Crack every 20 minutes, $1m hooker binge & dodgy laptop… inside Hunter Biden's sordid downfall that led to Joe's pardon

Yesterday at 05:27 AM

HUNTER Biden has long hit headlines for all the wrong reasons.

Marred by controversy, the 54-year-old’s name has become synonymous with crack, hookers and criminal indictments.

Hunter – the youngest son of outgoing president Joe Biden – has now been spared from going to prison after his dad’s controversial pardon for tax and gun crimes.

The younger Biden was set to be sentenced this month after being convicted of gun offences in Delaware in June and pleading guilty in a California tax evasion case. 

But the "full and unconditional" pardon signed last night covers any other crimes which Hunter committed between 2014 and this year.  

The pardon is the latest in a series of controversies to plague Hunter’s turbulent life.

He started drinking as a teenager and during college abused cocaine, spending time in and out of rehab.

In 2013, Hunter signed up for the US Navy Reserve, but was discharged on his very first day after testing positive for cocaine use.

Then after the death of his older brother Beau from brain cancer in 2015, it is understood he drank excessively – sometimes only leaving the house to buy vodka.

After a bitter divorce from his wife of 24 years, Kathleen Buhle, in 2017, she opened up about his severe alcohol and drug addictions which impacted “the whole family”.

She also told of his numerous infidelities – including with his sister-in-law, Hallie Biden, after his brother Beau’s death.

Hunter later struck up a relationship with Zoe Kestan late in 2017 after his divorce.

She told a jury earlier this year how he was abusing crack cocaine “every 20 minutes or so” when they first met.

Kestan said Hunter would “want to smoke as soon as he woke up”.

Two months after a stint in rehab in 2018, Hunter lied about drug use to buy a .38 caliber handgun – which went on to land him in hot water with prosecutors.

His life spiralled from there and sordid details of his life were laid bare in indictments and in court.

And the infamous laptop Hunter left at a Delaware repair shop became a political grenade during his dad’s 2020 election campaign.

The laptop detailed his sordid drug-fuelled orgies and international business dealings – and contained sexually explicit images.

The FBI launched an investigation into Hunter back in 2020 after the New York Post published incriminating files taken from the laptop.

Its hard drive contained a great number of emails, texts photos, and documents between Hunter, his family, and his associates detailing his business dealings in Ukraine and China.

It also reportedly contains a 12-minute video that appears to show Hunter smoking crack while engaged in a sex act with a woman, as well as numerous other sexually explicit images.

Late in 2020 – a month after his father’s White House victory – Hunter revealed he was under investigation by the Justice Department in a probe that had started in 2018 over his tax affairs.

Hunter pleaded guilty in September to federal tax evasion charges, and was due to be sentenced on December 16.

He was also set to be sentenced next week for his conviction in June on federal gun charges.

Prosecutors hammered the narrative that Hunter knowingly lied on a firearm form about using drugs when he bought a gun six years ago.

Federal prosecutors said that on October 12, 2018, Hunter walked into the StarQuest Shooters & Survival Supply store in Wilmington and purchased a .38 Colt Cobra revolver.

The government said the president’s son answered “No” to a question on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives form that asked if he was using or was addicted to drugs or a controlled substance.

“The defendant knew he used crack and was addicted to crack at the relevant time period,” prosecutor Leo Wise said during closing arguments.

“There is no evidence that anyone else possessed the gun from October 12 to October 23, other than the defendant,” Wise added of the gun Hunter owned for 11 days.

Jurors heard punishing testimony from those closest to Hunter about his years of drug addiction.

Prosecutors even played audio excerpts from Hunter’s 2021 memoir, Beautiful Things, in the courtroom, which described in the defendant’s own words his trouble with drugs and his sobriety.

A 12-panel jury convicted Hunter of all charges in June, and he could have faced 25 years behind bars before he was last night pardoned.

At a separate trial in Los Angeles in September, Hunter pleaded guilty to charges of failing to pay more than $1.4 million in taxes between 2016 and 2019.

Hunter had been charged with three felony tax offences and six misdemeanor offences, with the indictment detailing how he earned $7 million in income from his foreign business dealings.

The businessman spent almost $5 million on “everything but his taxes” during that period.

Hunter instead splashed cash on drugs, escorts, lavish hotels, luxury cars and clothing – which he falsely labelled as business expenses.

He spurged almost $1 million on hookers and “adult entertainment” in less than four years – a period in which he acknowledged he was addicted to alcohol and crack cocaine.

In 2017, his furious ex-wife Buhle branded his spending “irresponsible” in an email.

She told how he spent $122,000 in just two months, around the same time he cut monthly payments to her and their three daughter from $17,000 to $1,700.

Buhle wrote: “Simply looking at your spending is enough for any judge to be disgusted.”

Among his most extravagant spends was the $7,000 a month he splashed out to rent a $5 million waterfront home to share with Beau’s widow Hallie during their affair in early 2018.

That May he then spent $8,000 on an extended callout to a 24-year-old Russian prostitute.

Hunter also paid for 42 nights at the Chateau Marmont hotel in LA for a total of $34,400, where he cooked up crack on the stove in the tiny kitchen.

He then shelled out $140,000 a night for 14 nights at the Las Vegas Palms Casino resort.

According to images and texts found on his laptop, he went on a huge bender – fueled by crack cocaine and accompanied by prostitutes.

He faced the maximum penalty of 17 years in prison and a fine of up to $1 million for his years of dodging taxes.

But his indictments and outrageous behaviour has been forgiven by his dad Joe Biden.

Last night, the outgoing president – who has less than two months left in the White House – used his powers to pardon his son.

The bombshell decision came despite the president, 82, repeatedly insisting that he would not pardon his son or commute his sentence.

Biden claimed his son was “unfairly prosecuted” as he announced his drastic decision.

He said last night: “Today, I signed a pardon for my son Hunter.

“From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted.”

He added: “For my entire career I have followed a simple principle: just tell the American people the truth. They'll be fair-minded.

“Here's the truth: I believe in the justice system, but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice – and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further.

“I hope Americans will understand why a father and a President would come to this decision.”

The pardon spares the younger Biden from a possible prison sentence for federal felony gun and tax convictions.

Incoming President Trump, 78, blasted the decision.

Referencing those jailed for the riot at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, he wrote: "Does the pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J-6 hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years? 

"Such an abuse and miscarriage of justice.

“That system of justice must be fixed and due process must be restored for all Americans, which is exactly what President Trump will do as he returns to the White House with an overwhelming mandate from the American people.”