The ex-girlfriend of Hunter Biden has told a jury how he was abusing crack cocaine “every 20 minutes or so” when they first met.
The son of the US president is on trial in Wilmington, Delaware, for allegedly consuming drugs while in possession of a handgun.
Zoe Kestan told the court that Mr. Biden, 54, was frequently withdrawing money for drug sales. She first met him during a “private dance” at a “gentleman’s club” in New York.
The son of a US president is on trial for the first time in criminal history.
He is accused of knowingly lying on federal paperwork when he said he was not a drug user in order to buy a revolver and ammunition from a Wilmington gun shop on 12 October 2018, as well as illegally having the gun for 11 days.
Mr Biden could face up to 25 years in prison if found guilty of all three federal counts in the case.
He has pleaded not guilty and his legal team says he was in recovery at the time he bought the weapon.
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The prosecution is expected to rest its case on Thursday after calling on another six witnesses, including Hallie Biden, Mr Biden’s former partner and the widow of his brother, as well as Delaware state police officers, a DEA agent and a forensic expert.
Among the other prosecution witnesses was Gordon Cleveland, the former employee of the gun store who sold Mr Biden the gun in 2018.
In his testimony on Wednesday, Mr Cleveland said he told Mr Biden – and all other customers – to “truthfully” fill out the form.
The prosecution is trying to prove that Hunter Biden, who wrote a memoir about his drug addiction, was abusing crack cocaine at the time he bought the weapon.
During opening remarks earlier this week, Mr Biden’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, told jurors that the revolver was an impulse buy stemming from the tactics of a pushy salesman – Mr Cleveland.
In his testimony, Mr Cleveland acknowledged his reputation as a “whale hunter” known for being able to “sell whatever you had”, mostly expensive, high-quality guns.
He denied, however, ever trying to “upsell” Mr Biden, who he claimed had come into the store and “brought up” buying a gun, specifically a revolver.
On Wednesday, the defendant’s stepmother, US first lady Jill Biden, was again in court.
She sat in the first row behind Hunter Biden, along with his wife, Melissa Cohen Biden, and a Secret Service agent.
President Joe Biden is in France for events commemorating the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion.
FBI agent Erika Jensen, Ms Kestan, and the defendant’s ex-wife, Kathleen Buhle, also testified on the third day of the trial.
Ms Kestan detailed Hunter Biden’s drug use during their relationship.
On the first day they met at the gentleman’s club in December 2017, she said he started smoking crack “within 10 minutes”.
She said she saw this pattern repeated during their relationship in luxury hotel rooms in New York, New Jersey and California.
She said Mr Biden “would want to smoke as soon as he woke up”.
Ms Kestan also testified that she saw him smoking crack in Malibu, California, over several days in September 2018, a month before he bought the gun.
Prosecutors showed the jury images allegedly taken by Ms Kestan showing crack pipes in the rooms she stayed in with Hunter Biden.
Another apparently showed the defendant in a bath with a crack pipe in his hand