WILMINGTON, Del. — Hunter Biden defense attorney Abbe Lowell will get his first real chance Wednesday to cross-examine a witness called by federal prosecutors as the first son’s gun trial rolls on.
FBI Special Agent Erika Jensen helped prosecutor Derek Hines walk the jury through reams of evidence against Hunter, 54, during nearly three-and-a-half hours of direct examination on Tuesday.
Lowell then spent about 25 minutes grilling Jensen about the timeline of his client’s cocaine addiction before proceedings wrapped up for the day.
Evidence introduced by prosecutors Tuesday included text messages (some from Hunter’s notorious laptop) and audiobook excerpts of the first son’s memoir narrating his addiction struggles.
The texts were featured in a summary chart that law enforcement helped compile from more than 18,000 pages of communications.
Hines had used those messages to highlight instances in which Hunter appeared to pursue drug deals, including just one day after his Oct. 12, 2018, purchase of the revolver at the center of the case.
Audio passages from Hunter’s book were accompanied by highlighted text projected onto a screen for jurors to see.
One of the panelists — a younger man — was seen with a look of disbelief as Hunter’s voice recounted how he “became a bloodhound on the scent” of drugs and described his “superpower of finding crack cocaine anytime, anywhere.”
Most of the other jurors looked solemn and emotionless as passages detailed Hunter’s dangerous street deals, scouring of homeless encampments for cocaine, and learning how to transform the powdered drug into crack.
Hunter Biden, usually stoic, even became a bit fidgety at times listening to the play-by-play of his past “debauchery.”
When it was his time, Lowell quickly moved to muddy the waters, emphasizing to the jury that most of the evidence prosecutors laid out referenced a period outside of when Hunter purchased the firearm.
The defense also took issue with Hines’ description of a passage in Hunter’s book in which the first son recalled relapsing two weeks after getting clean.
Prosecutors cited some passages from Hunter’s memoir as evidence that following his stint at “The View” facility in August of 2018, he later resorted to his old ways — an attempt to disabuse jurors of any notion that Hunter was clean before he bought the gun.
But Lowell underscored that Hunter’s book didn’t specify whether that relapse referred to alcohol or crack.
Lowell also took issue with passages prosecutors dwelled on in which Hunter Biden described being paralyzed by his crack addiction — at one point staying in a car to smoke crack and missing scheduled flight after scheduled flight before deciding to embark on a road trip.
The defense attorney countered that around the time of the gun purchase, Hunter was very active and not compromised the way he had been in prior bouts of his addiction.
“There may be high-functioning alcoholics but there is no such thing as high-functioning crack addicts,” Lowell said earlier in the day during his opening arguments, listing off a few of Hunter’s obligations at the time.
Lowell also ripped into prosecutors for highlighting bank records showing Hunter Biden blowing through cash, insinuating they left out payments related to rehab.
During questioning of Jensen, Hines explained that on one bank account, Hunter withdrew $151,640.45 through September, October, and November of 2018 — roughly $50k a month. On another account, the defendant had withdrawn about $3.4 million the entire year of 2018.
On the day of the gun purchase, the first son had withdrawn about $5,000, according to Hines.
Lowell responded by claiming Hunter was without a credit card for long periods of time and used cash for his run-of-the-mil expenses. Book passages played by Hines included Hunter claiming to have often lost credit cards on drug-related escapades.
Hunter Biden’s defense
The key arguments presented by Lowell include:
- Prosecutors can’t prove Hunter “knowingly” lied at the time of the firearm purchase, with Lowell stressing that oftentimes addicts are in a state of denial.
- Hunter Biden may not have been high at the time of purchase, though Noreika has previously ruled that prosecutors don’t need to make that part of their case.
- Suggesting Hunter was struggling with alcoholism at the time rather than crack addiction.
- Hallie Biden, not Hunter, put the revolver in a gun pouch which later tested positive for cocaine residue.
- Hunter Biden was upsold by a pushy salesman at StarQuest Shooters & Survival Supply, whom Lowell described as a “whale hunter.”
“A sale is a sale and that was their goal that day and they wanted it done quickly,” Lowell chided during opening arguments.
Witnesses on deck
Hines has said Jensen’s testimony would likely take up the most time of any of the prosecution witnesses, who include:
- Kathleen Buhle, Hunter’s ex-wife
- Zoe Kestan, Hunter’s former girlfriend
- Hallie Biden, Hunter’s sister-in-law, turned lover
- Gordon Cleveland, the gun salesman
- Delaware State Police Senior Corporal Joshua Marley who responded on Oct. 23, 2018
- Former Delaware State Police Lt. Millard Greer who responded on Oct. 23, 2018
- Edward Banner, the man who rummaged through trash and found the revolver
- DEA special agent Joshua Romig to testify about coded language in drug deals
- Possibly forensic chemist Dr. Jason Brewer to testify about the cocaine residue in the gun pouch
For the defense, Lowell has hinted that he plans to call first brother James Biden to testify about Hunter’s rehab stint in August 2018.