New evidence shows that E. Martin Estrada, who was appointed by President Joe Biden to be the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, did not work with David Weiss, who is the U.S. Attorney for Delaware, to file charges against Hunter Biden in his district. .
Estrada’s statement shows that shortly after being sworn in, he met with his team of US attorneys to discuss Weiss’ request to work together on the Hunter Biden case. Estrada eventually spoke to Weiss on the phone and told her he would not be co-counsel on the charges.
“I first heard that there was a Hunter Biden investigation into our district shortly after he took the seat. So it would have been late September 2022 or early October 2022,” Estrada stated. He went on to talk about his conversations with lawyers in his firm surrounding Weiss’ application for partnership.
“I heard from the lawyers in my firm, from the career lawyers in my firm, that there was a request from the District of Delaware for a partner or a counsel. [sic] for certain charges they were investigating; that our career attorneys had communicated that they were recommending against partnership or co-counsel in the charges contemplated; and that the District of Delaware, through Mr. Weiss, you wanted to talk to me about this,” Estrada said.
Estrada’s first assistant attorney (FAUSA) first told him about Weiss’ request, but Estrada did not say who that person was in his evidence.
“My first assistant, my first assistant US attorney, told me that there had been this request from the District of Delaware to advise or assist in the case; that the head of my Fraud Section Majors, who would be the person making these decisions, recommended not to do so, and that this had been communicated to the District of Delaware,” Estrada stated.
He did not know whether the choice not to associate was made before or after he began his employment at the end of September 2022. Estrada’s evidence shows that the attorney for his Major Fraud Section Chief, who was the criminal head of his division, he agreed with the advice not to work with Weiss.
Estrada made it clear that “counsellor” in the case means working on it together. He said that as a U.S. attorney or assistant U.S. attorney, he had never worked with a co-counsel before.
The U.S. attorney also said the acting U.S. attorney for his district, who was his boss, gave Delaware’s assistant U.S. attorneys the go-ahead to become special attorneys, which means who can practice law in their district. His evidence shows that Estrada did not know the details of what happened with the hiring of the “special counsel.”
Estrada met with his head of Major Fraud and his criminal boss twice to discuss working together with Weiss’ office to charge Hunter Biden. He said that before his first meeting with his bosses in October 2022, he read three memos that helped him decide not to work with them on the case.
“Based on the recommendation of my most senior fraud boss and my then head of the criminal division who together had more than 40 years of experience as prosecutors, I agreed that we would not associate with or advise the prosecution ; but I did tell Mr. Weiss that we would provide office space and administrative support to their attorneys in their prosecution,” Estrada said.
“Ultimately, it was my – my conclusion. They had already made recommendations. And after reviewing the materials and doing analysis and then talking to them about materials and analysis, I agreed with their recommendations,” he add.
After their first team meeting on October 19, 2022, Estrada called Weiss. According to the evidence record, Weiss asked to speak on the phone and Estrada told her what he thought about the Hunter Biden case.
“I cannot enter the deliberative process. But I discussed our factual and legal analysis to explain to him why we would not be co-counseling the case, but then told him that we were happy to provide office space and administrative support to his attorneys. He thanked me for that and the call ended,” Estrada said.
Shortly after his call with Weiss, Estrada met with his top brass again and told them about his five-minute conversation with Weiss.
The evidence says that Estrada and Weiss spoke on the phone again on September 19, 2023, but it was not about working together as lawyers on the Hunter Biden case. Estrada did not discuss the details of the call because the investigation into Hunter Biden is still ongoing.
Estrada said he had never met the U.S. attorneys in Delaware who were said to have been given special permission to pursue cases in their district. It is not clear if those lawyers ever went to Estrada’s neighborhood.
The claim that Weiss failed to file tax charges in California and Washington, D.C., is one of the most shocking from IRS agents who swore as part of a GOP investigation that the case had been “slowly” and treated badly. by the Department of Justice.
Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, said he told the House Judiciary Committee behind closed doors on Tuesday that he knew Weiss had the power to file charges and offered to help him with the proceedings . In a statement, he said, “I did not and could not ‘block’ Mr. Weiss because he did not need my permission to press charges in my district.”
This is similar to what US Attorney Matthew Graves said last week. He said that even though he didn’t want to work with Weiss, he never tried to stop him and instead offered to help with logistics.
Weiss will appear before the Judiciary Committee in early November.
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