How Bob Menendez’s friends helped him steer clear of jail

“Gifts to cultivate friendship are not bribes,” Abbe Lowell said in his closing in defense of Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez — and enough jurors agreed to result in a hung jury and a mistrial.

The Biz Markie defense — he’s just a friend — worked. Lowell was worth every penny of the $4.5 million raised and spent by Menendez’s legal defense trust.

But the hung jury doesn’t change the facts:

Menendez’s co-defendant Salomon Melgen left the courtroom and went back to jail, where he isawaiting sentencing on 67 counts of Medicare fraud.

Menendez enjoyed ready access to Melgen’s private jets and luxury resorts financed by that Medicare fraud — and the New Jersey senator went all the way up the chain to the secretary of health and human services to keep the money flowing.

He got visas for Melgen’s supermodel girlfriends and he tried to steer a lucrative port security contract to the eye doctor who had no security background. Customs and Border Protection official Stephanie Talton testified that she found it “odd” that Menendez would “ask us to stop our law enforcement mission.”

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