US senator Bob Menendez just got a fresh round of bad news after Federal prosecutors on Tuesday hit him with the third superseding indictment against him in his sweeping Federal bribery case Menendez is being indicted on a dozen new charges related to an alleged yearslong corruption scheme involving his wife three New Jersey businessmen and the governments of Egypt and cutter among the latest charges new accusations of obstruction of justice in connection with mercedesbenz convertible prosecutors say Menendez knew was a payoff in exchange for his political influence but he lied to the US attorney's office to conceal that it was a bribe the new charges come just days after a key codefendant pleaded guilty and agreed to work with prosecutors senior political correspondent David Cruz has the latest details on the case it's like a Time relase toxin every couple of months the southern district of New York produces a new set of superseding indictments which sounds really important to the rest of us it's superseding after all superseding is simply IL legal ease for additional charges that's all it means it so it preserves the original charges and adds new charges which I think now we're on the third round yeah and this time of course it's it's obstruction former Federal prosecutor Brian Whistler says the most relevant new material is contained in counts 17 and 18 obstruction charges stemming from meetings Menendez his wife and their attorney had with codefendants there were meetings in the summer of 23 between uh Council for uh the senator and his spouse at which time it was represented that their defense was that these payments were in fact loans uh and the allegation is that uh the defendants knew full well that that was was that was not the case the new charges come just days after codefendant Jose urbe pleaded guilty and became a witness for the prosecution but it's the slow and steady drip of new indictments that is painting the picture for potential jurors and making it harder and harder for Menendez to breathe defense attorney Stan bran says prosecutors will throw as much at a defendant as they can because you never know I will tell you that there's nothing extraordinary about superseding indictments they they are a um tool of the government and they're used frequently to bring additional charges Andor again I must say to bring pressure on the defendant what I would note is despite all the strum and Drang of what the government puts in these cases there is still hanging over this case some some questions of both legal and constitutional nature including charging the senator with acts that I believe are cognate to his responsibilities as chairman of the Foreign Affairs committee that's what the Menendez legal team is arguing also the senator maintains his innocence trial is set to begin in May a month before the Democratic primary election to succeed the senator which has attracted four candidates none of them named Menendez he also remained adamant about not resigning no matter what fellow Democrats or the public may think of him the Senate does not seem in any way shape or form to be able to move on expelling him or to have the will to expel him and so this Falls squarely in his domain to decide when he goes um and at this point it'll be January of 20125 if he doesn't make the decision otherwise more fodder for Jersey corruption memes and maybe more hope for Republicans who can come election time make good political use of a Democrat most voters agree has soiled the state's reputation even further I'm David Cruz NJ Spotlight news