The ex-wife of Hunter Biden on Wednesday unpacked part of their life together and discussed the crack addiction of the son of the President of the United States, on trial for the alleged illegal purchase of a firearm in 2018.
• Read also: Biden assures his son Hunter of his “infinite love” at the opening of his trial for illegal possession of a weapon
• Read also: President Biden’s son on trial for illegal gun possession starting June 3
Hunter Biden, a 54-year-old lawyer and businessman turned artist, who recovered from years of drug and alcohol addiction, is a favorite target of the adversaries of his father, Donald Trump in the first place. .
They see him as Joe Biden’s weak point, five months before the presidential election which will pit the two men against each other.
Hunter Biden has been appearing since Monday in federal criminal court in Delaware, stronghold of the Biden family, for having lied about his drug use when he acquired a firearm, a Colt Cobra, in October 2018, a crime in the United States. United.
For the third day in a row, First Lady Jill Biden, Hunter’s mother-in-law, came to the courtroom in Wilmington to show her support for her son-in-law, whom she warmly embraced.
She stayed for part of the day.
Crack pipe
Like Tuesday, the debates focused on Hunter Biden’s addiction problems.
His past addiction to crack cocaine is no secret, but the prosecution wants to demonstrate to the 12 jurors that he could not have been unaware of it when he bought the weapon in 2018.
His first wife Kathleen Buhle — they divorced in 2017 — recounted on the stand that she found a crack pipe for the first time on July 3, 2015, in their home in Washington, when Joe Biden was vice president. -president of Barack Obama.
“When my daughter used the car, I had to check that she was not driving a vehicle carrying drugs,” she testified, claiming to have found them “around ten times”.
Mr. Biden’s lawyer then had Ms. Buhle confirm that she no longer saw him much and that she did not know if he was still addicted in October 2018 when he purchased the revolver, which “did not was never, ever loaded, carried or used during the 11 days it was in his possession,” according to the lawyer.
The defense wants to show that, that year, the accused was in a drug withdrawal phase, with ups and downs.
Then, the jury heard testimony from Zoe Kestan, a romantic acquaintance of Hunter Biden he met in a club in New York in late 2017.
Whenever they saw each other at hotels or residences in New York, Atlantic City or California, Hunter Biden smoked crack “about every 20 minutes,” said Zoe Kestan, for whom the president’s youngest son is a “so charming and kind” man who was trying to get through without succeeding.
The prosecution even paraded photos showing Hunter Biden in his bath, a glass pipe protruding from his hand.
Healed since 2019
On Tuesday, the audience was devoted at length to listening to extracts from his autobiography, “Les Belles Choses”, an audio book that has become an incriminating piece, because in it he recounts years of addiction when he “smoked )” crack.
Hunter Biden had claimed to be cured since 2019, but had not checked the “addict” box on the weapon purchase form the previous year.
The subject of numerous controversies and conspiracy theories, a laptop of Biden’s son – recovered and used by the federal police (FBI) – was also shown on Tuesday by the prosecutor.
The FBI agent who investigated Hunter Biden, Erika Jensen, testified Wednesday morning.
Joe Biden, 81, who lost his first wife and daughter in a car accident in 1972 and then his eldest son Beau Biden who died of cancer in 2015, assured Hunter of his “infinite love” on Monday in a statement.
The latter faces up to 25 years in prison, but in practice such prosecutions rarely result in prison time.
