Washington – Lawyer Sen. Bob Menendez concluded his witness call on Wednesday, choosing not to let the New Jersey Democrat take up his own defense as he fought back. allegations that he traded political favors for gold bars and cash.
Few witnesses testified on his behalf, compared to 30 witnesses called by the prosecution during the trial, which has so far lasted eight weeks.
Menendez’s defense attorney was called his sister and his wife’s sisterNadine Menendez, to testify there when they tried to show it is not unusual for a couple to keep gold and a lot of cash at home.
When federal investigators executed a search warrant at Menendez’s home in June 2022, they found it more than $480,000 in cash stored in envelopes, coats, shoes and bags, as well as 13 gold bars worth more than $ 100,000.
Menendez, who pleaded not guilty, was charged with bribery, extortion, wire fraud, obstruction of justice and acting as a foreign agent for Egypt. Nadine Menendez has also pleaded not guilty. He tried postponed until August when she was recovering from breast cancer surgery.
The senator’s older brother, Caridad Gonzalez, told jurors that his parents and aunt had a practice of keeping money at home after the family fled persecution in Cuba in 1951, before Menendez was born. He called the habit “the Cuban thing.”
“Dad always said he didn’t trust banks,” Gonzalez said. “If you trust the banks, you never know what can happen, so you should have money at home.”
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He remembers finding wads of money in a shoebox in Menendez’s home in the 1980s.
But prosecutors undermined one of the points made by Gonzalez after he testified that he asked his sister to help a neighbor with an immigration problem. Prosecutors showed text messages between the senator and his sister suggesting that he did not present the matter in the same way prosecutors said it was businessmen who bribed the couple.
Businessmen, Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, were tried with the senator. He has also pleaded not guilty.
When they sought Menendez’s help, he allegedly pressured US Department of Agriculture officials to protect Hana’s halal certification monopoly and intervene in a criminal case in New Jersey involving Daibes, according to prosecutors.
Russell Richardson, a forensic accountant, testified that Menendez withdrew $400 in cash almost every few weeks from 2008 to 2022, totaling more than $150,000.
The testimony was intended to support Menendez’s explanation that he withdrew thousands of dollars from his bank account over the decades because of his family’s experiences in Cuba.
Richardson testified during cross-examination that he found no record of Menendez withdrawing $10,000 in cash at once. Some of the money seized from Menendez’s home was found in a $10,000 wrapper, and Daibes’ fingerprints were found on some of the envelopes that contained the money.
Part of Menendez’s defense strategy has been to pin the blame on his wifeclaimed the senator was unaware of his wife’s financial challenges and dealings with businessmen accused of bribery.
Nadine Menendez’s sister, Katia Tabourian, testified that her sister and the senator broke up in late 2018 because her sister’s ex-boyfriend “caused a lot of chaos in the relationship with the senator.” Menendez’s attorney said the couple was unable to plan together during the hiatus in their relationship.
Tabourian confirmed that her sister locked the bedroom closet, which Menendez’s attorney said she did not have a key for. Investigators found gold bars and cash in a closet during a 2022 search. Tabourian said the family usually gave gifts of cash, gold and jewelry.
The jury is expected to hear the case at the end of next week, after testimony from Hana’s witness and closing arguments. Daibes’ legal team rested Wednesday without presenting a defense.
—Ash Kalmar contributed reporting.
