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The latest rage making rounds in beltway coffee bars is a betting pool on how stiff Hunter Biden’s prison sentence for tax fraud will be. No matter how much money they shake out of the family shell companies, to pay Abbe Lowell, it won’t help the Bidens one bit. Even Hunter’s chief counsel isn’t diabolical enough to erase his client’s new felony prior. That’s what judges call an “aggravating circumstance” when it comes time to decide how much prison time to dole out.
Stiffer sentence for priors
New York Post is snickering that the sentence Hunter Biden is likely to receive from California based Judge Mark Scarsi, on tax-evasion charges, has a little complication. One that makes a stiffer prison term virtually inevitable.
The Delaware jury didn’t take long to declare unanimously that Hunter admitted he was an addict in his memoir. That makes him automatically guilty of lying on the federal gun screening form. After a quick three hours to make sure they all agreed, a dozen of his peers made it official, finding him guilty. He’s now a convicted felon.
When Hunter goes up in front of Delaware Federal Judge Maryellen Noreika for sentencing on the gun charges, Lowell can argue successfully that his client “has no criminal history.” That won’t be true for the tax case.
Hunter Biden spent $872K on prostitutes, porn and took $1.6M from ATMs: Details revealed in tax evasion case – reporthttps://t.co/rCbFPWCtog
— 🔥⭐️Edwin⭐️🔥 (@Nuked4Every1) June 8, 2024
Everyone is considered “innocent until proven guilty,” unless you’re Donald Trump. Hunter has indisputably been proven guilty on the gun charges. There’s nothing to appeal so it’s going to stick. That means, if he’s also convicted of tax evasion, Judge Scarsi won’t have a choice as he considers an appropriate sentence.
Conservative legal scholar and pundit Jonathan Turley weighed in on the sentence complication recently. The professor of law at George Washington University thinks it can “undermine” Hunter Biden in two ways.
“First, he cannot count a ‘mitigating‘ factor of being without a criminal record or prior offenses to lower the sentencing level. Second, the court can consider the aggravating factor of prior criminal conduct to increase the sentencing level.”
Guilty or insane
Turley thinks that the defense team would have had a better chance by pleading insanity because what happened makes it look like Hunter must be nuts. “The tax case is far more serious in potential sentencing,” the professor lectures.
“It was insane for Hunter not to plead guilty [in the gun case] to increase the chances that he might avoid a prison sentence. That is doubly true with the California charges.”
The Biden family believed Abbe Lowell when he told them that the former plea agreement had been signed in blood so would cancel out the prosecution. They also learned the rather expensive lesson that lawyers don’t actually guarantee a particular result, no matter how much they’re paid.
Based on what I have heard in press, #HunterBiden' s Sentencing base offense level is 20 for the tax charges alone assuming 750k tax loss ($3m unreported x 28%) & no priors (??). Recommended sentencing according to US Sentencing Guidelines is 33-41 months in jail. pic.twitter.com/7yE6r4GClk
— Tax_Litig8r (@nick_kokis_esq) June 20, 2023
In September, Hunter will be the star of another popular trial. In California he faces three felonies and half a dozen misdemeanors. The IRS frowns on writing hookers off as a business expense. Failing to report (alleged) bribes as income is another no-no. A stiff prison sentence is probably in Hunter Biden’s horoscope.
No matter what sentence Hunter gets in either case, the real story is the way this blows back all over his dad. According to GOP consultant Rob Cole, “If Hunter and Joe Biden are found to have conspired together on tax evasion, and it turns out that Joe Biden really is the ‘big guy,‘ then his campaign is over.”
The MAGA faction are thrilled to hear another of his predictions. “In that case, Donald Trump will undoubtedly be the next President of the United States.“
