EDITORIAL : JUDGING THE JUDGE.

THE retrial of Erik and Lyle Menendez for the 1989 killing of their parents has been a dramatic contrast to the media circus of the brothers' first trial, as well as to the O.J. Simpson trial.

Superior Court Judge Stanley Weisberg's iron grip on the retrial clearly illustrates how a judge can greatly affect the outcome - especially when it's compared with Weisberg's own rulings in the first Menendez trial. It also renews doubts about how Judge Lance Ito probably let the Simpson proceedings get out of hand.

The brothers' first trial ended in two deadlocked juries hopelessly split between murder and manslaughter. This time, both were found guilty of first-degree murder, conspiracy and special circumstances in the shotgun deaths of Kitty and Jose Menendez.

Many factors were indeed different in the two trials. There were wholesale changes in lawyers, and the prosecution expanded and refined its case.

Yet many differences were attributable to Judge Weisberg himself. For example, courtroom groupies flocked to the brothers' first trial, which he allowed to be televised. But he barred TV cameras in the retrial, and it drew only a few spectators and reporters.

It's a striking reminder of how additional media attention is generated when TV cameras are allowed in the courtroom - and why judges should have broad discretion in these matters.

While the camera restrictions seem appropriate, we are less enthusiastic about some of the judge's other decisions, such as putting restrictions on courtroom artists, limiting what news photographers could shoot in the courtroom, and telling court employees not to talk to the media during jury deliberations - even to answer basic questions about procedures. The effect was to keep the public at arm's length from a public trial.

Perhaps more significant than the media-related rulings was Judge Weisberg's decision not to give jurors the option of convicting the brothers on the lesser offense of manslaughter, based on the argument that they had a genuine, if unreasonable, belief that their parents were on the verge of killing them.

The defense is certain to cite this and other issues when appealing the verdicts. And, who knows, an appellate court might disagree with Judge Weisberg, even though it is clear he did not arrive at the decisions lightly.

Whatever the final assessment of the retrial, it again demonstrates the considerable discretion that judges have within their courtrooms - and why it can have positive, as well as negative, consequences.