A Manhattan jury is ready to begin weighing the destiny of New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez — who’s charged with promoting out his put up as a world affairs bigwig to line his pockets with gold bars and different bribes.
Deliberations are slated to start Friday within the federal case accusing Menendez, 70, and his spouse of pocketing lots of of hundreds of {dollars} of gold bars, money and a Mercedes-Benz whereas defending and enriching three Backyard State businessmen and catering to the Egyptian and Qatari governments.
Manhattan federal Decide Sidney Stein started instructing the jury Thursday afternoon — after the feds once more blasted the senator’s brazen technique to blame his spouse Nadine Menendez, 57, for “protecting him at midnight” about asking native businessmen Wael Hana and property mogul Fred Daibes for the payoffs.
Daibes, 66, who’s charged alongside the senator, is an Edgewater, New Jersey actual property energy dealer who has been one of many senator’s closest pals for years, trial proof revealed.
“Are you going to just accept that there was a secret plan to dupe Senator Menendez?” prosecutor Daniel Richenthal instructed the jury within the closing a part of the federal government’s closing assertion. “That his spouse cooked up a scheme to gather cash and gold with two males, one in all whom was his shut pal, and that he by no means realized about it?”
The allegedly crooked former head of the highly effective Senate Overseas Relations Committee is charged with 16 totally different felonies, together with bribery, extortion, obstructing justice and performing as an unlawful overseas agent. The highest counts he faces carry a doable sentence of as much as 20 years in jail.
Menendez, a Democrat, has maintained his innocence — claiming that the feds focused him as a result of he’s a outstanding Latino — and has bucked calls from each Republicans and Democrats to resign.
Sporting a darkish blue go well with and pink tie on the protection desk, the senator frowned and shook his head at a number of factors in courtroom Thursday — together with when the prosecutor Richenthal reminded jurors that Menendez secretly ghostwrote a letter urging colleagues to unfreeze $300 million in Egyptian navy support throughout the time interval when he was allegedly “on the take.”
“That’s not the work of a diplomat,” Richenthal stated. “That’s the work of a corrupt official.”
However the senator appeared in greater spirits exterior the courthouse, telling reporters, “I stay up for the jury beginning tomorrow,” as he stepped right into a ready black Lincoln sedan.
The true property honcho Daibes and Egypt-born businessman Wael Hana, 40, are charged alongside the senator and are accused of conspiring to bathe the Menendezes with gold, money and even an air air purifier and an elliptical machine between 2018 and 2023.
In trade, Menendez helped make sure that Hana stored a profitable monopoly on halal meat exports to Egypt — which he was granted regardless of having no halal expertise — and tried to carry up Daibes’ pending federal financial institution fraud case with New Jersey’s high federal prosecutor, the Manhattan feds stated.
The senator additionally secretly lobbied his colleagues in Congress to melt their stances on Egypt’s human rights points after Hana linked the senator and his spouse with Egyptian officers, trial proof confirmed.
“What else can the love of my life do for you?” Nadine Menendez instructed one Egyptian authorities official whereas her husband smoked cigars and swigged crimson wine at a Might 2019 dinner at Morton’s Steakhouse, an FBI agent who secretly noticed the scene testified.
Nadine is scheduled to go on trial later this yr after her case was severed from her husband’s whereas she recovers from breast most cancers.
A fourth member of the alleged bribery scheme, disgraced insurance coverage dealer Jose Uribe, pleaded responsible and testified that he purchased Nadine a brand new Mercedes in trade for guarantees that her husband would tamper with state felony probes into his pals and kin.
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