Biden's niece gets off with no jail time in drunk driving case

FPI / December 23, 2020

Oh to have the name Biden. The things you can do — and get away with.

Joe Biden’s niece Caroline Biden received no jail time after pleading guilty to DUI on Dec. 3, Pennsylvania court records show. After negotiating a plea deal with the Montgomery County district attorney, she was sentenced to five-plus months of probation, with 20 days of rehab in January counted toward her sentence.

"The walk-free plea continues a long Biden family tradition of avoiding jail time," the New York Post reported on Dec. 19.

An investigation by the Post in July found at least eight other busts of Bidens resulted in wrist slaps.

Caroline Biden's arrest, "which was never made public, was at least the ninth among Joe Biden’s close family, and followed incidents involving his brother Frank, his son Hunter and his daughter Ashley," the Post reported in July. The cases — ranging from felony theft to drug possession — were all either thrown out, or resulted in light sentences with no jail time, according to a review of public records and published reports.

Caroline Biden, the 33-year-old daughter of Joe Biden's brother James, was arrested in Lower Merion Township, Pennsylvania in August 2019 after slamming her car into a tree.

Arresting officer Jeffrey Seamans noted Biden, who was driving without a license, “had difficulty focusing on the conversation” as he questioned her.

Biden’s car contained pill bottles for carisoprodol and lorazepam, both of which are controlled substances, the Post's report noted. A blood test later confirmed those and other drugs were in her system at the time of the crash.

Caroline Biden's arraignment for the August 2019 DUI was not held until Nov. 4, 2020 — one day after the presidential election. How's that for timing? The Post's report noted that a court spokesperson insisted the date was auto-generated and the timing was coincidental.

But, hey, that DUI was Caroline Biden's first offense — in Pennsylvania.

She also has a rap sheet in New York. In 2017, Caroline Biden was arrested for using a stolen credit card to rack up over $100,000 in goods at a Greenwich Village pharmacy.

A felony conviction in the stolen credit card case was later tossed, and she was allowed to re-plead to the lesser charge of petty larceny as part of a sweetheart deal negotiated by her attorneys. She avoided jail time.

"The pampered wild child made her debut in Manhattan Criminal Court in 2014 after a dustup with her Tribeca roommate over unpaid rent," the Post noted in an earlier report.

She was accused of trying to punch a responding female police officer and was booked on charges of resisting arrest and obstruction. That case also got a wrist slap with the charges getting dismissed and sealed after six months.

Ashley Biden, 39, started her rap sheet with a pot bust when she was a student at Tulane University in 1999. New Orleans police confirmed the possession arrest of the daughter of the then-Delaware senator, but no conviction was recorded in court records.

A second misdemeanor arrest for the Biden daughter was reported in 2002 after she allegedly attempted to obstruct a police officer — making “intimidating statements” — after a bottle-throwing brawl outside a Chicago bar. The charges were dropped.

Joe Biden’s brother, Francis ‘Frank’ Biden, 66, "won the prize for the most bizarre Biden family bust," the Post noted, when he allegedly stuffed two DVDs from a Florida Blockbuster down his pants in October 2003, cops said. He was 49 at the time. He never showed up for a scheduled court hearing on the attempted theft and the state attorney declined to prosecute, according to records obtained by the Miami New Times.

Frank Biden had more serious scrapes with the law. He was pinched in August 2003 for drunk driving in Fort Lauderdale, earning six months probation. He was arrested a year later for driving with a suspended license but avoided jail again by spending three months in rehab. In 1999, Biden was a passenger in a car involved in a fatal drunk-driving accident. He was found partially liable for the death of 38-year-old William Albano, and owes Albano's family almost $1 million dollars, according to the Daily Mail.

Today, Frank Biden works as a senior advisor to the Berman Law Group.

Biden’s son Hunter’s long history of drug abuse began in 1988 with an arrest for drug possession. He’s been in rehab at least six times for drugs and alcohol, and by his own admission spent four years addicted to crack. He is not known to have ever spent a day in jail.

The Post noted that Caroline Biden’s father, James, "has also increasingly come under suspicion for his involvement in the Pennsylvania hospital chain Americore." One of its hospitals in Ellwood City, Pennsylvania was raided by the FBI in January, Politico reported. James Biden — along with President-elect Joe Biden — was also connected to Chinese energy giant CEFC, through emails obtained from a laptop owned by Hunter Biden.

Free Press International