Hunter Biden will appear in Delaware on Monday as a defendant for the first day of a trial in which he is facing felony charges over a 2018 gun purchase.
Biden’s appearance will mark the first time the son of a sitting president has stood trial as a criminal defendant.
Special counsel David Weiss, who is leading the prosecution, has alleged Biden lied on a federal form about his drug use to purchase a revolver and that he then kept the firearm in his possession for 11 days.
Judge Maryellen Noreika, a Donald Trump appointee, is presiding over the case and estimated the trial could last up to two weeks.
The trial will begin with jury selection, and Noreika plans to ask prospective jurors who have been summoned to the Wilmington federal courthouse a series of questions to weed out bias.
The questions, according to court filings, involve gauging prospective jurors’ views about the Second Amendment and drug addiction. The judge also plans to ask them if their views on the 2024 election would affect their impartiality and if they believe Biden being the son of a president has caused him to be prosecuted more or less than what is fair.
The day before the trial, Noreika dealt blows to Biden’s defense team, including denying his request to allow one of his expert witnesses, a psychiatrist, to testify about drug addiction, according to court orders.
Biden’s attorneys had wanted the doctor to testify that addicts commonly are in a “state of denial” about their addiction, which would help them argue Biden thought that when he allegedly said on the gun form that he was not an illegal drug user, he was being truthful.
Read more at Washingtonexaminer.com
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