United States v. Still, No. 20-3103 (8th Cir. 2021)
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The Eighth Circuit affirmed defendant's conviction and sentence for being a felon in possession of a firearm. Assuming without deciding that a justification defense to prosecution under 18 U.S.C. 922(g) is available, the court agreed with the district court that defendant failed to present evidence sufficient to warrant denying the government's motion to exclude the justification defense.
Even if applying the voluntary manslaughter cross-reference was procedural error, the court concluded that such error was harmless because the district court stated that it would have varied upward had it not applied the cross-reference. The court also concluded that the district court did not clearly err in finding that defendant had attempted to destroy or conceal evidence and thereby to apply the obstruction of justice enhancement. Finally, defendant's sentence was substantively reasonable where the district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that the statutory maximum sentence was appropriate because of the "seriousness of the offense" and the "serious effects of what happened that day."
Court Description: [Wollman, Author, with Colloton and Kobes, Circuit Judges] Criminal case - Criminal law and sentencing. In this prosecution for being a felon in possession of a firearm, defendant moved to present a justification defense; the district court did not err in denying the request as a defendant seeking a justification instruction must produce evidence that he took reasonable steps to dispossess himself of the weapon once the threat entitling him to possess it abated; here, defendant had reasonable, legal alternatives to his continued possession of the firearm after a shooting and his continued possession of the gun and his failure to dispose of it properly were fatal to his justification defense; in calculating defendant's offense level, the district court did not err in applying a voluntary manslaughter cross-reference; even if the court erred in applying the cross-reference, the error was harmless as the court stated it would have varied upward to the same sentence if it had not applied the cross-reference; the district court did not clearly err on this record in applying an obstruction-of-justice enhancement based on its determination that defendant had attempted to destroy or conceal evidence; the sentence imposed was not substantively unreasonable.
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