According to recently released court records, Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) seems prepared to attempt to assign responsibility for the federal bribery accusations that his wife, Nadine Menendez, and the couple are facing.
According to the request, “Senator Menendez may choose to testify, as part of his defense, at trial to communications with his wife that serve to dramatically lessen any inference of culpability on Senator Menendez’s behalf.” “Among the things Senator Menendez will discuss are the things he and his wife talked about while having dinners with Egyptian officials, which affected his perception of the purpose of those dinners; the justifications Nadine gave for why they had given her certain financial items; the reasons he forwarded a list of questions to his wife that other Senators allegedly planned to ask an Egyptian official; and many other topics.”
The memo went on to say that the 70-year-old senator would “demonstrate the ways” in which his wife “kept information from Sen. Menendez or otherwise caused him to believe that nothing criminal was taking place” in order to prove the “lack of any inappropriate intent on Senator Menendez’s behalf.”
According to the letter, “they may inculpate Nadine by establishing the absence of any improper intent on Senator Menendez’s behalf.”
In Sept., Menendez and his spouse had criminal accusations placed on them after news broke that they collected bribes from up to three businesses for his acting as the head of the very influential Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The DOJ claims that the purpose of the purported bribery was to shield businesses and help Egypt.
In a later amended legal indictment, the prosecution said that Menendez had additionally utilized his influence to assist a friend in obtaining a multimillion dollar investment transaction with the Qatari government, in part by acting in a way that benefited Qatar.
Menendez faced additional charges in a later superseding indictment, including conspiracy, bribery, extortion, operating as a foreign agent while in public office, obstruction of justice, and honest services wire fraud.
