Son of US filmmaker Rob Reiner in court on charges that he murdered his parents
Nick Reiner is accused of fatally stabbing his father and mother and would face life imprisonment or the death penalty if convicted
The younger son of Hollywood filmmaker and political activist Rob Reiner made his first court appearance on Wednesday for the two murder charges he faces in the stabbing deaths of his parents, who were found slain in their Los Angeles home over the weekend.
The arraignment was delayed until January 7, and Nick Reiner, 32, did not enter a plea.
Bearded and wearing a blue protective vest, he made the court appearance three days after his arrest and a day after he was charged with one of the most shocking celebrity homicide cases in the city’s history.
He is accused of fatally stabbing his parents, actor-director Rob Reiner, 78, and photographer-producer Michele Reiner, 70, in the early morning hours of Sunday in the affluent west LA neighbourhood of Brentwood, then fleeing the scene.
After the hearing, Nick Reiner’s lawyer Alan Jackson called the case “a devastating tragedy that has befallen the Reiner family”. He said the proceedings will be very complex.
“And we ask that during this process you allow the system to move forward in the way that it was designed to move forward,” Jackson said outside the courthouse. “Not with a rush to judgment, not with jumping to conclusions.”