United States v. Thomas

615 F.3d 895, 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 16113, 2010 WL 3023656
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit·Decided August 4, 2010·No. 09-2655·Published·Cited by 11 cases

Opinion

BYE, Circuit Judge.

Robert Thomas was convicted following an unconditional guilty plea of being a felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), and receipt of an unregistered machine gun, in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861(d). Thomas was sentenced to 151 months’ imprisonment. On appeal, Thomas argues the evidence was insufficient to convict him of being a felon in possession of a firearm. In addition, Thomas contends that the district court 1 violated Fed.R.Crim.P. 32(i)(3)(B) by failing to make rulings on two Sentencing Guidelines enhancements. We affirm.

I

On August 5, 1976, Robert Thomas was convicted of delivery of LSD, a controlled substance, in the Circuit Court for St. Clair County, Illinois, and was sentenced to four to six years in prison. Thomas appealed his conviction, but began serving his sentence on August 6, 1976. On December 22, 1977, Thomas was released on bond. On August 14, 1978, while Thomas was still free on bond, the Appellate Court of Illinois reversed his conviction and remanded the case to the circuit court for dismissal on the theory that Thomas had been entrapped as a matter of law. People v. Thomas, 61 Ill.App.3d 1112, 21 Ill. Dec. 611, 381 N.E.2d 1058 (1978). The State of Illinois then appealed the case to the Illinois Supreme Court, which, on October 19, 1979, reversed the judgment of the appellate court and affirmed Thomas’s conviction and sentence. People v. Cross, 77 Ill.2d 396, 33 Ill.Dec. 285, 396 N.E.2d 812, 820 (1979). Thomas’s petition for a writ of certiorari to the United States Supreme Court was denied on March 17, 1980. Thomas v. Illinois, 445 U.S. 929, 100 S.Ct. 1316, 63 L.Ed.2d 762 (1980).

On April 16,1980, Thomas faked his own death by staging a suicide. He left his vehicle abandoned on a bridge in Ballard County, Kentucky. A supposed suicide note addressed to his wife was left on the seat inside the vehicle. After faking his death, Thomas traveled throughout the United States and eventually settled in Farmington, Arkansas, in 1984, where he *897 began living as “Christian Tadlock” with his girlfriend.

In late September 2007, Special Agent Wes Patterson of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) was contacted by a confidential informant who advised Patterson that a person known to him as “Chris” had asked the informant where he might obtain an MG-42 machine gun. Agent Patterson told the informant to provide Chris with his cellular telephone number so Chris could contact Agent Patterson. Shortly thereafter, an individual identifying himself as Chris contacted Agent Patterson and stated that he was interested in purchasing an MG-42 machine gun. Agent Patterson informed Chris that he had an MG-42 to sell and arrangements were made to consummate the transaction. On October 16, 2007, Agent Patterson made contact with Chris at a prearranged site in Joplin, Missouri. Chris arrived at the appointed location and introduced himself. After Patterson showed Chris an MG-42 firearm, Chris produced $1,200 in United States currency which he handed to Agent Patterson in payment for the firearm. In return, Patterson handed the firearm to Chris, who then placed the machine gun in the bed of his pickup truck. As Chris attempted to enter his vehicle he was apprehended by assisting law enforcement officers. Chris identified himself as “Christian Tadlock” to the officers and was carrying a valid Arkansas driver’s license in that name. Shortly thereafter, Christian Tadlock was determined to be Robert Thomas.

A search warrant was obtained for Thomas’s residence. During the course of the search, investigators recovered multiple machine guns, 21 rifles, 35 handguns, 3 shotguns, 45,000 rounds of ammunition, 57 hand grenades, pipe bombs, and an assortment of gun parts. A search of the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record revealed that there were no firearms registered to either Christian Tad-lock or Robert Thomas. The machine gun sold to Thomas by Agent Patterson was fully operational and had traveled in interstate commerce.

A federal grand jury returned a four-count superceding indictment against Thomas charging him with two counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), receipt of an unregistered machine gun, in violation of 26 U.S.C. §§ 5861(d) and 5871, and possession of a stolen firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(m).

On February 12, 2009, Thomas filed a motion to quash the indictment and dismiss the case, arguing (1) he was not a convicted felon, and (2) he was unaware that he had sustained a prior felony conviction. The district court denied the motion.

On February 19, 2009, Thomas pleaded guilty to one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm, and receipt of an unregistered machine gun. There was neither a plea agreement nor a conditional plea pursuant to Fed.R.Crim.P. 11(a)(2). The district court accepted Thomas’s guilty plea. A preliminary presentence investigation report (PSR) was subsequently prepared by the United States Probation Department and provided to the parties for comment. On May 15, 2009, Thomas submitted thirteen written objections to the preliminary PSR. Two of the objections related to factual findings made by the probation department that impacted his advisory Sentencing Guidelines range of punishment. Specifically, Thomas contended that the number of firearms attributed to him should be reduced by forty-four because “the 44 hand grenades were not ‘live grenades’ they contained gun powdered [sic] for use in reenactments *898 [sic].” Thomas also objected to receiving “a two level enhancement because he did not steal a firearm.”

The final PSR was prepared and disseminated to the parties and the district court on May 28, 2009. The PSR maintained that the contested portions of the preliminary report were correct and calculated Thomas’s total offense level at 32, including enhancements for both the number of firearms attributable to Thomas, see U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(l)(C), and the fact that one of the firearms was determined to have been stolen, see U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(b)(4). The probation officer, in addressing Thomas’s objections, noted that the grenades, even emptied of the original explosive charge, contained “gun powder and can explode” and were determined to be explosives by the ATF.

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United States v. Thomas, 615 F.3d 895, 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 16113, 2010 WL 3023656 (8th Cir. 2010).

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