NEW YORK – The jury that will decide the fate of once-powerful Cuban-born Democratic Senator Robert “Bob” Menendez, accused of corruption and being an agent of the Egyptian government, began deliberating on Friday after a two-month trial.
The senator has pleaded not guilty to 16 charges of alleged corruption and claims that it is a political plot against him.
The twelve members of the popular jury, anonymous citizens chosen by lottery, will have to decide unanimously whether the then senator put “his power up for sale” between 2018 and 2023 in exchange for thousands of dollars, gold bullion and a convertible Mercedes for his wife, which the police found at the family home in New Jersey, as the prosecution accuses.
In total, police found $480,000 in cash and gold bullion valued at $150,000 hidden among clothing, plastic bags, cupboards and a safe.
Also sitting in the trial are businessmen Wael Hana, an old friend of Nadine Arslanian, Menéndez’s wife, and his friend for decades, Fred Daibes, who are believed to have given the money to the couple.
A third, Jose Uribe (who gave the $60,000 sports car to Arslanian), pleaded guilty.
Senator’s wife awaits trial
Nadine Arslanian Menéndez, the fifth person charged in the plot, has been unable to sit in court due to breast cancer.
The senator is charged with 16 counts of bribery, fraud, extortion, obstruction of justice and receiving payments to act as an agent for Egyptian governments and to assist a Qatari fund.
If found guilty by the jury, the 70-year-old Cuban-born New Jersey politician could spend 20 years in prison.
In addition to trying to intervene in court to halt legal proceedings against Daibes and Uribe, the senator is also accused of allegedly transmitting “sensitive information” and “secretly helping” the Egyptian government in the military and intelligence spheres.
Menendez is also said to have helped Daibes, a successful property developer, invest in a fund linked to Qatar.
The witnesses
More than 30 witnesses were called to the courtroom and dozens of text messages were among the evidence presented by the prosecution to support what it calls a “large-scale corruption scheme.”
The defense maintains that there is “zero evidence” that the man who was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee until the case broke received bribes.
Instead, they focus on his wife Nadine Arslanian, whom he met in 2018 and who until then had financial problems, for “using” her husband’s name to get money and a job.
A senator since 2006 and a member of the House of Representatives for 14 years before that, Menendez has been a fierce opponent of normalizing relations with Cuba, a staunch enemy of Venezuela and China, and a staunch defender of Israel.
Source: With information from AFP