United States v. Deago Eddings

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
• Decided: April 14, 2025
• Docket: 24-1166
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT ________________

No. 24-1166 ________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

v.

DEAGO LEE EDDINGS, Appellant _____________

On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania (D.C. No. 2:21-cr-00117-001) District Judge: Honorable Marilyn J. Horan ________________

Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a) on April 11, 2025

Before: HARDIMAN, PORTER, and SMITH, Circuit Judges.

(Filed: April 14, 2025)

________________

OPINION * ________________

PORTER, Circuit Judge.

* This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not constitute binding precedent. I

Brentwood Borough police conducted a routine traffic stop in September 2020. In

the back seat of the car officers found Deago Eddings and a pistol. Eddings had recently

been released from prison, where he was serving a sentence for prior convictions of

attempted homicide, aggravated assault, and carrying a firearm without a license. At the

time of the stop, he was on Pennsylvania state parole as part of that prior sentence.

Eddings was charged with one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm in

violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). After his motion to suppress was denied, Eddings

pleaded guilty. He moved to withdraw his plea following our decision in Range v.

Attorney General, 69 F.4th 96 (3d Cir. 2023) (en banc), cert. granted, judgment vacated,

144 S. Ct. 2706 (2024). There, we held that § 922(g)(1) could not be applied to disarm

defendant Bryan Range in a manner consistent with our Nation’s historical tradition of

firearms regulation. Id. at 106. 1

Eddings likewise moved to dismiss his indictment, advancing facial and as-applied

challenges to § 922(g)(1) based on both the Second Amendment and the Commerce

Clause. The District Court denied both the withdrawal and dismissal motions and

proceeded to sentence Eddings to twenty-seven months’ imprisonment to be followed by

three years of supervised release.

Eddings appeals the denial of his constitutional challenges.

1 We later affirmed that holding on remand. Range v. Att’y Gen., 124 F.4th 218, 232 (3d Cir. 2024) (en banc).

2 II 2

Last year in United States v. Moore we examined whether disarming convicts on

supervised release was “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm

regulation.” 111 F.4th 266, 269 (3d Cir. 2024) (quoting N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n,

Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1, 24 (2022)). After undertaking the historical analysis mandated

by Bruen and United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), we concluded that the

government had met its burden to show that “history and tradition support disarming

convicts who are completing their sentences,” including those on supervised release.

Moore, 111 F.4th at 273. Earlier this year, we extended Moore’s logic to state equivalents

of federal supervised release, “including a sentence of parole or probation.” United States

v. Quailes, 126 F.4th 215, 217 (3d Cir. 2025).

As Eddings concedes, Moore and Quailes control the outcome here. Eddings was

on parole at the time of his indictment; he was therefore still completing his sentence, and

§ 922(g)(1) was constitutional as applied to him. 3 As Eddings also recognizes, his

Commerce Clause challenge is similarly foreclosed by a long line of Third Circuit and

Supreme Court precedent. See, e.g., United States v. Singletary, 268 F.3d 196 (3d Cir.

2001).

2 The District Court had jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 3231. We have appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review the District Court’s legal conclusions de novo and its factual findings for clear error. See United States v. Bergrin, 650 F.3d 257, 264 (3d Cir. 2011). 3 Eddings’s facial challenge concomitantly fails, as he cannot “establish that no set of circumstances exists under which the Act would be valid.” Rahimi, 602 U.S. at 693 (quoting United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 745 (1987)).

3 * * *

III

For the reasons discussed above, we will affirm the District Court’s order denying

Eddings’s motions to withdraw and dismiss and the District Court’s judgment of

sentence.