United States v. Reyes

United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · 2025 · Evidence

EvidenceSecond AmendmentCommerce ClauseFelon-in-Possession18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1)felon in possessionBruenRahimi

Facts

Police found Reyes asleep in a running pickup truck with altered license plates that were registered to another vehicle. After detaining him and impounding the truck, officers found a loaded .25 caliber pistol in a jacket next to where Reyes had been sitting. Reyes stipulated that he knowingly possessed the firearm and ammunition, that he previously had been convicted of a crime punishable by more than one year, that he knew of that status, and that the firearm and ammunition had traveled in interstate commerce. The opinion also described Reyes’s prior felony record, including drug offenses, evading arrest with a vehicle, unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon, and earlier violent conduct involving evading police and discharging a firearm.

Issue

Whether 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) was unconstitutional on its face under the Second Amendment, unconstitutional as applied to Reyes under the Commerce Clause, or unconstitutional as applied to Reyes under the Second Amendment after Bruen and Rahimi. The court also addressed the standard of review for the preserved as-applied Second Amendment claim and the unpreserved Commerce Clause argument.

Rule

Under Fifth Circuit precedent, a panel may not disregard prior circuit decisions absent an intervening change in law. Section 922(g)(1) may constitutionally be applied where the statute’s commerce element is satisfied by proof that the firearm previously traveled across state lines, without regard to the defendant’s own conduct. After Rahimi, the Second Amendment permits disarming persons who have been found to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of others, and § 922(g)(1) is constitutional as applied to defendants whose criminal histories are analogous to that tradition.

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In the Southern District of Texas, Darnell Price moves to dismiss a felon-in-possession indictment, arguing that the statute is facially invalid under the Second Amendment. On appeal, he concedes that an earlier Fifth Circuit panel rejected the same facial theory, but he argues the new panel should revisit that precedent because he believes it was wrongly decided.

How should the Fifth Circuit panel rule?

Explanation. Under the Fifth Circuit's rule of orderliness, one panel may not overturn another panel's decision absent an intervening change in law, such as a statutory amendment, a Supreme Court decision, or an en banc decision. A defendant's view that prior precedent was wrongly decided is not enough. (Derived from United States v. Reyes (n.d.).)