Judge Demands an Explanation as Hunter Biden Attempts to Avoid Appearing in Court for Gun Charges Arraignment
A federal judge wants to know why Hunter Biden thinks he does not have to show up in person on the three gun charges facing him.
The indictment against President Joe Biden’s son, which was unveiled last week, charges him with three crimes and says he knowingly lied when he indicated on a form to buy a gun that he was not using an illegal drug at the time.
Rather than appear in a Delaware courtroom for his initial hearing on the charges, Hunter Biden is seeking to appear by video, according to CNN.
“Defendant seeks to have the initial appearance on the Indictment in this matter held via video conference,” U.S. District Judge Christopher Burke wrote in a docket entry Monday, according to the Washington Examiner.
“Government opposes that request,” the entry said.
Burke said Hunter Biden’s attorneys had until Tuesday to make their case for why their client should be allowed to appear virtually.
Under the judge’s timetable, the prosecution would have until Wednesday to respond.
Constitutional attorney Andrew Lieb said because Hunter Biden lives in California, the request is not a total surprise.
“The judge is saying, ‘Write papers and I’ll make a decision.’ The judge may say they have to come in,” Lieb told the Examiner.
Hunter Biden still has unresolved issues related to his taxes in 2017 and 2018. In July, he had been set to enter a plea in a deal that would have resolved those charges, but the deal fell apart when it was revealed that it would not preclude future charges.
On Monday, Hunter Biden’s attorneys sued the Internal Revenue Service over the congressional testimony of two whistleblowers, saying the IRS “targeted and sought to embarrass” him, according to Fox News.
Agents Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler testified before the House Oversight Committee that their probe of Hunter Biden faced multiple roadblocks.
The lawsuit said even though the two men are whistleblowers, that status “cannot and does not shield them from their wrongful conduct in making unauthorized public disclosures that are not permitted by the whistleblower process.”
Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden’s lawyer, has called the charges against him politically motivated, according to NBC News.
“The evidence in this matter has not changed in the last six weeks, but the law has and so has MAGA Republicans’ improper and partisan interference in this process,” he said.
“Hunter Biden possessing an unloaded gun for 11 days was not a threat to public safety, but a prosecutor, with all the power imaginable, bending to political pressure presents a grave threat to our system of justice,” Lowell said.
“We believe these charges are barred by the agreement the prosecutors made with Mr. Biden, the recent rulings by several federal courts that this statute is unconstitutional, and the facts that he did not violate that law, and we plan to demonstrate all of that in court,” he said.
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