Sen. Bob Menendez's federal bribery case goes to jury after closing arguments

The New Jersey Democrat is fighting corruption charges, including bribery, wire fraud, extortion, obstruction of justice and acting as a foreign agent of Egypt.

A jury began deliberating Friday afternoon in Sen. Bob Menendez's bribery trial following four days of closing arguments in which prosecutors accused the New Jersey Democrat of "corruption on a massive scale," delivering favors for businessmen who showered him and his wife with hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and gold.

Menendez's attorney maintained the evidence showed only that the three-term senator had advocated for his constituents. "He was doing his job, and he was doing it well," his lawyer Adam Fee told the jury.

Asked on his way into the federal courthouse in New York on Friday morning how he felt about the jury getting the case, Menendez said, “I love it.”

The jury got the case shortly after 2 p.m. ET Friday, following lengthy charging instructions from U.S. District Judge Sidney H. Stein.

The final phase of the criminal trial — Menendez's second since 2015 — follows eight weeks of testimony from 34 witnesses, but not from the senator himself. He opted not to testify in his own defense, as was his right.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/bob-menendez-bribery-trial-jury-deliberations-rcna159960

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