Prosecutors say 3 Hunter Biden exes to testify about his addiction at gun trial
By Holmes Lybrand and Marshall Cohen, CNN
(CNN) — Special counsel David Weiss plans to present extremely personal testimony about Hunter Biden’s drug addiction from three of his former romantic partners, according to a new filing in the felony gun case against the president’s son.
In a filing Monday evening, prosecutors laid out their case against Hunter Biden, which is scheduled to go to trial on June 3 in Delaware. Prosecutors described some of their key witnesses and what they plan to say on the stand, and they also released text messages and photos that they plan to show to the jury.
The president’s son has pleaded not guilty to three crimes in the gun case, all stemming from Weiss’ claim that he was abusing drugs while he purchased and briefly possessed a revolver in 2018, which is against federal law.
These revelations about Weiss’ trial strategy and witness list underscore the extremely personal nature of this case, which will shine a national spotlight on what Hunter Biden has said was his rock bottom.
Hunter Biden has been very open about his lifelong struggle with alcohol and drug addiction. But to win a conviction, Weiss will need to bring that addiction to life for the jury, with compelling witnesses and photographic evidence, to prove in court that Hunter Biden was abusing drugs when he owned the gun.
The expected prosecution witnesses include Hunter Biden’s ex-wife Kathleen Buhle and his late brother’s widow, whom he later also dated, Hallie Biden. The filings don’t identify the women by name, but Weiss’ description of their testimony matches other public details and court filings from related cases.
Prosecutors say one witness, who CNN has identified as Hallie Biden, will testify that Hunter Biden possessed the revolver in 2018 and that she took it from his car and threw it in a dumpster near a grocery store in Wilmington, Delaware. She would search “his bags, backpacks, and vehicle in an effort to help him get sober, and discovered drug paraphernalia and drugs in his possessions on multiple occasions” in 2018, prosecutors wrote.
Prosecutors said in the filing that a third expected witness will testify that she “observed the defendant using crack cocaine frequently — every 20 minutes except when he slept.”
The filing from prosecutors also includes scores of text messages they say are from Hunter Biden, including images of drugs, as well as messages about sobriety and meeting with drug dealers.
“The government intends to show videos and photographs of the defendant smoking crack, or of crack or drug paraphernalia in videos/photographs backed up to the defendant’s Apple iCloud account or laptop, or sent in the defendant’s messages,” prosecutors wrote.
Other witnesses prosecutors will call include federal agents and the gun store employee who allegedly sold Hunter Biden the pistol in 2018. One Drug Enforcement Administration agent, prosecutors say, will discuss coded terms and drug language they say Hunter Biden used in text messages with others, “such as ‘baby powder,’ ‘Party Favor,’ ‘10grams,’ (and) ‘chore boy.’”
CORRECTION: A previous version of this story misidentified a potential prosecution witness.
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