WILMINGTON, Del. — Jurors in Hunter Biden’s gun trial began deliberating Monday after hearing new evidence from a witness about his drug use in October 2018, around the time he allegedly illegally purchased a firearm. fire.
Prosecutors rested the case after telling jurors that Biden was a “habitual” drug user from 2015 to 2019, a period that coincides with his gun possession, and that he knew he was an addict and even wrote extensively about it in his journals. memoirs.
His lead defense attorney, Abbe Lowell, said that while Biden may be an addict, prosecutors have not proven that he knowingly lied beyond a reasonable doubt about the form he used to buy the gun.
“With this burden so high, it is time to close this case,” Lowell said.
Following a response from prosecutors, U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika completed her instructions to jurors. They began deliberations but did not reach a verdict and will resume on Tuesday morning.
Biden was embraced by his wife, Melissa Cohen Biden, his uncle James Biden and others. Sometimes he held his palms together on the table as he watched the jury and prosecutors.
Here’s what you missed on Day 6 of the Hunter Biden trial:
Final statements
Assistant Special Counsel Leo Wise pointed to the large number of Biden confidants sitting behind the defense table as he began his closing arguments, a crowd that included Biden’s close friends and family, including his wife and his stepmother, the first lady. Jill Biden. Melissa Cohen Biden, Jill Biden and her half-sister, Ashley, wore black.
“All this is not evidence,” Wise said, pointing to three crowded rows. “The people sitting in the gallery are not evidence.”
Jurors may recognize them or have seen them react to something, he said, “but respectfully, none of that matters.”
Wise said Biden knew he was a drug addict and bought the gun anyway, lying on a federal form to pass a background check.
“It’s clear and simple. These same laws apply to the defendant just as they apply to anyone else,” Wise said. “What leads to the three criminal charges in this case are the defendant’s choices, not anyone else’s.”
Lowell said in his closing statement that jurors could not convict Biden based on the innuendo and conjecture that he said were the basis for the government’s case, and returned to Biden’s memoir.
“Reasonable doubt = innocent,” read a slide Lowell presented during his statement.
Lowell said the jury should carefully evaluate testimony in which witnesses were granted immunity, and he seemed to suggest that Zoe Kestan, Biden’s ex-girlfriend, or Hallie Biden, the widow of Biden’s brother Beau, both of whom provided accounts Biden’s devastating spiral into drug addiction could not be taken at face value.
“Whether or not their testimony may have been influenced by the government’s promise is for you to determine,” Lowell said.
He also criticized prosecutors’ “cruel” interrogation of Biden’s daughter, Naomi, who, under questioning on Friday, shared with the court that he had texted her at 2 a.m. to change cars or that she wrote to him in exasperation when her subsequent efforts to reach him went unanswered.
Prosecutors asked Naomi Biden if she knew if her father was seeing someone named “Frankie” at that time or if he had shared a code to access his bank account. She told the court she could not remember.
If someone suggests that Biden was meeting with a drug dealer instead of her, “but you don’t present that man or any real evidence that this exchange took place, and then ask her if she uses cocaine, that’s a reasonable doubt,” Lowell said. “And extraordinarily cruel.”
Lowell appeared to land a punch when he returned to the testimony of the salesman who sold his gun to Biden, who last week told the court he closely watched customers for any signs of drug use or drinking and would refuse the sale if he had any doubts. .
After mulling over the decision over the weekend, Biden chose not to testify in his own defense, which would have exposed him to potentially damaging cross-examination.
New text messages
FBI Special Agent Erika Jensen testified about previously unreleased messages and location data from Biden’s cellphone that showed him near a 7-Eleven on two dates close to the time of the gun purchase, a period the defense characterized as a gap in the indictment. case.
When Biden texted Hallie Biden, his sister-in-law and former romantic partner, about waiting at a 7-Eleven for a “drug dealer named ‘Mookie’” the day after buying the gun, it was because he was avoiding her at the time. time, he suggested the defense.
Prosecutors told Biden over the weekend that Naomi Biden’s testimony was inconsistent with new messages and location data they discovered on her cellphone, including her account of when her father arrived in New York to meet her in October. from 2018. In an email to the defense on Sunday night, prosecutors shared 42 text messages from Hunter Biden and others, as well as videos and other data that showed contradictory evidence.
Some of the messages showed that, days after Biden purchased a gun, he was arranging a meeting with someone named “Junior” at a 7-Eleven, who, at one point, asked him, “Do you want the same thing?”
Jurors took detailed notes.
In response, Lowell argued that when Hunter Biden texted Hallie Biden “are you up” in the early morning hours while waiting at the 7-Eleven, there could have been a simpler explanation.
“You don’t know if it was for a donut, a coffee?” he said.
This story originally appeared on NBCNews.com read the full story
