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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial | |
ARTICLE VIEW: | |
Federal corruption trial of Sen. Menendez on track to begin next week | |
By Hannah Rabinowitz, CNN | |
Updated: | |
5:28 PM EDT, Mon May 6, 2024 | |
Source: CNN | |
will be allowed to argue at his federal corruption trial that he | |
thought he was acting for the “good of the public” when helping | |
Egypt and Qatar, while prosecutors will be able to present evidence to | |
the jury that they allege shows the lawmaker and his wife took bribes | |
in a scheme involving the foreign governments to fund their lavish | |
lifestyle. | |
Judge Sidney Stein set those general perimeters at a hearing Monday in | |
federal court in New York, where he outlined how he wants the | |
high-profile trial to run. | |
The trial of Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, is expected to begin with | |
jury selection next Monday. Menendez will face a jury alongside two New | |
Jersey businessmen who are co-defendants. His wife, Nadine, but will be | |
tried separately. | |
Another co-defendant, businessman Jose Uribe, to charges related to | |
the bribery scheme and cooperated with federal prosecutors. | |
Menendez is one of several current and former members of Congress – | |
including and – facing federal charges and will be a test of how | |
jurors weigh evidence of elected officials accused of a crime. | |
The trial is scheduled to last several weeks, as prosecutors try to | |
prove that Menendez and the businessmen Wael Hana and Fred Daibes | |
engaged in a wide-ranging corruption scheme to help the Egyptian and | |
Qatari governments in exchange for lucrative bribes. All three men have | |
pleaded not guilty. | |
Stein, a Clinton appointee, ruled on what sorts of arguments he would | |
allow to be presented to a jury. It’s unclear what defense strategies | |
Menendez will chose to adopt. | |
The judge made clear that he would not allow the trial to spill into | |
infighting between attorneys or veer into political commentary. | |
Prosecutors, for their part, will be allowed to show the jury evidence | |
that Menendez and his wife allegedly used the money from their scheme | |
to live lavishly. Nadine Menendez also has pleaded not guilty. | |
“Mr. Menendez’s desire for the car, the gold, the watches go to his | |
motive – the lifestyle,” Stein ruled, adding that the prosecutors | |
still should not plan to show “hundreds of photographs of assets.” | |
Among the arguments that Stein barred was any effort by Menendez’s | |
attorneys to cross-examine FBI agents on whether the senator was | |
affirmatively warned by investigators that the Egyptian government | |
wanted to use him as an agent. The judge said that such questioning | |
might “lead the jury to believe” that the government “had an | |
obligation to warn” the senator, which they did not. | |
While the senator will be able to argue “whatever he did was good for | |
the public,” and that other lawmakers have held meetings with foreign | |
intelligence officials on trips abroad, the judge said he cannot use | |
how other lawmakers operate as a reason why he believed that his | |
actions weren’t criminal. | |
Stein still must deal with a number of issues before the trial | |
commences next week, including whether Menendez can call a psychiatrist | |
to testify that his habit of stashing gold bars and wads of cash in his | |
home is rooted in the trauma of his father’s suicide and his | |
family’s history of property confiscated in Cuba. | |
Prosecutors want to bar the testimony, saying the psychiatrist’s | |
finding on the senator’s mental state “does not appear to be the | |
product of any reliable scientific principle or method” and that | |
Menendez is trying to get “sympathy” from the jurors. | |
The judge hasn’t yet decided what sorts of questions defense | |
attorneys and prosecutors will be allowed to ask prospective New York | |
jurors. The defense has proposed asking: “Do you have any opinions | |
about people from New Jersey in general?” and “Do you think that | |
because they are from New Jersey, they are more likely to break the | |
law?” | |
Among the questions prosecutors have proposed is “Do any of you have | |
strong feelings regarding whether the United States Department of | |
Justice should or should not pursue charges against elected | |
officials?” | |
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