Hunter Biden’s legal team has officially dropped their request for a new trial on the gun charges against him, after conceding that one of their reasons was unfounded.
Last month, Hunter Biden was convicted of three felonies related to his 2018 handgun application, in which he falsely claimed he was not addicted to drugs.
According to CNN, this decision does not mark the end of efforts to appeal the ruling.
Hunter Biden’s attorneys argued that U.S. District Court Judge Maryellen Noreika lacked the authority to conduct the trial because she did not have the necessary jurisdiction.
However, a filing from the prosecution indicated that an appellate court’s documents, which dismissed Hunter Biden’s appeals to stop the trial, did grant Judge Maryellen Noreika the authority to proceed with the trial.
“The defendant’s motion is meritless and is based on his apparent misunderstanding of appellate practice and his failure to read the Third Circuit’s Orders,” prosecutors wrote.
“But both dismissal orders are plainly stamped ‘Issued in Lieu of Mandate’ and provide no basis for this Court to reconsider its earlier rulings with respect to jurisdiction when non-appealable orders are appealed,” the filing said, according to the New York Post.
“While the defendant repeatedly insisted before trial that his appeals divested this Court of jurisdiction, this is the first time he has spun this laughable tale of the mystery of the missing mandates,” the filing continued.
On Tuesday, following the Monday filings, Hunter Biden’s lawyers decided to withdraw their request for a new trial.
A separate set of filings from Hunter Biden’s legal team is still active.
According to Newsweek, Hunter Biden’s attorneys argue that his Second Amendment rights should remain intact because he was not subject to a Supreme Court ban on guns for individuals under domestic violence restraining orders.
His lawyers said that because Hunter Biden never “terrorized anyone with a gun in public, or anywhere else, or used it dangerously in any way,” he should not have been found guilty.
Hunter Biden is set to go on trial for tax charges in September.
A sentencing date has not yet been scheduled for his convictions on gun charges.
According to a recent AP/NORC poll, 57 percent of respondents last month believed that Hunter Biden should receive a prison sentence for his convictions. The poll’s margin of error was +/- 4 percentage points.
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