The highlight of the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton was when immunity deals were handed out to all her associates in “exchange for their cooperation” and then all of their devices were erased and destroyed.
The Hunter Biden investigation followed by a slap-on-the-wrist plea deal was equally a cover-up pretending to be an investigation.
And a judge just threw it out the window.
Judge Maryellen Noreika refused to accept a revised plea deal between the two parties after a three-hour hearing Wednesday, which would have offered Hunter Biden broad legal immunity from all tax crimes that took place between 2014 and 2019, as well as any drug or firearm charges. She ordered prosecutors and Hunter Biden’s attorneys to strike a new deal that limits the legal immunity offered to the first son.
The rejected deal came after the collapse of an initial plea agreement, which fell apart following a series of unusual last-minute disputes between his attorneys and federal prosecutors. Hunter Biden’s attorney, Chris Clark, said the agreement was “null and void” after a top prosecutor in the case said it would not provide the first son permanent legal immunity, the New York Times reported.
Permanent legal immunity in exchange for what? Nothing. So Hunter Biden is pleading not guilty while assuming that the party will protect him.
Even the New York Times coverage of this legal circle has been forced to admit it’s a cover-up.
From the start, the judge seemed highly skeptical of the unusual deal — which offered Hunter Biden broad immunity from prosecution in perpetuity, questioning why it had been filed under a provision that gave her no legal authority to reject it. When she asked Leo Wise, a prosecutor, if there was any precedent for the kind of deal being proposed, he replied, “No, your honor.”
Why strike a deal that cuts the judge out of having a say? Because it’s a rigged game.
Hunter Biden’s lawyers repeatedly cast the deal as the final chapter of the five-year inquiry into the president’s son. But Judge Maryellen Noreika quickly punctured that assertion when she asked a prosecutor, Leo Wise, if the Biden investigation was “ongoing.” He replied “yes,” adding that if Biden’s team thought otherwise, “then there’s no deal.”
The investigation has to be ‘ongoing’ to stalemate congressional investigations, but it also has to be over so Hunter Biden can move on at the same time.
The Democrat media keeps referring to Judge Maryellen Noreika as a Trump appointee which is true in the strictly technical term in which presidents allow Senate members from that state to pick judges regardless of party. Noreika was backed by local Democrats and was being considered by Biden for another judicial appointment (safe to say that’s dead now) and had ruled against a lawsuit by the computer repairman who found Hunter’s laptops. So, safe it to say she’s hardly MAGA, but this may have just been a bridge too far.
The judge who will review Hunter Biden’s plea deal on Wednesday accused a member of Biden’s legal team of misrepresenting herself in a phone call to the court — a bizarre episode that prompted the judge to threaten sanctions even as Biden’s lawyers insisted it was all a misunderstanding.
In a brief order Tuesday afternoon, U.S. District Court Judge Maryellen Noreika wrote that an employee at Latham & Watkins, a law firm representing the president’s son, had called the court clerk’s office and falsely claimed to work for a Republican lawyer in the hopes of persuading the clerk to remove documents that apparently contained Biden’s personal tax information.
And the congressional rollout of materials on the Biden crime family probably didn’t help either.
Judge Maryellen Noreika decided she didn’t want to rubber stamp blatant corruption. It’s a pity that too few in the political or the legal system feel the same way.
U.S. Attorney David Weiss said in a court filing at that time that Hunter Biden would plead guilty to failing to pay taxes in 2017 and 2018, and would enter a pretrial diversion agreement to avoid felony charges for illegally purchasing a handgun while addicted to illegal drugs.
Weiss did not mention in his June 20 filing that the agreement would also grant Hunter Biden legal immunity for any tax crimes committed during the six-year period from 2014 through 2019.
So now Hunter’s team will work with his dad’s prosecutors on a slightly less obnoxious cover-up.