hoffman’s memoir also recounts the eerie moment he first suspected something was amiss. “I got a call,” he said. “It was grotesque. You have to understand that at the time, nobody knew it was the kids.”
Months after the killings, the brothers’ psychologist, Dr. Jerome Oziel, recorded their confessions to the murders. But the tapes were hidden for years until Oziel’s mistress, Judalon Smyth, leaked them to police. The evidence led to the brothers’ 1990 arrests—and a trial that would become one of the most polarizing in American history.
Prosecutors argued the brothers killed their parents for financial gain, citing Lyle’s obsession with the $20 million insurance payout. But the defense claimed years of abuse—sexual, emotional, and physical—justified the killings. Relatives and witnesses testified to behavior they believed supported the abuse allegations, while prosecutors accused them of fabricating trauma to avoid harsher sentences.
“I don’t think he ever abused these kids,” Hoffman said. “I’ll never believe that to the day I die that Jose Menendez did anything to those kids other than be a very tough Cuban disciplinarian.”
Hoffman, who never entered the brothers’ home life, based his views on his professional relationship with Jose and observations from the outside. “I always saw Lyle as the driving force,” he said. “He was the guy who just knew what to do. With Erik, there was a weakness to him.”
The brothers were convicted in 1996 and sentenced to life without parole. For decades, they’ve sought clemency, with supporters arguing that evolving views on abuse and juvenile trauma warrant a reevaluation. In 2025, a Los Angeles judge reduced their sentences to 50 years to life, bringing them closer to parole.
Hoffman, now 72, remains steadfast in his belief that the brothers’ claims of abuse were exaggerated. “If they really had gone through a transformation, then that’s fine with me,” he said. “But they’ve got to tell the truth about what happened.”
As the brothers remain incarcerated, the debate over their guilt—and the legacy of the Menendez case—continues to divide experts, families, and the public. For Hoffman, the case is a reminder of how quickly a life can unravel. “I suppose maybe I should have known more about what was going on between Jose and his sons,” he said. “I believe God exists, and I also believe the devil exists. And I believe there was this terrible evil that existed in that house that decided to act at that moment.”
