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Prosecutors tried to ‘hide’ a blanket immunity clause for Hunter Biden in a ‘crazy’ and ‘unprecedented’ tactic – but were exposed by the judge during the three-hour hearing with the president’s son and his lawyers in her Wilmington courtroom Tuesday. says a former government lawyer.
Ex-Assistant US Attorney (AUSA) Will Scharf slammed prosecutors and Hunter’s legal team, led by Chris Clark, for allegedly trying to fool U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika into approving the generous and unorthodox plea deal without proper scrutiny, in a fiery interview with DailyMail.com.
The president’s son strolled into the courtroom in his former hometown, confident that his ‘sweetheart deal’ would breeze through – only to watch the plan to put his tax problems behind him crumble before his eyes.
Scharf, a former Trump administration official who is running for Attorney General of Missouri, claimed the proposed deal was ‘spitting in the face of justice’.
Legal experts expected a perfunctory hearing to waive through Hunter Biden’s ‘sweetheart’ plea deal over two tax misdemeanor charges in a Delaware federal court Wednesday. But instead his pact with prosecutors fell apart when it was dissected by Judge Maryellen Noreika
Legal observers slammed prosecutors and Hunter’s legal team, led by Chris Clark (right), for allegedly trying to fool U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika (left) into approving the generous and unorthodox plea deal without proper scrutiny
The former federal prosecutor, as well as courtroom witnesses and a transcript from the explosive hearing on Wednesday obtained by DailyMail.com, reveal the inside story.
Legal experts expected a perfunctory hearing to wave through Hunter’s ‘sweetheart’ plea deal over two tax misdemeanor charges in a Delaware federal court Wednesday.
But instead his pact with prosecutors fell apart when it was dissected by Judge Maryellen Noreika.
Hunter’s deal put before her consisted of two documents: a ‘plea agreement’, in which Hunter confessed to two tax misdemeanors; and a ‘diversion agreement’, where prosecutors pledged to drop gun charges against him if Hunter stuck to federal rules.
Buried in the diversion agreement was a clause that gave Hunter blanket immunity for a wide range of other potential charges that could be filed by the Delaware US Attorney, including illegal foreign lobbying.
Judge Noreika said in the hearing that, due to federal rules, she could make a decision on the plea agreement but did not have a say on the diversion agreement – and complained that prosecutors had stashed the pivotal immunity clause in the latter document.
‘You’re saying I don’t even get to accept it, I guess I’m supposed to rubber stamp it,’ she said.
‘You’re telling me that I don’t have any role in it, and you’re leaving provisions of the plea agreement out and putting them into an agreement that you are not asking me to sign off on.’
Scharf said that such non-prosecution promises always appear in the plea agreement. But in this case, they were instead ‘hidden’ in the diversion agreement.
Ex-Assistant US Attorney Will Scharf explains that buried in the ‘diversion’ agreement was a clause that gave Hunter blanket immunity for a wide range of other potential charges that could be filed by the Delaware US Attorney, including illegal foreign lobbying
He believes it was an attempt to pull the wool over Noreika’s eyes and get her to waive through the deal without spotting the huge concession by the Justice Department to the President’s son.
‘This was a way of hiding the ball both in federal court in Delaware, and in the court of public opinion, to give Hunter Biden a free pass on a decade of criminal activity not covered by the charges in this case,’ the former Missouri violent crime prosecutor said.
He described the strange construction as ‘crazy’, ‘totally unique’ and ‘not something that you would ever see in a court of law in any other circumstance, anywhere in the United States.
‘I believe that this was an effort to insulate Hunter Biden from any future legal liability for just about anything that he has ever done, without them saying that in a document which would be politically controversial and subject to judicial approval,’ he added.
‘The idea that he would be let off, effectively with two misdemeanor convictions for failure to pay taxes, is spitting in the face of law enforcement, it’s spitting in the face of justice.’
Scharf applauded the Delaware district judge for spotting the scheme.
‘Judge Noreika smelled a rat. She understood that the lawyers were trying to paint her into a corner and hide the ball,’ he said. ‘Instead, she backed DoJ and Hunter’s lawyers into a corner by pulling all the details out into the open and then indicating that she wasn’t going to approve a deal as broad as what she had discovered.’
In the hearing, Norieka grilled Delaware AUSA Leo Wise over the strange way they had arranged their deal.
‘We looked through a bunch of diversion agreements that we have access to and we couldn’t find anything that had anything similar to that,’ she said, according to a transcript.
‘Have you ever seen a diversion agreement where the agreement not to prosecute is so broad that it encompasses crimes in a different case?’
‘No,’ Wise admitted, then tried to follow up but was cut off by the judge and told to ‘sit down’.
Noreika scolded both sides for trying to get her to ‘rubber stamp’ the plea agreement without considering the blanket immunity awarded to Hunter in a separate document.
‘You seem to be asking for the inclusion of the Court in this agreement, yet you’re telling me that I don’t have any role in it,’ she chided. ‘You’re leaving provisions of the plea agreement out and putting them into an agreement that you are not asking me to sign off on.’
The prosecutor was later put on the spot by Noreika and forced to reveal that the DoJ’s investigation was ‘ongoing’ and that Hunter could be susceptible to illegal lobbying charges.
Scharf claimed Wise only did so in an attempt to save face after the overly generous back-door clause in their deal with Hunter was exposed.
But when Hunter’s hotshot attorney Abbe Lowell heard the Justice Department lawyer hint at potential further charges under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), he leapt up with a face like thunder and started angrily conferring with his team.
‘Hunter’s lawyers exploded,’ Scharf said. ‘They clearly believed that FARA was covered under the deal, because as written, the pretrial diversion agreement language was broad enough to cover it.
Hunter walked into the federal court in downtown Wilmington, Delaware, alongside his ‘sugar brother’ and lawyer Kevin Morris (left) – who was seen smoking a bong during a visit from the president’s son last week
With the previous deal in tatters, the First Son pleaded not guilty, and the judge gave both sides 30 days to hash out an acceptable agreement.
On leaving the courtroom, Hunter appeared shell-shocked. What was meant to be a 20-minute, perfunctory hearing that put his criminal troubles behind him turned into a devastating setback for the President’s son that will stretch his case into fall.
Other former prosecutors were left unimpressed by Delaware’s handling of the case.
‘The fact they didn’t cover this ahead of time is really sloppy on the prosecution’s part,’ former Washington DC Assistant US Attorney Shanlon Wu told CNN on Wednesday as the hearing unfolded.
‘For Biden’s team if it’s ambiguous it’s good for them. But the fact that the judge is pointing it out now, that’s on the prosecution. They should have taken care of this a long time ago.’
‘The fact that the parties did not have that written out and completely on the same page and a full understanding on that and went into court today, is a failure by both sides here,’ said ex New York prosecutor Elie Hoenig. ‘That is inexplicable to me.
‘Hunter Biden’s potential criminal problems are not over here.’
