The former American senator Bob Menéndez, a Democrat for New Jersey, was sentenced to 11 years in prison on Wednesday, after being convicted of all the positions in his federal trial for corruption.
Prosecutors of the Department of Justice had requested 15 years, while lawyers urged the court to consider a sentence that “depends largely on alternatives to imprisonment.”
Menéndez, who resigned after trial after decades in Democratic politics, has promised to appeal.
Before the sentence, their lawyers argued before Judge Sidney Stein that the defendant should remain free waiting for that appeal, citing a list of issues they plan to press to revoke his conviction.
As transcended, Menéndez wants an pardon from President Donald Trump after not getting one from former president Joe Biden.
Accused alleges that the bribes to Senator Bob Menéndez “paid off”
Menéndez was tried along with two entrepreneurs, Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, also declared guilty. Today Judge Stein condemned Hana to eight years of Daibes to seven.
Menéndez was convicted of the 16 positions, including bribery and acting as a foreign agent.
Prosecutors alleged that he accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for using their political influence to enrich entrepreneurs and benefit Egypt and Qatar.
They said bribes included cash and gold, among other things. “The court should impose substantial prison sentences – prison sentences of at least fifteen years for Menéndez, at least ten years for Hana and at least nine years for Daibes.”
“And significant financial sanctions for Darr a just punishment for this extraordinary abuse of power and betrayal of public confidence, and to deter others to participate in similar conduct,” prosecutors wrote to Stein before the sentence.
The lawyers have tried to blame his wife, Nadine Menéndez, who was diagnosed with cancer and faces a separate trial.
“Apart from the government’s arguments, there is almost no evidence that supports the inference that Senator Menéndez knew about cash and the gold that Nadine kept in her personal and safe closet and in her security box,” they wrote. And they added: “In fact, in other aspects, the evidence showed that Nadine was clearly involved in a behavior without the knowledge of Senator Menéndez.”
