NEW YORK — An investigator gave a New York jury a riveting account Tuesday of an evening in Washington, D.C., in 2019 when an FBI surveillance team encountered Sen. John Smith. Bob Menendez and his girlfriend in a fancy restaurant.
The investigator, Terrie Williams-Thompson, told the jury at Menendez’s bribery trial that the team was following another person across the table at Morton’s when she heard Menendez’s future wife, Nadine Arslanian, ask, “What can the love of do more in my life? You?”
Williams-Thompson testified that she heard the comment while sitting two arms’ lengths from the table while posing with another FBI investigator as a married couple on a date. She said they secretly filmed Menendez’s table as she strained to hear what she could and even posed for a photo to secretly photograph the people at the table.
The testimony provided the jury with some of the more interesting testimony at a fourth-week trial that has long seen FBI agents and others on the stand in the form of hundreds of pieces of evidence, from emails to phone recordings, bank records and gold bars. and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash were shown to the jury.
The cash and gold bars, found by the FBI during a 2022 raid on the home the couple shared Englewood Cliffs, New Jerseyhas featured prominently in prosecutors’ claims that the 70-year-old senator and his wife accepted the valuables, along with a nice car, in exchange for helping three New Jersey businessmen in their business ventures.
William-Thompson’s testimony about the Washington dinner highlights a key aspect of the indictment against Menendez, the three businessmen and Nadine Menendez that first brought them to Manhattan federal court to face criminal charges last fall. One businessman has pleaded guilty and will testify against Menendez and two other businessmen who are on trial together. Nadine Menendez is scheduled for trial in July. The two other businessmen and both Menendezes have pleaded not guilty.
According to the indictment, the May 21, 2019 steakhouse dinner included the Menendez couple, co-defendant Wael Hana and an unidentified Egyptian official, hours after they met in Menendez’s Senate office in Washington.
During the office meeting, Hana asked Menendez to help him counter the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s efforts to oppose the monopoly granted to his company to certify that all meat products shipped from the U.S. to Egypt meet religious requirements, the complaint said.
According to testimony from a former agricultural official, Menendez called one day to order him to abandon his efforts to oppose the monopoly.
Williams-Thompson said the surveillance she and seven or eight other investigators conducted at the steakhouse was part of her work over the past 18 years as an FBI investigative specialist.
She testified that she does not remember who the subject of the surveillance was that night, except that it was “someone from New York” and not the senator.
She said the team leader, a woman posing as an Uber driver, dropped off the two investigative specialists in front of the restaurant.
Inside, she said, Williams-Thompson and her fellow investigator, a man, filmed the other table using a hidden camera. She didn’t reveal exactly how it was hidden, but said it could be in a common device such as glasses, a tie or a key fob.
She said the volume of conversations at a patio table that was otherwise relatively quiet grew louder as more alcohol was consumed.
“They were eating. They were talking. They were laughing. They were smoking,” Williams-Thompson said of the wine-drinking group who smoked cigarettes and cigars.
Toward the end of dinner, she said, she heard the senator’s future wife ask, “What else can the love of my life do for you?”
On cross-examination, an attorney for Menendez attacked Williams-Thompson’s credibility when she recalled the quote, noting that she did not immediately document it in writing anywhere, although she said she was sure she informed someone on her team had brought. Williams-Thompson said that, other than the laughter, that was the only thing she heard from her that night.
When Assistant U.S. Attorney Lara Pomerantz asked if she had told anyone at the restaurant that she was with the FBI, she replied, “No ma’am. Because we don’t want this to come out at all. … I don’t want to blow our coverage.”
When asked if she ate while she was there, Williams-Thompson said: “I definitely did. And it was good too!” The comment caused laughter in the courtroom.
“That’s part of going up,” said the witness. “You eat? I’m going to eat.”
Judge Sidney H. Stein interrupted the questioning and told her, “I hope the FBI paid for your meal.”
“Oh yes, sir, it is,” she replied.