NEW YORK — A recent revelation by federal prosecutors has brought to light an inadvertent error regarding the bribery trial of former New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez. It was disclosed that a federal judge had excluded certain evidence from the trial, but this information ended up on a laptop that was provided to jurors. Prosecutors asserted on Wednesday that this mistake should not impact the conviction of Menendez in any way.
The prosecutors informed Judge Sidney H. Stein through a letter that they had recently become aware of a mix-up, where the laptop contained versions of multiple trial exhibits that were not fully redacted as ordered by the judge. Menendez, age 70, resigned from his Senate position in August following his conviction on 16 counts, including bribery and conspiracy. He lost his role as the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee after facing charges in the case last fall.
The former senator is awaiting sentencing, which is set for January 29. The trial revolved around allegations that he accepted illicit gifts, including gold and cash, from three businessmen from New Jersey while purportedly acting on behalf of the Egyptian government. Among his co-defendants, two were convicted alongside him, while one testified against him in a plea agreement.
Menendez’s legal team did not provide immediate responses to requests for comments on this matter. According to the letter shared by the prosecutors, nine government exhibits presented to jurors were missing crucial redactions mandated by Judge Stein to prevent infringement on the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause, which shields legislators regarding the information they communicate.
The prosecutors asserted that no corrective measures were needed following the discovery of this mistake for a number of reasons, including the fact that defense attorneys did not raise any objections when they reviewed the documents on the laptop before it was handed to the jurors. Additionally, they believed there was a “reasonable likelihood” that the jurors had not viewed the incorrectly redacted documents, and even if they had, the impact on the defendants would have been negligible. The prosecutors described the erroneous exhibits as “secondary relevance” and emphasized that sufficient properly admitted evidence existed.
Menendez has signaled his intention to appeal the conviction and has submitted documents to Judge Stein requesting either an acquittal or a new trial. He argued that a key reason for his request for dismissal was a breach of his rights as a lawmaker concerning speech and debate. His legal team contended that “the government walked all over the Senator’s constitutionally protected Speech or Debate privilege” in their attempts to assert that he engaged in official acts in exchange for bribes. They emphasized, “the evidence showed that he never used the authority of his office to do anything in exchange for a bribe,” and criticized the prosecution for relying on speculative assumptions rather than concrete proof.
Menendez first entered the Senate in 2006, appointed after Jon Corzine, the former senator, became governor of New Jersey. He successfully won election in 2006 and was subsequently re-elected in 2012 and again in 2018.
