February 4, 2024 / by emptywheel

 

The December Warrant Shows David Weiss Wasn’t Going to Charge Gun Crimes Until Trump Elicited Threats

Over a week ago, NBC’s Gary Grumbach emailed me to figure out how he could access the then still-sealed warrant dockets I liberated.

To the best of my knowledge, neither he nor anyone else at NBC reported that the dockets revealed that David Weiss first obtained a warrant to search Hunter Biden’s iCloud content and a laptop attributed to him for evidence relating to the gun charges on December 4, 81 days after indicting him. Indeed, besides me, only right wing outlets (Fox, NYPost, Washington Examiner) reported on the warrant.

The existence of the warrant was first disclosed as part of a legal fight (MTD; response; reply) over whether David Weiss charged Hunter Biden only because pressure from Donald Trump and Jim Jordan generated threats that led Weiss to fear for the safety of his family.

Q Do you have concerns for the safety of individuals working in your office?

A Sure. I have safety concerns for everybody who has worked on the case, and we want to make sure that folks — yeah, folks are encouraged to do what they need to do with respect to the pursuit of justice generally and they not be intimidated in any way from performing their responsibilities.

Q Do you have concerns that the threats and harassment employees have received are intended to intimidate them into not doing their jobs?

A I really can’t speak to the intention of any actor in this realm. I just know that these — that certain actions have been taken by individuals, doxing, and, you know, threats that have been made, and that gives rise to concern. We’ve got to be able to do our jobs. And, sure, people shouldn’t be intimidated, threatened, or in any way influenced by others who — again, I don’t know what their motives are, but we’re just trying to do a public service here, so —

Q Have you yourself been the subject of any threats or harassment?

A I’ve certainly received messages, calls, emails from folks who have not been completely enamored of my — with my role in this case.

Q Do you have concerns for your safety or that of your family because of these threats?

A You know, I’m not — for myself, I’m not particularly concerned. Certainly I am concerned, as any parent or spouse would be for — yeah, for family, yep.

The fact that, in five years of investigating Hunter Biden, in the over two years after Hunter Biden’s book came out, David Weiss never obtained a warrant to search the iCloud content that he already had in possession for evidence to support gun charges (and also never sent the gun to the FBI lab for testing) is pretty compelling evidence that he never intended to charge Hunter for gun crimes until Donald Trump elicited threats that led Weiss to fear for the safety of his family. In his response, Weiss claims it is a Hollywood plot that such threats might lead him to renege on his decision to deal with the gun crime as part of a diversion agreement, making light of the same threats that, he told Congress, led him to be “concerned, as any parent or spouse would be for — yeah, for family, yep.”

This is unbelievably scandalous — that in the middle of a presidential campaign, Donald Trump ginned up threats against a prosecutor and then, for the first time, after the statute of limitations expired, that prosecutor sought new evidence to prosecute Joe Biden’s son.

Yet Gary Grumbach doesn’t think that’s newsworthy.

Instead, Grumbach is focused on important things: like whether Joe Biden will visit his son on his birthday.

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Originally Posted @ https://www.emptywheel.net/2024/02/04/the-december-warrant-shows-david-weiss-wasnt-going-to-charge-gun-crimes-until-trump-elicited-threats/