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MANHATTAN (CN) — Prosecutors in New York federal court accused the wife of former New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez of accepting gold bars, luxury cars and sham paychecks in exchange for political favors from her powerful husband during opening arguments on Monday afternoon, commencing the second trial of a criminal bribery case that ended Menendez’s congressional career.
Nadine Arslanian Menendez — Bob’s second wife — is standing trial on 15 criminal counts in connection to the bribery scheme, having initially been charged alongside her Cuban-American husband in September 2023. A grand jury indictment from the Southern District of New York claimed the New Jersey couple took hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of bribes and gifts, including gold bars, from several businessmen in exchange for the senator’s political influence.
“They were partners in crime, partners in corruption and partners in greed,” assistant U.S. attorney Lara Pomerantz told jurors during the prosecution’s opening argument.
“They were on the take,” she added.
Prosecutors said Nadine coordinated and accepted bribe payments in exchange for official acts on behalf of the Egyptian government, including efforts to unfreeze millions of dollars of U.S. military aid to Egypt that had been paused due to human rights concerns.
Nadine is accused of introducing the senator to her longtime friend, Wael Hana, described by prosecutors as a “failed businessman” with ties to the Egyptian government. Hana later paid her sham paychecks through a shell company, prosecutors claim, after Menendez contacted a Department of Agriculture official in a bid to help Hana secure a lucrative monopoly on certifying halal meat imported into Egypt from the U.S.
Pomerantz told jurors that Nadine and Bob, together, repeatedly “promised to corrupt the criminal justice system” by accepting bribe payments in exchange for promises to interfere with pending state and federal cases against several New Jersey businessmen.
Nadine received envelopes of cash, mortgage payments and a 2019 Mercedes-Benz convertible, according to prosecutors.
“She communicated with the bribe payers. She passed messages to the senator, and she collected most of the bribes,” Pomerantz said.
Much of the evidence previewed in the government’s case against Nadine echoed, often in verbatim wording, the same prosecutors’ case against her husband.
Both pleaded not guilty; a jury convicted Bob Menendez last July on all 16 criminal counts he faced, including illegally accepting bribes of cash and gold bars from three New Jersey businessmen in exchange for agreeing to flex his legislative muscle to protect them from a trio of state and federal criminal investigations. He was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
Nadine, 58, was severed from standing trial with co-defendants because of her breast cancer diagnosis.
The jury selection process to impanel jurors to sit for Nadine’s expected 10-week trial took four full days, wrapping up Friday afternoon.
In addition to coordinating and collecting a series of quid pro quo bribes for years, prosecutors accuse Nadine of obstructing justice by lying in response to a grand jury probe, mischaracterizing the monthly car payments made on her Mercedes-Benz convertible as a personal loan because of her precarious financial condition.
Nadine Menendez’s attorney Barry Coburn delivered a brief opening argument on Monday, anticipating “an absolute utter failure of proof in this case with respect to ‘knowledge and intent’ with respect to every single count in this case,” referring to two separate elements that must each be proven beyond a reasonable doubt in order to convict on each count.
Coburn, a former prosecutor in the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s office, told jurors that the prosecution’s characterization of Nadine was “grossly inaccurate with respect to Nadine Menendez.”
Her trial is expected to run until mid-May.
U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein, a Bill Clinton appointee, set Bob Menendez’s prison surrender date for early June to accommodate his request to support Nadine while she stands trial.
He was not present in the courtroom on the first day of the trial Monday.
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