“I don’t think it’s a sin for him to want a limestone bath, per se,’’ [presiding Judge] Walls said. “It’s tabloid in nature. .?.?. Whether these defendants engaged in bribery does not depend on whether the senator chose a more expensive room. We’re not talking about Days Inn.’’

The judge...said he was concerned prosecutors were trying to create an unfair inference because the emails showed Menendez went to Paris with a woman friend. “It’s ridiculous, what you’re asserting,’’ Walls told the prosecutor. “You’re saying because a person, according to you, wants to stay at a hotel with another person that he then goes out and solicits a bribe. Is that what you’re telling me?”

The exchange prompted Menendez’s lawyer to interject: “This person is actually just a friend, and it is not anybody to be shacked up with.’’

Cooney, the prosecutor, then insisted he was not trying to suggest to the jury Menendez “went to Paris in order to shack up with another person.’’

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/federal-judge-excoriates-sen-menendez-prosecution-team/2017/09/07/7e9606b0-9402-11e7-89fa-bb822a46da5b_story.html?tid=sm_tw