Judge Sentences Former Sen. Bob Menendez To 11 Years

Former New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez was sentenced to 11 years in prison Wednesday by a federal judge.

The sentence, handed down in a Manhattan courtroom by the U.S. District Court Judge Sidney Stein, would make Menendez one of just several senators in history to be sent to prison.

Stein said the lengthy sentence was meant to deter other politicians from wrongdoing.

Before he was sentenced, Menendez, 71, and his attorney were contrite and asked for mercy — arguing he’d already been punished enough, having lost public office and being subjected to widespread mockery as “Gold Bar Bob.”

“Other than family, I have lost everything I ever cared about,” Menendez told Stein.

The judge, however, said Menendez had succumbed to greed and hubris.

“Somewhere along the way, I don’t know where, you lost your way,” Stein told the former senator.

Then outside the courtroom, Menendez blasted prosecutors from the Southern District of New York, calling the charges and evidence used against him “outrageous.”

A jury last summer found Menendez guilty of bribery, acting as a foreign agent for Egypt, obstruction of justice, extortion and conspiring to commit those crimes along with a pair of businesspeople — who were also sentenced on Wednesday.