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   From: nospam@ix.netcom.com   
      
   Sen. Bob Menendez was a “bribed man” who repeatedly sprang into action for   
   cash and gold, federal prosecutors said Monday in the first hours of their   
   closing arguments.   
      
   “It wasn’t enough for him to be one of the most powerful people in   
   Washington,” federal prosecutor Paul Monteleoni said.   
      
   The closing argument is a chance for prosecutors to tie together over two   
   months of testimony and evidence that they say puts Menendez at the heart   
   of several overlapping conspiracies to disrupt criminal cases against New   
   Jersey business people and aid the government of Egypt in exchange for   
   bribes.   
      
   Prosecutors are expected to take about three more hours to sum up their   
   case before jurors begin their deliberations later this week. The trial of   
   Menendez and two New Jersey business people accused of bribing him began   
   in May. Menendez and his two co-defendants have pleaded not guilty and are   
   expected to give several hours of their closing arguments beginning   
   Tuesday.   
      
   “The government is intoxicated with their own rhetoric,” Menendez said as   
   he left the courthouse on Monday.   
      
   Monteleoni said the senator engaged in a “clear pattern” of corruption   
   when he accepted bribes and took actions to help those who were bribing   
   him.   
      
   His closing argument sought to preempt defense arguments that the senator   
   was kept in the dark about the bribes by his wife or that the bribes were   
   gifts to the couple from long-time friends — arguments that the senator   
   and his co-defendants are likely to lean heavily on.   
      
   Monteleoni tried to put Menendez in the center of the conspiracy and   
   called his wife, Nadine, a “go between.” She is also charged but will   
   stand trial separately because of a breast cancer diagnosis.   
      
   Monteleoni said evidence showed that Menendez personally accepted a   
   $10,000 check for his wife’s “sham” consulting business from New Jersey   
   real estate developer Fred Daibes, one of the co-defendants. At another   
   point, Monteleoni said Daibes visited the Menendez home to drop off donuts   
   and a gold bar worth nearly $60,000 — an assertion based on a trip to the   
   house by Daibes followed soon after by a Google search by the senator for   
   the price of a kilogram of gold.   
      
   In exchange for bribes, prosecutors allege Menendez tried to disrupt a   
   federal criminal case against Daibes and a state investigation of another   
   man who has already pleaded guilty to bribing the senator and Nadine with   
   a luxury car.   
      
   Other allegations involving Egypt are among the most serious, since they   
   cover the senator’s time leading the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a   
   time when he was among one of the most influential people in American   
   foreign affairs.   
      
   In exchange for bribes, Monteleoni said, Menendez cast aside years of   
   concern about human rights to help the Egyptian government ghostwrite a   
   letter meant for fellow senators pushing back on such concerns and take   
   other actions to aid Egypt.   
      
   Monteleoni told jurors Menendez didn’t get to be chair of that committee   
   by being clueless and pointed to numerous texts and phone calls with   
   Nadine and the men accused of bribing them.   
      
   “Why is he texting this to his girlfriend?” Monteleoni asked as he showed   
   jurors a text about arms sales from the senator to Nadine before they   
   married.   
      
   At another point, he showed jurors text messages and testimony from   
   earlier in the trial where Menendez’s staff talked about the senator   
   acting “weird” toward Egypt.   
      
   “Menendez wasn’t acting weirdly, he was acting corruptly,” Monteleoni   
   said.   
      
   Just like Michelle Obama did "working" for two months and collecting   
   $316,962.00.   
      
   https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/08/menendez-prosecutor-closing-   
   statement-00166914   
      
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