New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez’s wife has confided in friends that she is convinced she will go to prison because she is short of money for legal representation, The Post has learned.
Nadine Arslanian, the Democrat’s second wife, faces up to 45 years in prison if convicted on bribery and corruption charges when she goes on trial in July.
Her attorneys withdrew from her case earlier this month after successfully having her trial put off until July because she has “a serious medical condition” — leaving her without a defense team.
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Now multiple members of her social circle have told The Post that Arslanian, a mother of two from her first marriage, is expecting to be convicted and jailed after her July trial because of her concern over cash.
Her husband — who lewdly nicknamed her “Bubbles” over her cleavage — has a legal defense fund that has already paid foranexpertwitnessfor his case andmuchof her legal costs, but she fears it cannot come close to covering the final bill.
She will face a jury at federal court in Manhattan after her husband’s separate trial, which begins on May 6 — at which his lawyers say he might “inculpate” his wife.
But the couple remain married and living together in the home they share in Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
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The $1.2 million house is where the FBI found stacks of cash and gold bars when the bureau raided it, leading to Menendez, Arslanian and three New Jersey businessmen being charged with a sprawling scheme to sell his power and secretly conspire to act as agents for the governments of Egypt and Qatar.
The couple is accused of trading political favors for the loot as well as a Mercedes convertible, according to a federal indictment.
Menendez, 70, Arslanian, 57, and two of their co-accused, Fred Daibes and Wael Hana, have vigorously denied all charges, although one of the five, Jose Uribe, pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with federal prosecutors in Manhattan.
On Tuesday, a bombshell secret filing was unsealed in which Menedez’s attorneys said that, if he takes the stand in his own defense, his evidence could “inculpate Nadine.”
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One of the circle who has heard Arslanian’s fear is Kim De Paola, a former cast member of “The Real Housewives of New Jersey,” who told The Post: “She has said that she thinks she is going to jail.”
De Paola knew Arslanian from parties and fashion shows for Posche by Kim D, De Paola’s now-shuttered Allendale, NJ, boutique, and said that few people from their North Jersey social scene have any sympathy for the couple — or sense of surprise that Menendez would pin the blame on his wife.
“Everyone despises Menendez,” said De Paolo. “And any man who throws his wife under the bus does not deserve any respect.
“In New Jersey, men will stand by their women. Like he didn’t know what was going on! To throw a woman under the bus like that is disgusting.”
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De Paola, host of the “Get Real with Kim D” podcast and author of an upcoming memoir, “My Life with the Big Boys,” said Arslanian was always on the lookout for the “next best thing” when it came to her romantic life.
She divorced Raffi Arslanian, her first husband, in 2005, and later dated New Jersey lawyer Douglas Anton, who represented singer R. Kelly at his sex-trafficking trial in 2021.
“When she used to come to my events, she had her boobs hangingto her knees,” De Paolo said.
“We’d all look at her and say, ‘What in the world?’ She was always trying to be provocative. She is just very trashy. And I think that’s how she got the men.”
De Paola likened the couple to Depression-era bandits Bonnie and Clyde and said they are both obsessed with a luxurious lifestyle.
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“In life when you put out these kinds of things when you are after the Louis Vuitton bag, things like this happen,” she said. “What do you expect?”
Danny Onorato, a Washington, DC, lawyer representing Arslanian, refused comment Thursday. Robert Luskin, a lawyer representing Menendez, did not respond to a request for comment.
Arslanian was involved in a love triangle, first revealed by The Post, with Anton and Menendez.
De Paola said Arslanian had boasted about the senator despite people knowing she was dating Anton.
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“I was sitting at my salon and heard the girls talking that Nadine had come in and told everybody that she’s in love and that he’s a senator,” De Paola said, adding that she reached out to Anton, her former lawyer, with the news.
However, another friend, author and podcast host John Alite, a former mobster, who was close to Arslanian, said of her, “She is not the one who is a gold digger. She is totally isolated in that marriage.”
Alite told The Post that he has not heard from his former friend since she married the senator.
As well as the federal indictment, Arslanian’s possible legal troubles include when she killed a man with her Mercedes in Bogota, NJ, in December 2018.
The New Jersey attorney general announced a new investigation into the death and its aftermath last year.
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She called a friend for help before she called 911 — and may only have called the number when police had already arrived, then told them the wrong location for the crash, which killed Bogota resident Richard Koop.
Dashcam footage and 911 recordings do not show her asking after the victim, but they do show her refusing to have her cellphone searched.
A retired Hackensack chief of police, Michael Mordaga, came to the scene at her friend’s request and helped her leave.
She did not take a field sobriety test, and was not charged with any wrongdoing.
But Arslanian did not hesitate to dial 911 repeatedly at her home, documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws by NorthJersey.com disclosed.
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In the last several years, she has called and visited the Englewood Cliffs police department 18 times, complaining about suspicious vehicles outside her home, repeated calls from a blocked number to her cellphone and a neighbor dumping animal waste on her suburban property, among other complaints.
Menendez also called the police to the house once, in September 2020, a month before they married, to report that a suspicious car was parked near the driveway.
The senator told the police that the driver was “male with medium complexion skin, dark hair and appeared to look Arabic,” northjersey.com reported.
“I don’t blame her for being anxious now, because you know what she’s going through,” an Englewood Cliffs neighbor told The Post Wednesday.
“But even before all of this, look at all the craziness her first husband dumped her with.
“I don’t know if she has OCD or she has anxiety, but I could see someone going through a bad divorce, having no money, being anxious.”
Additional reporting by Reuven Fenton
