Hunter Biden next faces a September court date in California over tax evasion charges.
Hunter Biden was found guilty on all charges in his gun trial on June 11, becoming the first child of a sitting president to face a federal trial and conviction.
The trial hinged on a Colt Cobra revolver that Mr. Biden bought from a gun store on Oct. 12, 2018, during a time prosecutors say he was in the throes of crack cocaine addiction.
Authorities accused Mr. Biden of lying to the federally licensed gun store by illegally claiming on his application that he was not a drug user at the time of purchase and then unlawfully possessing the gun for 11 days. Mr. Biden was facing three felonies and pled not guilty to the charges.
Jurors deliberated for an hour late in the afternoon on June 10 before resuming the following morning. In total, they spent three hours deliberating the case.
The verdict was handed down after a weeklong trial that saw testimony from Mr. Biden’s ex-wife Kathleen Buhle, ex-girlfriend Zoe Kestan, sister-in-law and ex-partner Hallie Biden, daughter Naomi Biden, expert witnesses, the gun store owner and the clerk who sold the gun to Mr. Biden, and the man who found the gun in the trash.
Prosecutors argued that testimony from Mr. Biden’s ex-romantic partners, along with text messages and memoir excerpts, proved that Mr. Biden was “knowingly” an active drug addict in October 2018 when he purchased the firearm.
The defense, on the contrary, argued that since Mr. Biden did not consider himself an addict when he purchased the gun, he did not “knowingly” lie on the gun application form when he checked “no” when asked if he was a drug addict.
In his closing arguments on June 10, prosecutor Leo Wise focused on self-admissions of drug addiction in Mr. Biden’s memoir and text messages he sent around the time of the gun purchase in which he told Hallie Biden he was either waiting for a drug dealer or actively smoking crack cocaine.
By Jacob Burg
