Verdict within days, after closing arguments heard in Hunter Biden case

WILMINGTON: The evidence against US President Joe Biden’s son was grim but established that he was guilty of making a false statement about his use of illegal drugs on a background check form when he bought a gun, a government lawyer told a jury on Monday (June 10).

"It was personal and it was ugly and it was overwhelming," government prosecutor Leo Wise told the 12-member jury during closing arguments in the trial of the son, Hunter Biden, 54. "But it was also necessary."

The federal government case, the first criminal trial of a US president’s child, has offered an intimate view of the younger Biden’s years of struggle with alcohol and crack cocaine abuse, which prosecutors say legally precluded him from buying a gun.

Hunter Biden has pleaded not guilty to felony charges both of lying about his addiction when he filled out a government screening document for the Colt Cobra revolver and of illegally possessing the weapon for 11 days. He did not take the stand himself to give evidence.

Earlier on Monday, the defence attorney Abbe Lowell rejected the prosecution’s assertion that large cash withdrawals made by Hunter Biden could have been only for drug transactions.

Prosecution witnesses were unable to back up that assertion with detailed financial records, he said.

The defence had suggested the money could have been used to pay for rehab, though the prosecutor had countered that financial records suggested otherwise.

HALLIE BIDEN THREW GUN IN TRASH

As far as Hunter Biden illegally possessing the gun, there’s no evidence that he ever took it out of the locked box it came in before his sister-in-law Hallie Biden found it and threw it in the trash, Lowell said in closing arguments.

“On October 23rd, Hallie did something incredibly stupid,” Lowell said. “She may have done it for love,” or perhaps out of anger in suspecting that Hunter had been with another woman, he added.

President Joe Biden’s son has been charged with three felonies: lying to a federally licensed gun dealer, making a false claim on the application by saying he was not a drug user and illegally having the gun for 11 days.

Lowell also argued that prosecutors were unable to show when and how drug residue got on a leather pouch Hallie Biden found in Hunter’s truck and inside of which she put his gun before tossing it in the trash. They also couldn’t say who put it there.

GUN FORM ASKS "IS" PERSON A USER 

Lowell noted that the federal form Hunter filled out when he bought the gun asks in the present tense whether the purchaser “is” a user of or addicted to illegal drugs. He also suggested that Biden decided on a whim to go to the gun store after visiting a nearby store to buy a new cellphone.

Lowell noted that Hunter bought several other items at the gun store, including a utility knife, flashlight and BB gun.

“It does reflect on whether Hunter had the necessary intent” to buy a gun and lie on the paperwork.

Lowell also noted that Hallie Biden did not see Hunter using drugs in the days surrounding the gun purchase. As far as text exchanges with Hallie Biden suggesting drug use and drug deals in the days following the gun purchase, Lowell suggested, perhaps Hunter was “just putting somebody off.”

“At any given time, he would lie to her about where he was,” Lowell said.

The trial in US District Court in Wilmington, Delaware, follows another historic first - the May 30 criminal conviction of Donald Trump, the first US president to be found guilty of a felony. Trump is the Republican challenger to Joe Biden, a Democrat, in a Nov 5 presidential election.

Trump and some of his Republican allies in Congress have alleged the case and three other criminal prosecutions are politically motivated attempts to prevent him from regaining power.

Congressional Democrats cite the Hunter Biden prosecution as evidence that Joe Biden is not using the justice system for political or personal ends.

Wise said it did not matter if well-known people appeared in court or how they reacted to the evidence, a possible reference to First Lady Jill Biden's attendance. “None of that matters. What matters came from the witness stand,” he said.

Last week, Hunter Biden’s ex-wife, former girlfriend and sister-in-law testified for the prosecution about his drug use, telling jurors that they often found drugs and paraphernalia in his possession and were concerned at times about his spiralling addiction.

SOBER SINCE 2019

Hunter Biden told the judge overseeing the case at a 2023 hearing that he has been sober since 2019.

Biden’s lawyer Abbe Lowell told jurors during his opening statement that his client did not intend to deceive because he had been clean when he bought the gun and did not consider himself a drug user at the time.

The defence called three witnesses on Friday, including the gun shop owner and an employee and Hunter Biden’s daughter Naomi, who said her father appeared to be doing well when she saw him during the weeks before and after he bought the gun.

The sentencing guidelines for the charges against Biden are 15 to 21 months, but legal experts say defendants in cases similar to his often get shorter sentences and are less likely to be incarcerated if they abide by the terms of their pretrial release.