“I panicked, and I wanted to get rid of them,” she said about finding the gun and ammunition in the vehicle’s console in October 2018. “I didn’t want him to hurt himself, and I didn’t want my kids to find it and hurt themselves.” The purchase of the Colt revolver by Hunter Biden — and Hallie Biden’s frenzied disposal of it — are the fulcrum of the case against him.
Federal prosecutors say the president’s son was in the throes of a heavy crack addiction when he bought the gun. He has been charged with three felonies: lying to a federally licensed gun dealer, making a false claim on the application by saying he was not a drug user and illegally having the gun for 11 days. Hunter Biden, who has pleaded not guilty, has said the Justice Department is bending to political pressure from Republicans and that he is being unfairly targeted.
Ms Biden, who had a brief romantic relationship with Hunter after Beau Biden died in 2015, told the court that from the time Hunter returned to Delaware from a 2018 trip to California until she threw his gun away, she did not see him using drugs. That time period included the day he bought the weapon. Much of her testimony focused on October 23 2018 — 11 days after he bought the gun and when she tossed it.
Hunter was staying with her and seemed exhausted. Asked by the prosecutor if it appeared that Hunter was using drugs around then, she said: “He could have been”. As Hunter Biden slept in her home, Ms Biden went to check.