EXCLUSIVE: 'She was scared I would harm myself.' Hunter Biden's texts to his therapist tell why lover Hallie took his .38 and reveals Secret Service DID step in to handle the investigation after she threw his handgun in a grocery store trashcan

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Hunter Biden told his therapist in 2018 that his lover and brother's widow, Hallie Biden, left his .38 handgun in a grocery store trashcan – prompting a police investigation.

Hunter claimed that when Delaware cops found the gun 'the FBI and the Secret Service' got involved, and that Hallie told officers she took the weapon because she was 'afraid for the kids' and 'because she was scared I would harm myself due to my drug and alcohol problem', in texts found on his abandoned laptop.

A copy of a police report obtained by news site Politico confirmed the October 23, 2018 incident in Wilmington.

The Secret Service told the site they had no record of agents investigating the incident, and Joe Biden, who was not under their protection at the time said he had no knowledge of their involvement.

But Hunter's texted claims that the agency was involved are echoed by two sources who spoke to Politico.

In October 2018, Hallie Biden tossed a gun that she'd found in Hunter Biden's pick-up truck. She was concerned he was going to kill himself with it, he told police later. She then went to retrieve it but it had gone and that's when police got involved

In texts obtained by DailyMail.com, Hunter messaged his therapist to tell him about the ordeal. 'She stole the gun out of my truck lock box and threw in a garbage can full to the top at Jansens. Then told me it was my problem to deal with,' Hunter wrote

One source said Secret Service agents asked the Wilmington, Delaware gun store owner where Hunter bought the .38 for the sale paperwork.

The source, who the site reported had firsthand knowledge of the episode, said that the store owner, Ron Palmieri, refused to hand over the papers as he feared the agents wanted to hide Hunter's ownership of the gun.

The source said Palmieri instead later turned over the documents to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

A .38 revolver, similar to the kind Hallie found in Hunter's truck

A second source who was reportedly briefed by the Secret Service confirmed the story to the site.

'Did I tell you what she did with my 38,' Hunter wrote in a December 2018 text message to his therapist, found on his abandoned laptop. 'Took from lock box of truck and put in IN PapER BAG AND Threw it in trash can at local high end grocer. For no reason.

'And I freaked when I saw it was missing 10 minutes after she took it and when she went back to get it after I scared the sh*t out of her it was gone which led to state police investigation of me. True story… But really on top of the full open trash can.'

Hunter repeated the story in a three-way text message with Hallie and his therapist in January 2019, claiming that the FBI and US Secret Service were involved.

'She stole the gun out of my truck lock box and threw in a garbage can full to the top at Jansens. Then told me it was my problem to deal with.

'Then when the police the FBI the secret service came on the scene she said she took it from me because she was scared I would harm myself due to my drug and alcohol problem and our volatile relationship and that she was afraid for the kids. Really not joking the cop kept me convinced that Hallie was implying she was scared of me.'

Hallie wrapped the gun in a plastic bag and put it in a trash van outside Janssen's Market in Wilmington 

The owner of the gun store, Ron Palmieri, said Secret Service agents visited the store and asked for the records that proved Hunter owned the gun. He refused to give them to them

At the same time, Secret Service agents visited Starquest Shooters (pictured) and asked for records that proved Hunter owned the weapon 

When a cop asked if the gun had been used in a crime, Hunter 'became very agitated' and asked the cop if he was intentionally lying to 'make him mad'.

The cop then asked him if he'd been using drugs or was drunk and he said: 'Listen, it isn't like that. 

Hunter's drug and alcohol problems are well documented. He is shown in one of a series of compromising photos that emerged during his father' s campaign

'I think she believes I was gonna kill myself.' 

Hunter's drug and alcohol problems have been well documented. 

Within a few days, the gun reappeared when a man who regularly went through the trash bins of the store brought it back. 

No one was arrested or charged and the incident was kept mostly a secret.  

No one in the Biden family was entitled to Secret Service protection at the time but Politico cites unnamed sources who say that agents from the Secret Service offices in Wilmington and Philadelphia kept an 'informal' role in protecting them after Joe left office as Vice President in 2017.  

Vice Presidents are not entitled to lifelong Secret Service protection in the way that Presidents are. 

The Secret Service told Politico it had no record of any involvement of its officers in the investigation. 

Hunter, during his police interview, told police he never asked his father for 'anything'. 

Hunter and Hallie's relationship was revealed in 2017, two years after Beau's death. Beau died from a brain tumor. 

Hunter was seen with his wife Melissa Cohen, their child Beau and his father before heading on Marine One on Friday 

Hallie was married to Hunter's brother Beau, who died in 2015 after battling cancer

At the time, Hunter was married to Kathleen, his first wife. 

He and Hallie dated for two years before ending their controversial romance.

Around the same time, it emerged that he'd secretly married a South African woman, Melissa Cohen, six days after meeting her. 

They now have a baby son together, who is also called Hunter. 

In August 2018, months before the gun incident and when he was still with Hallie, he fathered another child with Lunden Alexis Roberts, a stripper who lives in Arkansas. 

She sued him after he stopped paying child support.  

Hunter's problems with drugs and tortured personal love life has been a sore spot for President Biden and plagued his Presidential campaign. 

He scarcely talks about him other to say that he supports his sobriety, and has denied ever intervening or abusing his powers to help him. 

In response to the Politico revelations, a White House spokesman said on Thursday: 'President Biden did not have any knowledge of, or involvement in, the Secret Service’s alleged role in this incident, and neither he nor any family member was a protectee at that time.'