New charges in US bribery case against pro-Armenian senator Bob Menendez

US Senator Bob Menendez and his wife have been re-indicted by prosecutors who added obstruction of justice charges to existing charges, greatly expanding the case just days after another defendant pleaded guilty.

The New Jersey Democrat and his wife, Nadine, were accused on March 5 of causing their lawyers to make false statements to federal prosecutors in New York about a Mercedes-Benz convertible and mortgage payments that the US alleges were bribes from businessmen seeking favours from the senator, Bloomberg has learned.

One of the businessmen, Jose Uribe, pleaded guilty on March 1 to bribery, fraud and obstruction charges, admitting he gave the car to the couple in exchange for the senator’s help in resolving an indictment of an associate and a related investigation of an employee. Uribe, one of three businessmen indicted in the case, said he caused his former lawyer to tell prosecutors falsely that monthly payments he made on the car were loans. Uribe, 56, is cooperating with prosecutors against Menendez, agreeing to give an inside account of the scheme.

An Egyptian American businessman, Wael Hana, allegedly made mortgage payments to Nadine Menendez in a separate bribery plot. The new indictment alleges that Menendez told his former lawyer to tell prosecutors in September 2023 that the payments were loans. 

“As Menendez well knew, Menendez had learned of both the mortgage company payment and the car payments prior to 2022, and they were not loans, but bribe payments," according to the indictment. 

A lawyer for Menendez didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment.

The latest indictment complicates the legal challenges for Menendez, who has pleaded not guilty and faces a May 6 trial in New York federal court. FBI agents seized 13 gold bars, nearly $500,000 in cash and the Mercedes in a raid on Menendez’s home, and prosecutors displayed that haul in indictment photos that brought widespread condemnation to the senator. 

Menendez, 70, stepped down as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and hasn’t said if he’ll run for reelection. Tammy Snyder Murphy, wife of Governor Phil Murphy, is running in the June primary for his seat against US Representative Andy Kim.

In pleading guilty, Uribe said he made payments on the car in a way that concealed his involvement. Prosecutors had said Uribe gave Nadine Menendez $15,000 in cash for a down payment on a convertible and made monthly payments for three years. Nadine Menendez needed a new car after she was driving a Mercedes in December 2018 and fatally struck a pedestrian.