(Washington) US President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, is summoned to appear in person on October 3 in Delaware for his public arraignment for illegal possession of a weapon, according to a decision rendered Wednesday.
The judge denied California resident Hunter Biden’s request to appear by videoconference. After initially setting the hearing for September 26, he accepted a defense request to postpone it for a week, to October 3.
“Mr. Biden will plead not guilty and there is no reason why he cannot say these two words by videoconference,” his lawyer, Abbe David Lowell, wrote in a letter to the judge on Tuesday.
But Judge Christopher Burke motivates his decision by the fact that this first appearance “is one of the rare occasions in a criminal case during which a defendant physically appears before our court, before a judge”.
In addition, “most of the accusations against the defendant are new and were not mentioned during his previous appearance in July 2023, so this will be the first time that they will be debated in court,” adds -he.
Hunter Biden is accused of lying when filling out forms to acquire a firearm in 2018, in which he denied the drug addiction he later admitted to.
He reached a guilty plea agreement with prosecutor David Weiss in June, covering both tax evasion and illegal firearm acquisition charges, which likely would have allowed him to avoid prison and a embarrassing trial for him and his father.
But this agreement was canceled following doubts expressed in July by a judge on the validity of the arrangement.