Attorneys indicated on Wednesday that jurors may hear possibly inflammatory details of Hunter Biden’s personal life when the president’s son goes on trial next month in downtown Los Angeles on federal tax charges.
President Joe Biden’s son faces nine tax-related counts, including three felony counts and six misdemeanor counts of failure to pay taxes.
Hunter Biden, 54, of Malibu, “spent millions of dollars on an extravagant lifestyle rather than paying his tax bills,” the indictment alleges.
Evidence of the younger Biden’s partying during a period when he was admittedly using crack cocaine and allegedly willfully failing to pay more than $1.4 million in taxes may become part of the trial, attorneys said.
A pretrial hearing in the case Wednesday in L.A. federal court dealt with motions and questions of evidence to be resolved before jury selection is expected to begin Sept. 5. Hunter Biden did not attend the hearing.
On Monday, U.S. District Judge Mark Scarsi, a Donald Trump appointee who is presiding over the trial, rejected the defendant’s bid to toss the case after the president’s son sought to argue that David C. Weiss, the special counsel overseeing the prosecution, was improperly appointed.
The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals previously rejected the younger Biden’s request to revive a bid to have the charges against him dismissed.
Hunter Biden’s lawyers wrote in legal filings that they believe the case was brought “in direct response to political pressure.” His attorneys say the defendant has since paid the government $2 million in back taxes and penalties.
Regarding the tax charges, the 56-page indictment alleges that between 2016 and Oct. 15, 2020, “the defendant spent this money on drugs, escorts and girlfriends, luxury hotels and rental properties, exotic cars, clothing and other items of a personal nature, in short, everything but his taxes.”
Hunter Biden’s lead defense attorney, veteran Los Angeles criminal lawyer Mark J. Geragos, has said the trial could last as long as 10 days.
In June, the president’s son was convicted of three felony charges in a separate federal case brought in Delaware stemming from the purchase of a gun in 2018. Hunter Biden was found guilty of having lied on a mandatory gun-purchase form by saying he was not illegally using or addicted to drugs —when, in fact, he later admitted to having been addicted to illegal narcotics at the time.
Court papers show Hunter Biden is scheduled to be sentenced in the Delaware gun case on Nov. 13, in the week after the presidential election.
Described in the indictment as a Georgetown- and Yale-educated lawyer, lobbyist, consultant and businessperson, Hunter Biden served on the board of a Ukrainian industrial conglomerate and a Chinese private equity fund during the time of the tax allegations.
“He negotiated and executed contracts and agreements for business and legal services that paid millions of dollars of compensation to him and/or his domestic corporations, Owasco PC and Owasco LLC,” according to the indictment for tax evasion.
In addition to his business interests, the defendant was an employee of a multinational law firm, the document states.
Hunter Biden has said he had forgotten to pay his taxes during a period when he was in the grip of drug addiction.
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