While there are a total of seven spin-offs of the original Lei & Ordem (1990), including Lei & Ordem: Unidade de Vítimas Especiais (1999), Lei & Ordem: Crimes Premeditados (2001) , Lei & Ordem: Processos Judiciais (2005), Conviction (2006), Lei & Ordem: Reino Unido (2009), Lei & Ordem: Los Angeles (2010), and Lei & Ordem: Crime Organizado (2021), Law & Order: True Crime (2017) is the first produced as a mini-series.
Edie Falco was nominated for the 2018 Emmy Award in the Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie category for her role as Leslie Abramson in Lei & Ordem Crimes Reais (2017), but lost to Regina King from Seven Seconds (2018).
Actress Julianne Nicholson previously appeared as recurring character Detective Megan Wheeler on Lei & Ordem: Crimes Premeditados (2001).
The Menendez murders were the basis of a season one episode of the original Lei & Ordem (1990) series called The Serpent's Tooth (1991), which aired a year after the brothers were arrested on March 8, 1990. The episode's plot has the two sons of a wealthy couple as the prime suspects of their parents murder, similar to the Menendez case, the brother's motive was the abuse from their father and inheritance. One of the alternate theories of the crime had just been presented by Erik and Lyle's lawyer when the episode was being written, that Jose and Kitty were killed by a business associate with ties to organized crime, which was used in the episode's plot with the brothers being acquitted and their father's business partner being arrested.
As the ending caption showed the Menendez brothers were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole and had exhausted all of their appeals at the time of filming. They appealed their conviction to the California Court of Appeals in February of 1998, who upheld the original convictions; in May of 1998 the Supreme Court of California declined to hear the case allowing the Appellate Court's ruling to stand. Both brothers filed a petition of habeas corpus with the Supreme Court of California in 1999, both were denied. After exhausting all of their appeals in state court they filed separate habeas corpus petitions in the United States District Court for the Central District of California, in March of 2003 a federal magistrate recommended the denial of the petitions and the District Court followed the recommendation. They then filed an appeal with the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in September of 2005 the Appellate Court unanimously denied both their habeas corpus petitions; this exhausted all of their federal appeals, as their case did not meet the criteria for being considered by the United States Supreme Court as there were no issues of the brother's constitutional rights being violated. In 2022 new evidence came to light that supported their claims about their father's sexual abuse, singer Roy Rossello stated in a television documentary that he visited the Menendez home in New Jersey in 1988 when he was 14, and alleged that Jose Menendez drugged and raped him. In May of 2023 the brothers filed a motion for a new hearing based on this allegation, the appeal also cites a letter discovered in 2018 written by Erik to his cousin, Andy Cano, where he talked about knowing that his father had abused Rossello and mentioned his own abuse. On October 3, 2024 Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon announced that his office believed the appeal had merit and was thoroughly reviewing it. On October 24 Gascon announced that his office filed a motion with the Los Angeles County Superior Court for a re-sentencing hearing. If a judge decides to accept DA Gascon's recommendation the brother's sentences would be reduced to the minimum for first degree murder: life with the possibility of parole after 25 years, making them eligible for parole immediately as they have been in prison for almost 30 years with good behavior. A re-sentencing trial was scheduled for January 30, 2025 but was later postponed to March 20, 2025 due to the Los Angeles wildfires.