Trial of Sen. Bob Menendez takes a weeklong break after jurors get stuck in elevator

NEW YORK (AP) — The trial of Sen. Bob Menendez grinded to a weeklong break on Tuesday after federal court jurors who were treated to a brick-by-brick build of the prosecution’s bribery case got stuck in an elevator a day after they were forced from their usual assembly room because of flooding.

Judge Sidney H. Stein said jurors were trapped in an elevator for several minutes during what was supposed to be a 10-minute late-afternoon break that lasted almost a half hour.

The elevator breakdown came as jurors were shuttled between floors to an assembly room because carpeting in their usual assembly room just outside the courtroom was found to be soaked on Monday after somebody left sink faucets on over the weekend. As jurors left for the day, Stein humorously warned them: “Don’t all get into one elevator.”

The mishap came on a day when prosecutors slowly tried to build their case against the Democrat with evidence they hoped would score points with jurors against Menendez and his two co-defendants — two New Jersey businessmen who the government claims paid him bribes consisting of gold bars, hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and a car.

Lawyers for Menendez, 70, of Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, and the businessmen say their clients are not guilty and that the government is trying to turn common interactions between a politician and his constituents into crimes.

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