A prosecutor reportedly told six witnesses that he was not permitted to charge Hunter Biden with any crimes, according to a new report. The report, which was published by the New York Post, claims that the prosecutor, David Weiss, told the witnesses that he was “blocked” from charging Hunter Biden by “higher-ups” in the Justice Department.
IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley testified on the matter last month, telling the House Oversight Committee that Weiss revealed in an October 2022, meeting that he had actually wanted to charge Hunter Biden in two federal districts but that he had been denied.
When Attorney General Merrick Garland denied that had ever happened, Shapley publicly named the witnesses he said Weiss had told.
“He surprised us by telling us on the charges, ‘I’m not the deciding official on whether charges are filed,’” Shapley told the committee when he testified in late May. “He then shocked us with the earth-shattering news that the Biden-appointed D.C. U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves would not allow him to charge in his district.
Garland claimed on Friday that Weiss would have been “permitted to continue his investigation and to make a decision to prosecute any way in which he wanted to and in any district in which he wanted to,” adding, “I don’t know how it would be possible for anybody to block him from bringing a prosecution, given that he has this authority.”
Within hours, Shapley’s legal team went public with the names of four of the six witnesses he’d said Weiss told about the situation.
“Those six witnesses include Baltimore FBI Special Agent in Charge Tom Sobocinski and Assistant Special Agent in Charge Ryeshia Holley, IRS Assistant Special Agent in Charge Gary Shapley and Special Agent in Charge Darrell Waldon, who also independently and contemporaneously corroborated Mr. Shapley’s account in an email, now public as Exhibit 10, following p. 148 of his testimony transcript,” the statement read. “Mr. Shapley would have no insight into why Mr. Weiss’s [sic] would make these statements at the October 7, 2022 meeting if they were false. That Mr. Weiss made these statements is easily corroborated, and it is up to him and the Justice Department to reconcile the evidence of his October 7, 2022 statements with contrary statements by Mr. Weiss and the Attorney General to Congress.”
Statement from IRS Agent Gary Shapley's legal team: "In an October 7, 2022, meeting at the Delaware U.S. Attorney's Office, U.S. Attorney David Weiss told six witnesses he did not have authority to charge in other districts and had thus requested special counsel status. Those six… pic.twitter.com/hMKhCQfDo6
— Empower Oversight (@EMPOWR_us) June 23, 2023
