Somewhere between your thrifted JNCOs and a fresh VHS-to-TikTok conspiracy doc, the ’90s have staged a full-blown comeback. But this time, it’s not Tamagotchis or frosted tips. It’s trauma.
Enter: Roy Rosselló of Menudo—boy band alum, survivor, and now, spiritual hype man for Erik and Lyle Menendez.
In a recent statement, Rosselló expressed his belief that the Menendez brothers were “always innocent victims.” Not just wrongly convicted victims. Always. As in: open your Lisa Frank diary and scrawl “justice for Lyle” in purple glitter gel pen.
We’re not saying Rosselló is wrong. We’re saying America’s true crime arc has reached the shared trauma crossover episode we never saw coming.
To recap:
Roy Rosselló was in Menudo, the original boy band boot camp where trauma came with a side of choreography. Erik and Lyle Menendez? Convicted in 1996 of murdering their parents in Beverly Hills with matching shotguns and a matching defense: child abuse.
For years, the case was served up to the public like a scandal tapas platter: rich kids, murder, polo shirts, courtroom tears, and just enough repressed emotion to keep us watching.
But now—decades later—survivors of abuse are refusing to stay in the footnotes. They’re comparing notes. Swapping horror stories. Filling in the parts the news edited out in favor of that iconic crying-on-the-stand shot.
And Roy Rosselló? He’s not here for the slick narratives or the Dateline voiceover. He’s here to say what many now believe: maybe the boys weren’t monsters. Maybe they were mirror images of a system that fed on them.
Let’s be clear:
America loves a good villain arc—until it threatens the myth of the “perfect victim.”
If you fought back? Too angry.
If you stayed too long? Too weak.
If you smiled on camera once in 1989? Clearly guilty.
But as more survivors come forward, the lines blur. Suddenly, courtroom performances start to look like coping mechanisms. Tears start to feel real. And Roy Rosselló becomes more than a washed-up pop star—he becomes a chorus member in a long-overdue reckoning.
This is the era of revisiting headlines with receipts.
It’s the era where every glossy scandal gets a trauma-informed remix.
The era where we ask not just what happened, but why.
Because sometimes victims don’t cry on cue.
Sometimes they shoot back.
And sometimes, decades later, the guy from Menudo shows up to say, “Yeah. Same.”
So when Roy Rosselló tells you the Menendez brothers were victims, not villains—listen.
Not because it’s easy.
Not because it fits the rerun schedule.
But because maybe justice wasn’t served the first time.
Maybe it was choreographed.