Hunter Biden offers to change plea to avoid a trial in tax case

Los Angeles (CNN) — Hunter Biden is attempting to resolve his federal tax evasion case in California with a plea where he maintains his innocence but will accept punishment, his lawyers announced in court Thursday, moments before jury selection was scheduled to begin.

The arrangement won’t be final until District Judge Mark Scarsi, a Trump appointee who has presided over the tax case, gives his stamp of approval in open court. The court is now on break and will resume at 2 p.m. ET.

This type of arrangement, called an “Alford plea,” would see Biden acknowledge that special counsel David Weiss has enough evidence to convict him – and then he would accept whatever sentence Scarsi eventually hands down.

“I think this can be resolved today,” Hunter Biden’s attorney Abbe Lowell said.

Prosecutors from Weiss’ team said they would object to an Alford plea. Prosecutor Leo Wise told the judge that Lowell’s comments in court were the first time he learned about a potential plea change.

Lowell also said “there has not been an agreement” between the parties – like a plea agreement – in which Biden would plead guilty to some charges in exchange for other charges being dropped. The only offer that Hunter’s team ever got from prosecutors, Lowell said, was for him to plead guilty to all nine counts.

The potential resolution of the tax case comes on the brink of a trial in downtown Los Angeles. This would have been Biden’s second criminal trial this year, after he was convicted in June on three federal gun charges in Wilmington, Delaware.

Biden was charged with nine tax crimes, including three felony charges. Prosecutors allege that Biden failed to pay $1.4 million in federal taxes and evaded taxes by filing tax returns with fraudulent business deductions. They also allege that Biden was using his money on luxury cars, extravagant hotels and sex workers, instead of paying taxes when they were due.

The president’s son eventually paid roughly $2 million in back taxes and penalties after learning of the investigation and getting sober, following a years-long struggle with drug addiction and alcoholism. In the weeks before the trial, the judge blocked Biden’s lawyers from telling jurors about the belated tax payment, or about the potential origins of his addiction – dealing a major blow to his defense strategy.

During the brief hearing, Scarsi noted that there are around 120 prospective jurors waiting inside the courthouse, because the jury selection process was scheduled to begin Thursday morning.

Scarsi indicated that if he doesn’t accept Biden’s attempt to promptly resolve the case that the trial will move forward with jury selection on Thursday and Friday as planned.

Prosecutors asked Scarsi for additional time to review the law around an Alford plea, saying it was the first time they heard about Biden’s offer to change his plea.

The judge responded, “I would normally give you the opportunity to brief it, but the issue is, we have 120 jurors that we want to hang on to if we need them.”

Biden’s wife Melissa Cohen was not allowed in the courtroom, drawing a complaint from Lowell. Nobody except the parties and their attorneys were let inside because all of the extra space in the courtroom pews were going to be used for potential jurors during jury selection, the judge said.

Lowell’s presence and involvement is notable. He was the lead defense attorney for his client’s Delaware gun case, but he was absent from a key pretrial hearing two weeks ago in the California tax case. Instead, celebrity attorney Mark Geragos, who was retained earlier this summer, took the lead at that hearing.

President Joe Biden has continually said that he will not pardon his son in either of his cases. It is not clear if the president’s thinking has changed since dropping his reelection bid, but he still has the ability to pardon his son or commute his sentence.

In July, Biden added Los Angeles attorney Mark Geragos to his legal team. Abbe Lowell, who handled Biden’s gun case in Delaware, was expected to take a back seat for his tax case with Geragos as the lead attorney. CNN previously reported that there were plea discussions earlier this summer that did not lead to a deal at that time.

This story has been updated with additional reporting.

CNN’s Emma Tucker contributed to this report.

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