Hunter Biden trial: Drug expert, FBI chemist expected to testify Friday | AP News

Romig said a photo taken in December 2018 shows Hunter Biden holding what appears to be a crack pipe.

Prosecutor Derek Hines also played a video taken on Hunter Biden’s phone in December 2018 of chunks of a white substance on a digital scale. Romig said the video appears to show about 2 grams of crack cocaine.

On cross-examination, defense attorney Abbe Lowell asked Romig whether he investigated any of the alleged drug dealers who were texting with Biden.

Romig said he did not investigate anyone because he was not involved in the Hunter Biden case.

“This is not my investigation,” he said.

Prosecutor Derek Hines led DEA special agent Joshua Romig through a series of text messages that prosecutors say were exchanged between Hunter Biden and three different drug dealers in the spring and summer of 2018.

Romig said the language in the text exchanges was indicative of drug deals.

DEA special agent Joshua Romig is testifying in the Hunter Biden gun trial.

Prosecutor Derek Hines asked Romig about how cocaine flows into the United States from countries such as Colombia and Peru.

Romig also explained that crack cocaine is a more powerful form of the drug derived from powder cocaine. Hunter Biden is accused of lying about being addicted to crack cocaine when he bought a gun in October 2018.

On cross-examination, defense attorney David Kolansky noted that the amount of residue Brewer tested was “minimal.”

He also noted that Brewer tested the pouch in October 2023, five years after the pouch was recovered by police who were called after Hallie Biden threw it in the trash can.

Kolasnky also noted that the tests Brewer did do not indicate when the drug residue got on the pouch or how it got there.

Wise handed Brewer a leather pouch in which Hunter’s sister-in-law and former lover Hallie Biden put the gun before tossing it in a trash can outside an upscale grocery store near her home 11 days after he bought it.

Brewer said he tested the pouch to determine whether there was any trace of drugs or drug residue.

“I found a minimal amount of white powder, or off-white powder,” Brewer said. The powder was found on the interior flap and in the bottom of the pouch.

Brewer said he tested the powder with a chemical solution and gas chromatography.

“Did you reach a conclusion about the substance you tested?” Wise asked.

“Cocaine was identified within the residual white powder that I sampled,” Brewer said.

House Republicans issued criminal referrals Wednesday against President Joe Biden’s son and brother, accusing them of making false statements to Congress as part of the GOP’s yearlong impeachment inquiry.

Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden’s attorney, said in a statement that the referrals are “nothing more than a desperate attempt by Republicans to twist Hunter’s testimony so they can distract from their failed impeachment inquiry and interfere with his trial.”

The White House has said in the past that President Biden would not pardon Hunter, but he was asked in an interview Thursday whether he would accept the outcome of his son’s trial, and he said: “Yes,” according to ABC.

He also said “yes” when asked whether he’d rule out a pardon.

Key witnesses in the trial have included Hunter Biden’s ex-wife, Beau Biden’s widow Hallie Biden and Zoe Kestan, a former romantic partner. President Biden’s brother James was also called as a witness.

Read more about the trial’s witnesses here.

The widow of Hunter Biden’s brother told jurors in his federal gun trial Thursday about the moment she found the revolver in his truck, describing how she put it into a leather pouch, stuffed it into a shopping bag and tossed it in a trash can outside a market near her home.

“I panicked, and I wanted to get rid of them,” she testified 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.

President Joe Biden’s son was in federal court, prepared to plead guilty to misdemeanor tax offenses. The culmination of a sprawling investigation, the deal between Hunter Biden and prosecutors was going to spare him a politically explosive trial in the middle of his father’s reelection campaign and likely prison time.

But it all fell apart.

Now, Hunter Biden is on trial on federal gun charges in a case brought by his father’s Justice Department at a time when America’s political and legal worlds are colliding like never before. Dogged for years by investigations, scrutinized over his troubled personal life and vilified by Republicans, the younger Biden is now also confronting the threat of felony convictions and time behind bars.