Former Sen. Bob Menendez and his defense attorneys are still fighting his corruption conviction. In a letter late Thursday to the federal judge in charge of the case, they asked for leniency at sentencing later this month, writing that the ordeal made Menendez a “national punchline” despite what they called a lifetime of good deeds and saving lives.
The disgraced senator’s attorneys asked for Menendez’s years of public service and personal hardships to be taken into consideration, referring to his professional and financial troubles since being convicted last July on 16 counts of federal bribery and corruption charges.
The request comes as his defense team also mounts a case for a retrial, pointing to mistakes prosecutors made with evidence given to the jury as grounds for his verdict to be upended.
In an interview with NJ Spotlight News, former Monmouth County prosecutor Chris Gramiccioni said U.S. District Court Judge Sydney Stein has several factors to weigh when deciding whether to toss Menendez’s conviction or order a new trial.
“There’s a constitutional right to a fair jury trial, and there’s presumption of prejudice when evidence like this, that was rendered inadmissible, it gets before a jury,” said Gramiccioni. “But that’s not just the only finding that has to be demonstrated to justify a new trial… There has to be some kind of evidence to believe that the jury actually considered that evidence for there to be prejudice enough to overturn the verdict and not have a new trial imposed.”
“And that’s what the argument by the government is,” added Gramiccioni. “There was 3,000 bits of information on this laptop. There’s no reason to believe they [the jurors] even looked at this. And even if they did, it’s harmless error, and the government is rightfully pointing out … the defense had a couple days to review what was going to be sent back to the jury during deliberations, and they missed it.”
Gramiccioni said it’s a tall order to have the conviction overturned.
