Motion to suppress evidence, new attorney, sealed documents and more Sen. Menendez news

It was a busy week for Sen. Bob Menendez, his wife and three New Jersey businessmen charged alongside him with bribery offenses in September.

Menendez made motions to suppress evidence, while the other four defendants indicted alongside him — his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, and businessmen Fred Daibes, Wael Hana and Jose Uribe — filed court documents to make a statement on sealed documents.

The sealed documents were challenged this month by the Inner City Press and The New York Times and were joined last week by Gannett, representing The Record and NorthJersey.com.

Arslanian added a new attorney, with experience in illegal lobbying on behalf of a foreign country, to her team.

Here's a look at all that took place with the case this past week.

New attorney for Nadine Arslanian Menendez

Arslanian has hired additional representation for the case using pro hac vice, a process that allows her to bring in an attorney who is not bar-certified in the state where the trial is taking place. In this instance that means she’s hiring Mark MacDougall, who can work in Massachusetts and Maryland.

MacDougall is from the firm Schertler Onorato Mead & Sears in Washington, D.C., and has been certified as in good standing with the Maryland Supreme Court.

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He has experience with this type of case as well, having previously represented Bijan Rafiekian, a former business partner to former President Donald Trump’s National Security Adviser Michael Flynn against the federal Department of Justice. Rafiekian had been accused of illegally lobbying on behalf of the Turkish government.

More Fourth Amendment attention

The senator is not alone in trying to suppress evidence found by investigators through the use of warrants. Arslanian also filed to have the evidence found in the Englewood Cliffs home she owns suppressed, including the cash and gold bars.

Menendez filed his motion on Monday and Arslanian joined it later in the week. His filing alleged that the “government’s apparent zeal to 'get back' at Senator Menendez for defeating its prior prosecution has overwhelmed its sound judgment."

The filing also alleged that several of the government’s search warrants were "riddled with material misrepresentations and omissions that deceived the authorizing magistrate judge" and now require an evidentiary hearing. The filing argues that the search warrants were "overbroad and unparticularized."

The investigation included recorded conversations from confidential sources in Arabic that were translated from 2019, interviews with confidential sources from 2020 through 2022, and search warrants that began in January 2022.

Sealed documents in Menendez case

Since the indictment went public in September, 14 sealed court documents have been filed, along with several pages full of redactions.

The New York Times and the Inner City Press made motions to unseal the documents early this month. Gannett Satellite Information Network, LLC, on behalf of The Record and Northjersey.com, joined the motion last week to unseal the documents.

When Menendez made his motion to dismiss the superseding indictment, he said his actions were “not official acts” and that the prosecutors hid key evidence from the public and court. However, the descriptions of examples of more than a dozen pages are sealed documents.

The New York Times argued that one page redacts information about the senator’s 2021 trip to Egypt in which he describes a statement by a "key State Department official" that shows he was acting "consistent with what the Biden administration sought" and contrary to Egypt's interests.

Four more sealed documents were filed with the court on Jan. 18. Days later, Menendez, Arslanian Menendez, Hana, Uribe and Daibes all submitted documents in response.

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Hana did not object. His attorney said even Hana himself has not seen some of the redactions meant for “attorney’s eyes only” and does not object to the court's unsealing his filings and unredacted versions of his motions and supporting documents on the public docket.

Daibes, Uribe and Arslanian Menendez sent statements saying they took “no position” on the unsealing of documents.

Menendez took no position on the unsealing the certain documents or the redactions requested by the state.

The government said Menendez may and should file a less-redacted version of his memorandum of law in support of his motion to dismiss and an unredacted version of the supporting declaration and its exhibits.

“The government also requests that the court maintain the materials placed in the vault (the 'Vault Materials') under seal.”

It’s unclear when to expect certain documents will be made available and what the judge will decide.

Background — the charges

The indictment alleges that between 2018 and 2022, Menendez and his wife “engaged in a corrupt relationship with Hana, Uribe and Daibes” to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for Menendez using his “power and influence to protect, to enrich those businessmen and to benefit the government of Egypt” even as he sat as chair of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Bribes allegedly included cash, gold bars, payments toward a home mortgage, compensation for a low- or no-show job and a Mercedes-Benz — much of which is detailed in photographs in the 50-page indictment.

The most recent version of the indictment alleges that Menendez received payments from Daibes in return for helping him get a Qatari investment company with ties to that country’s government to invest in a Daibes property by doing things that were viewed as favorable to the government of Qatar.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Sen. Menendez, co-defendants in bribery case have busy week