Questions In Fatal Crash Involving Menendez’s Wife

The New York Times reports:

It was a cold evening in December 2018, and Nadine Arslanian, the soon-to-be wife of Senator Robert Menendez, was zipping through the darkened streets of suburban New Jersey in a black Mercedes-Benz sedan. She would later tell the police she did not see the man stepping out in front of her to cross a busy thoroughfare. The crash that ensued just after 7:30 p.m. killed the man, Richard Koop, 49, almost instantly.

The revelation helps fill in an important narrative gap around one of the most blatant bribes alleged in a 39-page federal indictment unveiled last month against Ms. Menendez, her powerful husband and three businessmen. Prosecutors said in those charging papers that Ms. Menendez needed a car so badly after a December 2018 “accident” that the senator, a Democrat, was willing to try to suppress an unrelated criminal prosecution for a New Jersey businessman in exchange for a $60,000 Mercedes convertible.

Read the full article. According to the Times, police treated the future Mrs. Menendez “with striking deference” and allowed her to leave the scene without being tested for DUI after she summoned a friend who just happened to be a retired cop. There’s so much more, including bodycam video. Gift link.

so the guy leading the charge against congestion pricing allegedly did a bunch of crimes in order to get a new mercedes for his fiancee after she killed someone with her old one. https://t.co/EvYEWCb4fN

— Tim Murphy (@timothypmurphy) October 4, 2023

Senator Robert Menendez was accused of getting a $60,000 car for his wife as a bribe. She damaged her previous car in a crash that killed a man.https://t.co/dAxlwI6LS6

— The New York Times (@nytimes) October 4, 2023