Hallie Biden Was First Compelled to Testify against Hunter Biden in 2022
Remember how I wrote about how Hallie Biden was being compelled to testify?
I described how prosecutors submitted a filing in Delaware on May 17 asking to keep some exhibits pertaining to the testimony a female witness sealed until after she testified.
The United States of America, by and through its attorneys, David. C. Weiss, Special Counsel, and Derek E. Hines and Leo J. Wise, Assistant United States Attorneys for the District of Delaware, move that the enclosed filing be filed under seal as well as the accompanying proposed order and requested order from the court. The filing relates to a witness issue in the upcoming trial. The government will move to unseal this filing after the conclusion of the witness’s testimony at trial. In the interim, the government requests that the filings remain under seal to protect her identity from public disclosure so that her security is not compromised and so that there will be no witness intimidation issues that could undermine these proceedings. See United States v. Smith, 776 F.2d 1104, 1115 (3d Cir. 1985).
They filed an unsealed motion to compel Hallie Biden’s testimony in Los Angeles on May 21.
The Special Counsel hereby applies to this Honorable Court for an order compelling Hallie Biden to testify and produce evidence pursuant to the provisions of Title 18, United States Code, Section 6001 et seq., and respectfully represents as follows:
1. Hallie Biden has been subpoenaed to testify before this Court during trial beginning on June 20, 2024;
2. Counsel for Hallie Biden has advised that if Hallie Biden is called to the stand she will at that time refuse to answer questions, invoking the constitutional privilege against self-incrimination;
3. In the judgment of the Special Counsel, the testimony of Hallie Biden may be necessary to the public interest; and
4. Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg, an authorized Deputy Assistant Attorney General of the United States, has approved this application for an order instructing Hallie Biden to testify pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 6002 and 28 C.F.R. § 0.175(a).
As noted, Stuart Goldberg, the Acting Assistant Attorney General for DOJ’s tax division, submitted authorization for that grant of immunity. His letter doing so is dated May 20, 2024.
Judge Noreika has now ordered unsealed the earlier exhibits tied to testimony. And as I suspected, it pertains to Hallie Biden. As in CA, the approval for compelling her testimony was signed by Goldberg. That earlier letter is dated April 11, 2022.
Of some interest: the order approving that immunity was signed by Judge Noreika, back on April 18, 2022.
That suggests Noreika may have been involved in this case for longer than was known. That might arise if, for example, a non-prosecution agreement (for someone like Zoe Kestan) were filed under seal before Noreika some time ago, and she got assigned Hunter’s case as a related case (though not such paperwork is in Hunter’s docket).
Note that Noreika’s order included tax charges, FARA, and gun charges. So the tax division approved compelling Hallie’s testimony for the gun charges.
Derek Hines’ motion to unseal the exhibits the exhibits notably did not unseal the motion regarding the immunity it in the first place, which remains sealed.
So it’s not clear — and Hines didn’t make it clear when he moved to seal the filing — why it was fine to submit the immunity paperwork publicly in California but not in Delaware.
The filing relates to a witness issue in the upcoming trial. The government will move to unseal this filing after the conclusion of the witness’s testimony at trial. In the interim, the government requests that the filings remain under seal to protect her identity from public disclosure so that her security is not compromised and so that there will be no witness intimidation issues that could undermine these proceedings.
One way or another, though, it’s clear that Hallie Biden was first compelled to testify against her brother-in-law in 2022, when Lesley Wolf was overseeing the case.
So the prosecution immunized and/or gave nonpros agreements to three people, including the owner of a business that was willing to sell a handgun illegally, in order to prosecute a former addict for checking a box on a form? I would think the gun store owner would be a higher prosecution priority than a buyer–that is if politics were not driving every decision in this case.
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From EW coverage and anything else i’ve read online, her Delaware testimony had no bearing on Hunter’s tax liabilities and late payment. Am I wrong? Do we know anything about what relevant testimony she’d have in California? Does this mean she gave or might have given grand jury testimony in California? I believe an earlier EW post indicated she testified at trial in Delaware of having visited Hunter in California at a time both were using crack, yes/no? Might she have interacted with Kevin Morris when there?
Again, who’s running the DOJ?
In one of your previous articles, you wrote:
Does the revelation that Judge Noreika’s signature appears on the order approving immunity for Hallie Biden back in August 2022, ten months before she was assigned the current case if I have the timeline on this correct, provide further evidence for that hypothesis?
Dr. W notes the order of grand jury testimony immunity relates to gun, tax and FARA statutes.
This explains why Judge N asked about FARA at the hearing where new counsel, Wise, flipped the plea contract agreement. Judge N had prior knowledge of FARA as an issue under consideration, at the grand jury level, in her District, prior to the plea hearing. Otherwise would she have known to ask whether FARA liability was covered?
The order had a hand written 22-181 number after typed: Misc. Action No. on Judge N’s Grand Jury related order. Normally would judicial involvement occur when a federal prosecutor is conducting a grand jury?
Would it have been more proper for a different judge to review a prosecution/defense agreed plea contract instead of one who gave an ex parte prior order to only one party with the other party not having notice that a prior ex parte involvement existed?
Do I read things correctly?
Lunden Roberts and her attorney, Clint Lancaster, also have been subpoenaed to appear in the CA tax case. Clint Lancaster and his wife are heavily involved in MAGA politics. Below is a little background info.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, Lunden Roberts’ father is a gun manufacturer. Lunden is coming out with a tell-all book in August. So, maybe Hallie knows about or can contribute to that story. Or maybe not.
“Arkansan at work in Wisconsin on election takeover for Republicans” – Arkansas Times, 12/22/21
“That Arkansas lawyer? Clint Lancaster of Benton. Yes, you’ve heard of him and his wife before. He represented Trump during the Wisconsin recount. Also, the Post notes:
“Lancaster also represented an Arkansas woman [Lunden Roberts] who sued Biden’s son Hunter, alleging that he fathered her child….”
https://arktimes.com/arkansas-blog/2021/12/22/arkansan-at-work-in-wisconsin-on-2024-election-takeover-for-republicans
Another – help me Dr. W: If Weiss was conducting things (w or w/o Wise) in Delaware and claiming lack of jurisdiction to charge or bargain CA tax stuff with Wolf dealing there, and Wolf was plea negotiating subject to Weiss agreeing; and if the Delaware District Court has a rule that once on a case the judge is preassigned, that gave Weiss a total free hand to judge shop over the Delaware bench in taking the motion for the Hallie immunity ex parte to Noreika. Do you know if the Del. District functions that way, even from before an indictment and formal cause number is assigned? That a grand jury matter needing judicial scrutiny can be used to judge shop all the way to trial, affecting all the discretionary pretrial, evidence, and instructions discretion? Are things that way?
Noticed the prosecution leaned into nobody is above the law, yet Hallie went into Hunter’s truck and she broke into the lockbox and stole his gun then proceeded to throw it out in a public trash can. The gun shop made a very shady sale just for the profit.
I wonder how those dynamics play with the jury or they just stick to the prosecutions narrative.
I wonder if Lowell was able to draw the jury’s attention to either of these things in his closing. Without reading transcripts of the whole trial (which cost money) its hard to know exactly what they heard.
Lowell did mention it was Hunter who told Hallie to call the police and file a report. Other than that I don’t know what was mentioned.
So they had Hallie for stealing the gun and used that to pressure her into squealing that Hunter was using, even though she didn’t know.
They also had Hallie on tax crimes. Does that mean the Biden clan has an uncanny ability to get audited?