Two days after legendary director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele, were found deceased, their son has formally been charged.
Rob Reiner, 78, and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, 68, died Sunday (December 14) at their home in Brentwood, California. Their bodies were found by their daughter, Romy, on Sunday afternoon and their son, Nick, was arrested hours later on suspicion of homicide.
Authorities confirmed Nick’s arrest in a brief press conference on Monday, saying, Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell confirmed during a press conference that Nick Reiner has been arrested for the murder of his parents, Rob and Michele Reiner.
“We have our Robbery Homicide Division handling the investigation…were able to take into custody Nick Reiner a suspect in this case. He was subsequently booked for murder and is being held on $4 million bail,” LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said at the time.
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32-year-old Nick was expected to make an appearance in court on Tuesday morning, but was not “medically cleared” to be transported to the courthouse, per CNN.
Authorities shared new details of the case in a press conference on Tuesday afternoon.
LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell and Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman spoke to the press. During the conference, Hochman announced that formal murder charges against Nick Reiner would be made Tuesday afternoon.
Reiner will be charged with two counts of first-degree murder with a special circumstance of multiple murders. “He also faces a special allegation that he personally used a dangerous and deadly weapon, that being a knife,” Hochman said. “These charges carry a maximum sentence of life in prison without possibility of parole or the death penalty.”
Hochman explained the meaning of the rare special circumstance charge. He told those in attendance that it “is a situation where one of the enumerating factors that lead to elevating, in some ways, a first-degree murder case occurs. One of those special circumstances is called ‘multiple murders.’ Here we have two, and it qualified under the definition of multiple murders to allege the special circumstance in this particular case.”
More simply put, a first-degree murder charge with the addition of a special circumstance of multiple murders makes the charge more severe. This allows the prosecution to seek a harsher penalty for the accused.
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Nick Reiner will be brought to court after formal charges are filed, where he will be arraigned on the charges and will issue a plea of guilty or not guilty.
Hochman and McDonnell took questions from the press, but declined to answer any inquiries into Nick’s mental state, whether or not he was under the influence of narcotics when he was arrested, or any other questions that may taint the investigation and subsequent trial. They also did not confirm the cause of the deaths, though multiple outlets previously reported that Rob and Michele Reiner had been stabbed to death.
Watch the full press conference in the video below.
This continues to be a developing story.