Bob Menendez asked a judge Wednesday to set aside guilty verdicts that forced his resignation from the U.S. Senate and grant a new bribery trial.
Lawyers for the New Jersey Democrat said in papers filed in Manhattan federal court that a recent revelation by prosecutors that improper evidence was put on a computer used by jurors during deliberations means that a new trial is “unavoidable.”
The 70-year-old Menendez was convicted in July of 16 charges, including bribery, in part based on an allegation that he accepted bribes in exchange for approving military aid to Egypt.
He awaits a Jan. 29 sentencing. Menendez resigned from the Senate in August.
At trial, prosecutors said Menendez accepted gold and cash from three New Jersey businessmen in return for favors.
Earlier this month, prosecutors revealed in a letter to Judge Sidney H. Stein that they had discovered that some factual information that the judge had ruled should be excluded from several trial exhibits was instead inadvertently loaded onto a computer used by jurors to reach their verdict.
Click this link for the original source of this article.
Author: Faith N
This content is courtesy of, and owned and copyrighted by, https://www.offthepress.com and its author. This content is made available by use of the public RSS feed offered by the host site and is used for educational purposes only. If you are the author or represent the host site and would like this content removed now and in the future, please contact USSANews.com using the email address in the Contact page found in the website menu.
