Joe Biden’s son Hunter pleaded guilty to tax evasion in a Los Angeles court on Thursday, avoiding a new trial but facing up to 17 years in prison.
Hunter Biden, the son of the American president, formally pleaded guilty on Thursday, September 5, to tax fraud in a Los Angeles court, a turnaround that spares him a new trial after his conviction in June in another case.
“Guilty,” Hunter Biden, 54, replied when the judge listed the charges against him, The New York Times reported.
This former lawyer and businessman, now a painter, was notably facing one count of tax fraud and two counts of false declarations for not having paid 1.4 million dollars in taxes over the last decade.
The judge set sentencing for December 16. Hunter Biden faces up to 17 years in prison.
Even before the trial began Thursday morning in Los Angeles, his lawyer Abbe Lowell had told the judge that he was prepared to plead guilty, but using a specific feature of American law that allows one to accept a conviction while proclaiming one’s innocence. The prosecution, however, refused this procedure, preferring that the trial go ahead.
Alas, Hunter Biden has told his lawyers that he has finally agreed to plead guilty in full, without agreeing with prosecutors to reduce his sentence but thereby avoiding an embarrassing new trial.
Already condemned
With AFP
- FRANCE 24
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