Hunter Biden’s wife shakes her head as his laptop is dramatically revealed at gun trial

Hunter Biden’s gun trial was shown his infamous laptop and saw photos, videos and text messages from when he was in the depths of his addiction to crack cocaine during a dramatic day in court.

Melissa Cohen, the wife of the president’s son, shook her head as Prosecutor Derek Hines took the Macbook Pro 13 from a plastic sleeve, walked it across the courtroom and held it up to the jury.

The revelation came on a second day of the trial that heard Hunter ‘smoked crack every 15 minutes’ and went into details into his life of ‘debauchery’. 

Hines’ first witness FBI agent Erika Jensen confirmed it belonged to Hunter in an admission that flew in the face of many who tried to discredit its contents as Russian disinformation. 

He then showed the court evidence taken from the ‘Laptop from Hell’ – including pictures of text messages where Hunter refers to himself as an ‘addict’ and his conversations with suspected drug dealers.

There was also a message where he describes ‘sleeping on a car smoking crack’ two days after buying the Colt Cobra Revolver at the center of the case.

The 12 jurors also saw video of a shirtless Hunter smoking a pipe and weighing what appeared to be crack on digital scales.

Prosecutors have to prove that Hunter, 54, intentionally lied about his drug addiction when he bought the gun on October 12, 2018. 

It was a fraught and emotional morning for Melissa – who started crying when Hunter’s attorney Abbe Lowell referred to Hunter beginning his whirlwind romance with her in the spring of 2019, in his opening statement to the jury. 

During a break in the proceedings she also lashed out at Donald Trump White House aide Garrett Ziegler and called him a ‘Nazi piece of s***’ 

In the morning, both the prosecution and defense give their opening statements to the jury, followed by testimony from FBI Special Jensen, who investigated Hunter’s gun crimes.

Prosecutor Hines went first and took a little over 20 minutes for his opening statement.

He told the jury that ‘no one is above the law’, that it ‘applies equally to all people’, and that prosecutions of defendants are about ‘the choices they made not the people they are’.

‘We’re here because he chose to lie,’ Hines said, referring to Hunter’s gun purchase form in which he claimed he was not an addict. 

‘No one is allowed to lie on a federal form like that, not even Hunter Biden.’

Hoping to portray a slam-dunk case, Hines told the jury they will hear from the salesman at StarQuest Shooters in Wilmington, Delaware who sold Hunter the gun and saw him fill out the form.

He said Hunter ‘admitted in his own words’ that he was an addict when he bought the gun.

Hines explained that the government needs to prove Hunter knew he was an addict or drug abuser when he bought the gun in order to achieve three guilty verdicts, but said that the First Son Hunter ‘admitted in his own words’ to it.

‘He was addicted to crack before, during, and after’ the gun incident, Hines said.

The prosecutor told the jury they will be shown video evidence of Hallie, Hunter’s then-lover and brother’s widow, dumping his gun in the trash at Janssens Supermarket in Wilmington on October 23, 2018 after she found the gun in Hunter’s truck.

He and his co-prosecutor Leo Wise were flanked by several aides at the government’s table, and their boss, Special Counsel David Weiss, sat in the public benches watching.

After Hines concluded his opening statement, Melissa was unable to contain herself and mouthed something angrily but silently at his back, from her seat next to Jill Biden.

Later in the morning, the jury were played extensive excerpts from the audio book of Hunter’s memoir, narrated by the First Son himself, detailing his sordid crack cocaine-fueled exploits in 2016 through 2019, and his first hit of the drug in the 1990s.

One revelation came from Hunter’s hotshot lawyer Abe Lowell, who said that Hunter drove his father Joe Biden’s black Cadillac SUV to the gun store in October 2018 when he bought the gun, over which he is now charged.

The lawyer also raised eyebrows in the courtroom when he said that a leather pouch that police found containing both Hunter’s gun and cocaine residue in 2018 was actually used by Hunter’s daughters in New York the days before the gun incident.

The controversial claim distanced Hunter from the drugs found on the pouch – but potentially put his kids in the frame.

Lowell also indicated that Hunter’s uncle, Jim Biden, will testify during the trial about Hunter’s efforts to get sober.

Ashley Biden, Hunter’s half-sister, was also ashen-faced and appeared on the verge of tears through much of the morning’s proceedings. 

At one point, when the jury was played excerpts of the audio book of Hunter’s memoir describing his drug-fueled car crash he had on highway I-10 in 2016, Jill put her arm around her daughter.

‘We will show you overwhelming evidence he knew he was a drug user and drug addict,’ Hines told the jury, pointing out that during 2018 Hunter repeatedly checked himself into rehab. ‘These attempts reflected he understood and knew he had an addiction.’

Being aware of his addiction at the time of the gun purchase would make Hunter’s statement on the federal form a lie.

Hines also pointed to large cash withdrawals ‘consistent with’ someone buying drugs, including a $5,000 withdrawal on the day of the gun purchase.

He confirmed that Hallie, as well as his ex-wife Kathleen Buhle, and ex-girlfriend Zoe Kestan, will testify, saying that Hunter was smoking crack every 15 or 20 minutes during his worst periods in 2018.

Other witnesses will include two Delaware State Police officers who interviewed Hunter and Hallie and found the gun after the incident of Hallie throwing it in the supermarket trash was reported to cops.

Edward Thomas Banner, a man who found the gun in the trash and took it home before being traced by police, will also testify, along with a DEA special agent Joshua Romig who will explain slang Hunter used for drugs, and chemist Dr Jason Brewer, who analyzed the cocaine found on the leather gun pouch.

‘Addiction may not be a choice,’ Hines told the jury in his conclusion, ‘but lying when buying a gun is a choice.’

Trial begins having already lost one juror 

The first day of the trial began with a juror emailing the judge on Monday night saying that she was unemployed, living an hour’s drive away without a car or money for parking, and hadn’t realized she would be needed for multiple days.

One of the four alternate jurors took her place, allowing the trial to go ahead.

Hunter’s wealthy bankroller Kevin Morris, whom DailyMail.com has previously photographed smoking a bong from the balcony of his Los Angeles home, was dressed in a grey suit and a bright green tie.

Abbe Lowell took around 45 minutes for his opening statement, around double Hines’ time.

Towards the end, some jurors were yawning repeatedly or fidgeting, though others remained leaning forward and engaged.

He emphasized to the jury that the burden was on the government to prove Hunter knew he was an addict when he bought the gun, and suggested that his actions before the purchase of going to rehab and getting a sober coach in August that year, reflected someone who no longer thought of themselves as a drug abuser.

Lowell claimed that Hunter was lying when he texted Hallie that he we smoking crack two days after buying the gun, because his relationship with her was breaking down and he didn’t want to see her.

‘The better evidence is that Hunter was not using drugs at the time he bought the gun,’ Lowell told the jury.

He said that Hallie put the gun in the cocaine-dusted leather pouch after she found it, and that it was previously in the possession of Hunter’s daughters.

Lowell also added that the pouch was not tested for fingerprints.

He told the jury that they have ‘enormous power’ and that ‘with this power comes tremendous responsibility.’

He admonished them: ‘You promised to be fair and impartial, hear all the evidence before you and make up your minds.’

During Agent Jensen’s testimony, Hines played long excerpts from Hunter’s audio book of Beautiful Things, detailing his four-day crack bender in 2016 in Nashville, a ‘six-day bacchanal’ in Los Angeles, a drug-fueled car crash on the I-10, and his regular descent into the city’s skid row to buy crack in 2018 before learning to cook it at the Chateau Marmont hotel.

During the excerpts, Morris kept a keen eye on the jury, with arms folded, looking stern-faced.

Notably, the jury did not laugh or smile at the humorous parts of Hunter’s memoir, including a story of how during Hunter’s ‘non-stop depravity’ in LA, a stripper ordered two filet mignon steaks to room service at his hotel, then fed one to her dog.

The damning evidence from the FBI agent who investigated Hunter 

Jensen described how the FBI obtained Hunter’s text messages, emails, photos and other material from his phone and laptop backups from a subpoena to Apple’s iCloud.

She also retold how the FBI obtained Hunter’s abandoned laptop – killing dead conspiracy theories spread at the time it was first published that it was Russian disinformation.

The computer itself, encased in a plastic sleeve, was even held up to the jury in the courtroom, marking the first time the infamous ‘Laptop From Hell’ has been shown in public.

Jensen said the FBI recovered it from the owner of The Mac Store in Wilmington, Delaware, in late 2019, matched its serial number to Hunter’s iCloud account, and used forensic tools to extract its data after obtaining a warrant.

They also found an email obtained from their subpoena to Apple, of an invoice to Hunter from The Mac Store dated April 17 2019, for laptop data transfer, corroborating the story.

Jensen said there was significant ‘overlap’ between the iCloud data and the laptop data, and that Hunter’s messages they recovered totaled over 18,000 pages when extracted to a PDF document.

Jensen showed the jury text messages between Hunter and suspected drug dealers, conversations with family and friends in which he confessed to his addiction, and bank statements showing him withdrawing up to $14,000 per day and an average of $50,000 per month in the fall of 2018 when he bought the gun.

Jensen identified for the jury invoices emailed to Hunter for a $2,500-per-day rehab in the affluent neighborhood of Brentwood, Los Angeles, where he stayed from August 21 to 27. He was also billed $8,400 for a ‘sober companion’ from August 27 to September 2.

Jensen said the FBI obtained ‘hundreds of pages’ of bank showing transactions between September and November 2018.

She agreed with Hines’ description of Hunter making ‘large cash withdrawals nearly every day’, between $205 and $16,000, and that he withdrew a total $151,640.45 during the period – an average of about $50,000 a month.

In highlighting the records, the prosecution were trying to show the jury that Hunter may have been using cash to buy drugs throughout the period he owned the gun.

A bank withdrawal slip shown to the jury revealed Hunter took out $5,000 cash the day he bought the gun on October 12 2018 – but only spent about $900 at StarQuest. He also withdrew $1,600 on both the 10th and 11th.

Jensen agreed that the signature on the bank slip matched Hunter’s signature on his gun purchase form.

Bank statements for the year ending November 30 2018 showed inflows of $1.4 million to one account, and ATM withdrawals totaling a staggering $494,000.

His statements for his business, Owasco PC, showed he deposited $3.4 million that year, and withdrew the same amount. The ATM and check card withdrawals from that account totaled about $399,000.

Though the jury were not told anything about Hunter’s other upcoming California trial for tax crimes in September, the prosecutors may in that case use the very same bank statements to show Hunter used his business accounts for drugs and hookers – then tried to deduct the payments on his taxes.

As the afternoon wore on with Hines painstakingly pulling out texts and bank records to show the jury, the prosecutor cracked open a Celsius energy drink during a 15-minute recess.

Some of the jurors looked like they were in need of a caffeine hit too, with some slumping, their eyelids drooping, and fidgeting in their padded swivel chairs.

A host of text messages were shown to the jury of Hunter appearing to discuss drug deals and his addiction.

On November 27, 2018 he wrote to one suspected dealer that he wanted an ‘ounce’, and the dealer told him it was ‘gonna be 1450’. ‘Its 17g pure give him 1100. You’ll be happy,’ the contact wrote to Hunter.

On December 18, 2018 he told Hallie’s sister Liz Secundy in a text message that he was ‘insane and an addict’.

A video Hunter sent Secundy showed him topless, holding what appeared to be a crack pipe.

Secundy asked him to admit he was ‘in the throes of addiction’, and he replied ‘I admit it completely’, but added ‘I’ll f**king get sober when I want to get f**king sober.’

The prosecution showed a second video of Hunter weighing what appear to be crack rocks on a scale, and a photo of Hunter’s hand holding a crack pipe dated January 14 2019. They also showed a bong in the background of one January 31 2019 photo.

In Lowell’s cross-examination of Agent Jensen, he asked her to admit that Hunter’s memoir was written after the fact and was ‘not a contemporaneous diary’.

He also pointed out evidence that Hunter’s drug use was not as severe or regular as in dark periods earlier in 2018 when he lived in LA and took crack every 15 minutes.

Unlike then, Lowell asked Jensen to confirm to the jury, in the fall of 2018 Hunter was able to catch a plane, see his family, and sleep more than 10 hours a week.

Lowell also appeared to score a point against the prosecution when he asked Jensen if Hunter’s heavy cash withdrawals were linked to his rehab payments.

‘Did you match up those withdrawals to these invoices?’ he asked. ‘No,’ Jensen replied.