Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Hunter Biden Returns to Court in Delaware and Is Expected to Plead Not Guilty to Gun Charges
By admin
Published 1 year ago on
October 3, 2023

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

WILMINGTON, Del. — Hunter Biden is due back Tuesday in a Delaware courtroom, where he’s expected to plead not guilty to federal firearms charges that emerged after his earlier deal collapsed.

The president’s son is facing charges that he lied about his drug use in October 2018 on a form to buy a gun that he kept for about 11 days.

He’s acknowledged struggling with an addiction to crack cocaine during that period, but his lawyers have said he didn’t break the law. Gun charges like these are rare, and an appeals court has found the ban on drug users having guns violates the Second Amendment under new Supreme Court standards.

Hunter Biden’s attorneys are suggesting that prosecutors bowed to pressure by Republicans who have insisted the Democratic president’s son got a sweetheart deal, and the charges were the result of political pressure.

He was indicted after the implosion this summer of his plea agreement with federal prosecutors on tax and gun charges. The deal devolved after the judge who was supposed to sign off on the agreement instead raised a series of questions about the deal. Federal prosecutors had been looking into his business dealings for five years and the agreement would have dispensed with criminal proceedings before his father was actively campaigning for president in 2024.

Now, a special counsel has been appointed to handle the case and there appears no easy end in sight. No new tax charges have yet been filed, but the special counsel has indicated they could come in Washington or in California, where Hunter Biden lives.

How Hunter Biden Factors Into GOP Impeachment Inquiry

In Congress, House Republicans are seeking to link Hunter Biden’s dealings to his father’s through an impeachment inquiry. Republicans have been investigating Hunter Biden for years, since his father was vice president. While questions have arisen about the ethics surrounding the Biden family’s international business, no evidence has emerged so far to prove that Joe Biden, in his current or previous office, abused his role or accepted bribes.

The legal wrangling could spill into 2024, with Republicans eager to divert attention from the multiple criminal indictments faced by GOP primary frontrunner Donald Trump, whose trials could be unfolding at the same time.

After remaining silent for years, Hunter Biden has taken a more aggressive legal stance in recent weeks, filing a series of lawsuits over the dissemination of personal information purportedly from his laptop and his tax data by whistleblower IRS agents who testified before Congress as part of the GOP probe.

The president’s son, who has not held public office, is charged with two counts of making false statements and one count of illegal gun possession, punishable by up to 25 years in prison. Under the failed deal, he would have pleaded guilty and served probation rather than jail time on misdemeanor tax charges and avoided prosecution on a single gun count if he stayed out of trouble for two years.

Defense attorneys have argued that he remains protected by an immunity provision that was part of the scuttled plea agreement, but prosecutors overseen by special counsel David Weiss disagree. Weiss also serves as U.S. Attorney for Delaware and was originally appointed by Trump.

Hunter Biden had asked for Tuesday’s hearing to be conducted remotely over video feed but U.S. Magistrate Judge Christopher Burke sided with prosecutors, saying there would be no “special treatment.”

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

Fashion Fair’s Forever 21 to Close. ‘Still a Ways to Go,’ Says Employee

DON'T MISS

Who Runs Elon Musk’s DOGE? Not Musk, the White House Says.

DON'T MISS

New Self-Pollinating Almond Tree Could Be Huge for a Big Fresno Cash Crop

DON'T MISS

Madera County Secures First Fentanyl-Related Homicide Conviction

DON'T MISS

Musk Team Seeks Access to IRS System With Taxpayers’ Records

DON'T MISS

Bannon Calls Musk a ‘Parasitic Illegal Immigrant’

DON'T MISS

Fresno Weather Forecast: Pretty as a Postcard

DON'T MISS

Kennedy Says ‘Nothing’ Off-Limits in Scrutinizing Chronic Disease

DON'T MISS

Judge Declines to Immediately Block Elon Musk or DOGE From Federal Data or Layoffs

DON'T MISS

NBA Playoff Race Heats Up as All-Star Break Ends

UP NEXT

Madera County Secures First Fentanyl-Related Homicide Conviction

UP NEXT

Musk Team Seeks Access to IRS System With Taxpayers’ Records

UP NEXT

Bannon Calls Musk a ‘Parasitic Illegal Immigrant’

UP NEXT

Judge Declines to Immediately Block Elon Musk or DOGE From Federal Data or Layoffs

UP NEXT

Aryan Brotherhood Members Convicted of Murder, Racketeering in Federal Trial

UP NEXT

Trump to Sign Executive Orders as Joint Interview with Musk Airs

UP NEXT

Timeline of a Cultlike Group Tied to the Killing of a Border Patrol Agent

UP NEXT

Trump Admin Gives Schools Deadline to End DEI Programs or Lose Federal Funding

UP NEXT

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Tiffany Evelyn Tate

UP NEXT

NAACP Urges Support for Companies Upholding DEI Commitments

Madera County Secures First Fentanyl-Related Homicide Conviction

7 hours ago

Musk Team Seeks Access to IRS System With Taxpayers’ Records

7 hours ago

Bannon Calls Musk a ‘Parasitic Illegal Immigrant’

7 hours ago

Fresno Weather Forecast: Pretty as a Postcard

7 hours ago

Kennedy Says ‘Nothing’ Off-Limits in Scrutinizing Chronic Disease

7 hours ago

Judge Declines to Immediately Block Elon Musk or DOGE From Federal Data or Layoffs

8 hours ago

NBA Playoff Race Heats Up as All-Star Break Ends

8 hours ago

NASCAR’s Jeff Gordon Talks ‘Days of Thunder’ Sequel With Tom Cruise

8 hours ago

Adames Joins Giants, Excited to Team Up With Gold Glover Chapman

8 hours ago

Leonard Peltier Released After Biden Commuted Sentence in FBI Agents’ Killings

9 hours ago

Fashion Fair’s Forever 21 to Close. ‘Still a Ways to Go,’ Says Employee

Signs hung throughout fast-fashion clothing store Forever 21 show discounts ranging from 10% to 40% off the “entire store.” And,...

4 hours ago

4 hours ago

Fashion Fair’s Forever 21 to Close. ‘Still a Ways to Go,’ Says Employee

6 hours ago

Who Runs Elon Musk’s DOGE? Not Musk, the White House Says.

6 hours ago

New Self-Pollinating Almond Tree Could Be Huge for a Big Fresno Cash Crop

Fentanyl M30 Pills
7 hours ago

Madera County Secures First Fentanyl-Related Homicide Conviction

7 hours ago

Musk Team Seeks Access to IRS System With Taxpayers’ Records

FILE — Steve Bannon speaks to reporters outside State Supreme Court in Manhattan, Feb. 11, 2025. Stephen Bannon, a top adviser during President Trump’s first term and a key figure among his supporters, said Elon Musk wants to “play-act as God” as part of his push to overhaul the federal government. (Jefferson Siegel/The New York Times)
7 hours ago

Bannon Calls Musk a ‘Parasitic Illegal Immigrant’

7 hours ago

Fresno Weather Forecast: Pretty as a Postcard

7 hours ago

Kennedy Says ‘Nothing’ Off-Limits in Scrutinizing Chronic Disease

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend