Hunter Biden, son of former Vice President Joe Biden, waits for the start of his father's debate at Centre College in Danville, Ky., on Oct. 11, 2012. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo)
Former Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden got an Arkansas judge to strike down claims that he is the subject of multiple criminal investigations, according to court filings.
D&A Investigations, a private investigative company, claimed in court papers (pdf) that Biden, 48, is the subject of “more than one criminal investigation involving fraud, money laundering and a counterfeiting scheme.”
One of the probes was allegedly linked to Burisma, the Ukranian energy company that Biden worked for from 2014 to 2019. Joe Biden said in 2016 that he pressured Ukraine to oust a prosecutor who was probing the company.
Biden and a group of business associates “established bank and financial accounts with Morgan Stanley … for Burisma Holdings Limited … for the money laundering scheme,” D&A Investigations claimed.
Hunter Biden filed a motion (pdf) to strike down the claims made by D&A Investigations, arguing “the notice is filed by a non-party simply to make scandalous allegations in the pending suit to gain some media attention.”
Judge Don McSpadden, who is overseeing a paternity case filed against Biden by Lunden Roberts, struck down the claims later Monday (pdf), ruling the private investigative firm, an “Intervener,” didn’t intervene pursuant to Arkansas civil law.
The notice “was not filed in any acceptable manner to this court,” McSpadden wrote.
Reached by the New York Post, Dominic Casey, the D&A investigator who filed the papers, declined to say whether Roberts hired the company.
Roberts has alleged that Biden fathered her child, whose gender and identity have remained shielded from public view. A DNA test taken last month showed “with scientific certainty” that Biden is the father, Roberts has said in court filings. Biden has said he’s “not contesting paternity.”
Roberts said Monday (pdf) that the defendant “has had no involvement in the child’s life since the child’s birth, never interacted with the child, never parented the child ... and could not identify the child out of a photo lineup.”
“The defendant is a complete stranger to this child,” the filing stated, arguing that Roberts should have primary physical and legal custody of the child and that Biden shouldn’t get visitation rights unless his attorneys state specific dates and times he wants to visit the child.
Former Vice President Joe Biden (L) and his son Hunter Biden at the Duke Georgetown NCAA college basketball game in Washington on Jan. 30, 2010. (Nick Wass/AP Photo)
McSpadden ordered both parties to submit five years of financial information as he decides whether to grant child support and, if so, how much it would be. Roberts’ attorneys have asked Biden to confirm that he voluntarily left the board of Burisma, a Ukranian energy company, and how much he was paid by the company during his time of employment. They also asked Biden to admit that he received money from China.
Roberts submitted her financial information recently (pdf). The 28-year-old told the court she received payments from a company owned by Biden from May 2018 to November 2018, the Washington-based law firm Owasco PC.
“She never received a tax document for these payments,” her attorneys wrote in the court papers, adding that bank records reflect the payments.
Roberts submitted pay stubs as proof of employment and a health insurance card she said Biden provided her.
Roberts said she receives small amounts of money from her parents and gifts from family and friends as she made her case for child support.
“Occasionally, and without regular reoccurrence, the plaintiff has been provided insignificant amounts of money—what some may classify as ‘petty cash’—by her parents for her or her daughter’s needs,” the filing stated, adding later that the toys and other gifts were “infrequent and while cherished and very appreciated, are not gifts of monetary value.”
Biden, meanwhile, has failed to file a number of documents relating to his financial situation, according to Roberts’ attorneys (pdf), including his full and complete tax returns for the past five years and any documents showing income or money he received from stocks, dividends, payments, and other sources.
The attorneys said in the filing that Biden’s conduct violating the court’s order “is willful and contemptuous.”
“This Court should enter an order compelling the defendant to appear” at the next court hearing, slated for Jan. 7, 2020, “and show cause as to why he should not be held in contempt.”
Biden, who remarried earlier this year, is expecting his fifth child, his first with his new wife, the Daily Mail reported. He married Melissa Cohen, a 32-year-old South African native.
Little has been revealed about Biden’s financial situation, but court papers did show that he owns a three-bedroom house in the Hollywood Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, according to the Post. The house is valued at $2.5 million. It was sold on June 19 but it’s not clear what amount Biden paid for it.
