Gold Bars Found In Sen. Menendez's Home Linked To Robbery: Report

BERGEN COUNTY, NJ — At least two gold bars found in a North Jersey home owned by Sen. Bob Menendez are linked to a gunpoint robbery of a businessman, according to an NBC report on Tuesday.

The report said businessman Fred Daibes was robbed at his Edgewater home in 2013, and that $500,000 in cash and 22 gold bars were stolen, according to documents from the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office and Edgewater police.

[A Maine Mom Is Looking All Over For Her Missing Son Graham Lacher. You Can Help.]

But the four suspects were caught the same year and the items were returned, the report says.

Two of the gold bars, identified by serial number, were among the items found years later when the FBI searched a Clifton home owned by Menendez and his wife, according to the report. A September 2023 indictment of Menendez has alleged that Fred Daibes, the victim of the gunpoint robbery, was among those who had bribed Menendez in exchange for certain favors.

Two other gold bars that were stolen from Daibes are mentioned in the indictment as well, but were not found during the search, NBC said.

The newly released information does not link Menendez to the robbery.

Menendez and his wife, Nadine Arslanian, were indicted on Sept. 22, 2023 for allegedly accepting bribes including cash and a Mercedes Benz convertible from at least three people.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, "The Indictment alleges that Menendez and his wife, Nadine Menendez, accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars of bribes from [Wael] Hana, [Fernando] Uribe, and [Fred] Daibes in exchange for Menendez’s agreement to use his official position to protect and enrich them and to benefit the Government of Egypt. Among other things, Menendez agreed and sought to pressure a senior official at the U.S. Department of Agriculture in an effort to protect a business monopoly granted to Hana by Egypt, disrupt a criminal case undertaken by the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office related to associates of Uribe, and disrupt a federal criminal prosecution brought by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey against Daibes."

The indictment notes that during a search of the couple's home in 2019, "The FBI found many of the fruits of this bribery scheme, including cash, gold, the luxury convertible, and home furnishings. Over $480,000 in cash — much of it stuffed into envelopes and hidden in clothing, closets, and a safe."

The couple married in October 2020.

Read prior reporting here:

• Menendez's Wife Struck And Killed Man With Her Mercedes: Report
• Gold Bars For Govt. Documents: Feds Say NJ Sen. Menendez Aided Egypt