On Thursday, the wife of former New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez (D) was sentenced in a foreign influence trial.
Nadine Menendez was sentenced to more than four years in prison on Thursday for participating with her husband and former U.S. senator Bob Menendez in a corruption scheme to obtain expensive gifts and bribes including gold bars, a luxury car and $1 million in cash. (RELATED: United States Senator Bob Menendez Charged With Aiding Middle East Government)
Nadine Menendez, 58, was convicted in April for her part in the scheme, which also resulted in her husband’s conviction last year for bribery and other charges and sentencing in January to 11 years in prison. Prosecutors recommended that she serve at least seven years in prison for her conviction on bribery, obstruction of justice, conspiracy to commit those crimes and related counts.
U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein issued a sentence of 54 months and said Nadine Menendez was a knowing actor in the long-running corruption scheme.
“You were a central participant in a wide-ranging extensive conspiracy involving the corruption of the one of the highest ranking United States senators, the chair of the senate foreign relations committee,” Stein said. “You set up meetings. You initiated actions. You involved others. You knew what you were doing throughout.”
Nadine threw her husband under the bus as she was sentenced to prison Thursday for her role in the couple’s corruption scheme — painting herself as a victim.
“I put my life in his hands and he strung me like a puppet,” Nadine Menedez said through tears as she pleaded for forgiveness from Manhattan federal Judge Sidney Stein.
“The blindfold is off. I now know he is not my savior. He is not the man I thought he was,” she said.
The attorneys argued that she needed ongoing treatment for breast cancer that would not be accommodated adequately by the Bureau of Prisons.
Her husband, who is currently serving his sentence in a low-security prison in Pennsylvania, submitted his own letter for the judge to review. In that submission, Bob Menendez attempted to walk back his lawyers’ comments at his trial that suggested his wife orchestrated the crimes, according to The Washington Post. (RELATED: Bob Menendez Sentenced On Corruption And Bribery Charges)
“Your Honor, you gave me a tough sentence that surely serves the deterrent value you said was needed,” Bob Menendez wrote. “To imprison Nadine, would not recognize the trauma she has suffered, how it has affected her and her judgment, and I would respectfully say would not have any greater deterrent effect.”
Manhattan prosecutors in a recent court filing highlighted the gravity of Nadine Menendez’s illegal conduct.
“The defendant did not commit bribery reluctantly, fleetingly, or on a small scale,” the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office wrote in an Aug. 21 sentencing memo. “She did so eagerly, for years, and in a scheme implicating foreign relations, national security, and the integrity of state and federal law enforcement.”
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