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Parties Involved:
James Anthony Brian Morelock
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 22-13439

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

JAMES ANTHONY BRIAN MORELOCK, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

versus

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Defendant-Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Georgia

D.C. Docket No. 1:19-cr-00211-AT-CMS-1

____________________

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2 Opinion of the Court 22-13439

Before GRANT, LUCK, and WILSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

In 2019, federal agents executed a search warrant at James 

Morelock’s residence and found a stockpile of firearms. All told, 

agents discovered nine handguns, nine rifles, and four shotguns. 

And that is to say nothing of the four sets of body armor and gun 

silencer they also found. This discovery was a problem for 

Morelock because, as a felon, he cannot possess a firearm. See 18 

U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). 

At his bench trial, Morelock admitted that he knowingly 

possessed firearms at his residence. But he insisted that the statute 

prohibiting him from doing so, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), is

unconstitutional. The district court disagreed and found him 

guilty. It sentenced Morelock to a year and a day in prison—a fiftyone-month downward variance from the Sentencing Guidelines—

followed by three years of supervised release. 

Morelock now appeals his conviction and sentence, making 

three arguments along the way. First, that § 922(g)(1) is 

unconstitutional as applied to him. Second, that his prior conviction 

for attempted armed bank robbery and kidnapping is not a “crime 

of violence” under the Sentencing Guidelines. Third, and finally, 

that the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress the 

evidence found at his home. 

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22-13439 Opinion of the Court 3

We are unpersuaded. Because Morelock’s first two 

arguments are foreclosed by our precedents and his third is 

unsupported by the record, we affirm his conviction and sentence.

I.

In the fall of 1996, James Morelock and his co-conspirators 

broke into a family’s home and held them hostage at gunpoint. 

Clad in military-style fatigues, combat boots, and plastic masks, 

Morelock’s crew told one of the hostages that if she did not help 

them rob a bank, they would kill her family. This threat was 

credible given that the intruders were armed with two pistols, a 

sawed-off shotgun, and (for good measure) an Uzi-style machine 

gun with a silencer. Once the would-be robbers arrived at the bank, 

however, they changed their mind and decided not to commit the 

heist after all. For this Morelock was convicted of attempted armed 

bank robbery with kidnapping. See 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a), (d), (e). He

was released from prison in late 2010. 

About a decade later, an anonymous informant submitted 

an online tip to the FBI warning that Morelock “might be up to 

something again.” She explained that Morelock had shown her 

multiple firearms and “SWAT-style” body armor. 

When federal investigators followed up with the online 

tipster, she denied making the tip. But she did identify a relative of 

Morelock’s for investigators to question. And that relative 

corroborated the online tip, telling investigators that he was 

confident Morelock had body armor and several firearms in his 

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4 Opinion of the Court 22-13439

possession. The relative said that he saw Morelock “physically 

possess” the guns less than four months ago. 

A few weeks later, federal investigators interviewed another 

one of Morelock’s relatives. This relative also corroborated the 

online tip. Based on “firsthand knowledge,” he believed that 

Morelock was in possession of body armor and multiple firearms

as recently as a month ago. 

Two days after agents interviewed this second relative, they 

executed a search warrant at Morelock’s residence. The search was 

fruitful. Agents discovered (among other things) twenty-two 

firearms, four sets of body armor, and a silencer. Morelock moved 

to suppress this evidence, arguing that the affidavit was flawed. 

The magistrate judge denied the motion. 

At trial, Morelock conceded that he possessed firearms but 

contended that 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) is unconstitutional. The 

district court rejected that argument and found him guilty. 

Morelock now appeals his conviction and sentence.

II.

Several standards of review govern this appeal. We review 

the constitutionality of a statute de novo. United States v. Bolatete, 

977 F.3d 1022, 1032 (11th Cir. 2020). Whether an offense qualifies 

as a “crime of violence” under the Sentencing Guidelines is also a 

question that we review de novo. United States v. Estrada, 777 F.3d 

1318, 1321 (11th Cir. 2015) (per curiam). In evaluating the district 

court’s denial of Morelock’s motion to suppress, we “review the 

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22-13439 Opinion of the Court 5

district court’s findings of fact under the clearly erroneous standard 

and its application of law to those facts de novo.” United States v. 

Morley, 99 F.4th 1328, 1336 (11th Cir. 2024). And we generally 

review a district court’s denial of an evidentiary hearing for abuse 

of discretion. United States v. Barsoum, 763 F.3d 1321, 1328 (11th Cir. 

2014).

III.

Morelock raises three arguments on appeal. None is 

persuasive.

First, Morelock argues that § 922(g)(1) is unconstitutional 

after the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol 

Ass’n v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022). But we rejected this very argument 

in United States v. Dubois, 94 F.4th 1284 (11th Cir. 2024). There, we 

explained that our precedents upholding the constitutionality of 

§ 922(g)(1) remain good law after Bruen. See Dubois, 94 F.4th at 

1291–93. So Morelock cannot prevail on this ground.

Second, Morelock contends that his prior conviction for 

attempted armed bank robbery with kidnapping in violation of 18 

U.S.C. § 2113(a), (d), and (e) is not a “crime of violence” under the 

Sentencing Guidelines. He patterns his challenge on United States 

v. Taylor, which clarified that attempted Hobbs Act robbery does 

not qualify as a crime of violence. See 596 U.S. 845, 851–52 (2022).

Again, our precedent forecloses this argument. 

We recently explained that attempted bank robbery under

§ 2113(a) is a crime of violence because “it requires as an element 

that the defendant acted ‘by force and violence, or by intimidation’ 

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6 Opinion of the Court 22-13439

in committing the inchoate crime.” United States v. Armstrong, 122 

F.4th 1278, 1291 (11th Cir. 2024) (quoting 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a)). We 

pointed out that the Hobbs Act is “structured differently” than 

§ 2113(a) because it “does not require any actual or threatened 

force to sustain a conviction.” Id. at 1289. While “a criminal can 

commit an attempted Hobbs Act robbery without actually using 

force or violence,” that is not the case for an attempted bank 

robbery under § 2113(a). See id. at 1290 (citing Taylor, 596 U.S. at 

851–52). That is because § 2113(a) criminalizes “only attempts that 

occur ‘by force and violence, or by intimidation.’” Id.

Third, and finally, Morelock maintains that the district court 

should have granted his motion to suppress the evidence obtained 

from his home. He contends that the federal agent’s affidavit was 

faulty, which means that the search warrant was not supported by 

probable cause. Morelock also adds that, at the very least, the court 

should have ordered a hearing to “assess material omissions from 

the affidavit.” 

Not so. Probable cause for a search warrant exists if, “given 

all the circumstances set forth in the affidavit, there is a fair 

probability that contraband or evidence of a crime will be found in 

a particular place.” United States v. Trader, 981 F.3d 961, 969 (11th 

Cir. 2020) (alteration adopted and quotation omitted). Given the 

circumstances here, the district court correctly found that the 

government’s affidavit established a “fair probability” that there 

were firearms at Morelock’s home. See id.

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22-13439 Opinion of the Court 7

The government’s affidavit was supported by three separate 

informants. To begin, an anonymous informant submitted a tip 

through the FBI website stating that Morelock had shown her

firearms and body armor that he kept at his home. When federal 

agents tried to follow up with this online informant, she denied 

ever making the tip. But she did identify one of Morelock’s 

relatives for agents to interview. And that relative confirmed that 

he had personally seen Morelock clean three firearms in his home 

within the last several months. Federal agents received further 

corroboration when another one of Morelock’s relatives told them

that Morelock kept firearms and body armor in his home. This 

second relative reported firsthand knowledge that there were 

firearms in Morelock’s residence as recently as a month before the 

statement. The two relatives offered matching descriptions of the 

firearms and body armor inside the residence. 

These tips provided enough detailed, verifiable information 

to establish a fair probability that there were firearms in Morelock’s 

home. See United States v. Martin, 297 F.3d 1308, 1314–15 (11th Cir. 

2002). And the information in the tips was not stale—two firsthand 

observations of Morelock possessing firearms in his home are 

sufficient to establish probable cause that he would still be in 

possession of those firearms a few months later. See United States 

v. Anton, 546 F.3d 1355, 1358 (11th Cir. 2008).

Finally, the district court did not err in finding that Morelock 

failed to make a “substantial preliminary showing” that the 

government intentionally or recklessly omitted material 

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8 Opinion of the Court 22-13439

information from its affidavit. See Franks v. Delaware, 438 U.S. 154, 

155–56 (1978). Morelock first argues that the affidavit should have 

disclosed that “multiple people who could legally possess firearms”

lived with him at the home. It did. The affidavit stated that 

Morelock resided “with his wife, children, and brother.” 

Morelock adds that the affidavit should have also mentioned

that the two relatives who spoke with federal agents were, in fact, 

relatives of his half-brother, and that this half-brother was locked 

in a dispute with Morelock’s father over ownership of Morelock’s 

residence. As a result, Morelock says, these informants had an 

“obvious motive to fabricate accusations against the current 

occupants of the house.” But he provides zero evidence that 

federal agents knew or should have known of this family feud. And 

without such knowledge, that information could not have been 

intentionally or recklessly omitted from the affidavit.

* * *

We AFFIRM Morelock’s conviction and sentence.

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