(Wilmington) The criminal trial of Hunter Biden for illegal possession of a firearm plunged Tuesday into the past dependencies of the youngest son of the American president, five months before the election between the Democrat and his Republican rival Donald Trump, just convicted .
Hunter Biden, a 54-year-old lawyer and businessman turned artist who recovered from years of drug and alcohol addiction, is a prime target of his father Donald Trump’s adversaries at first leader – who see him as the Achilles heel of the outgoing tenant of the White House.
As at the opening of the trial on Monday, first lady Jill Biden was present to support her son-in-law at the federal court in Wilmington, in the small state of Delaware, the stronghold on the east coast of the Biden clan. The Democratic president had assured his son the day before of his “infinite love”.
“No one is above the law. Whoever you are and whatever your name,” thundered prosecutor Derek Hines, like what all the prosecutors pursuing civil and criminal charges against Donald Trump and his family have been hammering home for months.
Crack
Strict navy blue suit, graying hair carefully combed back, Hunter Biden appears for having lied about his drug use when he acquired a firearm in 2018, a crime in the United States.
Tuesday, the hearing was devoted at length to listening to extracts from Hunter Biden’s autobiography, “Les Belles Choses”, a book that has become an incriminating piece for the prosecution, because it recounts years of addiction.
In the room, the jurors heard a version of the audio book read by Hunter Biden himself: we hear him talking about his crack consumption, the vodka drunk from the bottle, the nocturnal wanderings in search of drugs around seedy convenience stores, the failed attempts at detoxification, and short-lived romances with the widow of his brother Beau Biden who died in 2015 of cancer, and to whom he was very close.
PHOTO MATT SLOCUM, ASSOCIATED PRESS
First Lady of the United States, Jill Biden
The two brothers were the only survivors of a 1972 car crash that killed their little sister and their mother, a tragedy that marked the start of Joe Biden’s political career.
Beau Biden’s widow, Hallie Biden, will testify at the trial, cited by the prosecution as being the one who found the gun Hunter Biden bought and threw it in a trash can.
“Robert Hunter Biden chose to illegally possess a firearm” while “he was a crack user and drug addict,” accused prosecutor Hines, showing a photo of a Colt Cobra, the revolver at the center of the case .
Tax fraud
He pleaded not guilty and his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, assured jurors that “he was no longer using drugs when he acquired this weapon (which) was never, ever, loaded, carried or used during the 11 days where it was in his possession.
For years, Republicans have been trying to smear Joe Biden through his son, to the point of opening an impeachment investigation into the head of state around Hunter Biden’s affairs in Ukraine and China – without it being resolved. provides compromising evidence.
The subject of much controversy and conspiracy theories, a Hunter Biden laptop recovered and used by the federal police was shown to jurors on Tuesday by the prosecutor, and an FBI agent authenticated it.
During this trial, which is expected to last two weeks, the jury will have to decide on two counts relating to alleged lies in the documents necessary for the purchase of the revolver in 2018, and a third on the illegal possession of this weapon .
Hunter Biden faces up to 25 years in prison, but in practice such prosecutions rarely result in prison time on their own.
He was also charged in December with tax fraud for evading, through a “stratagem,” the obligation to pay $1.4 million in taxes. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial will be held in September in California, where he lives.
These two trials could interfere with Joe Biden’s attempts to mark the contrast with his Republican opponent, targeted by four separate criminal proceedings.