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Parties Involved:
Christopher Wayne Mitchell
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 23-10780

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee,

versus

CHRISTOPHER WAYNE MITCHELL, 

Defendant-Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Alabama

D.C. Docket No. 1:22-cr-00111-KD-B-1

____________________

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2 Opinion of the Court 23-10780

Before WILSON, ROSENBAUM, and LAGOA, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Christopher Wayne Mitchell appeals his conviction for possessing a firearm as a convicted felon. See 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). He 

argues that § 922(g)(1) is facially unconstitutional under New York 

State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022). Our 

precedent forecloses Mitchell’s challenge. So we affirm. 

I.

A police officer conducted a traffic stop of a vehicle registered to Mitchell, who had an active warrant. While detaining 

Mitchell during the stop, the officer saw a silver pistol in plain view 

on the floor of the car. Then, during a brief search of the car, officers found a loaded pistol magazine under the driver’s seat. 

Mitchell, who had a prior felony conviction, was charged by 

indictment with two counts of violating § 922(g)(1). Mitchell 

moved to dismiss the indictment based on the Supreme Court’s decision in Bruen, but the district court denied the motion. Mitchell 

then pled guilty to one § 922(g) count, and the other count was dismissed at sentencing. The court sentenced Mitchell to time served, 

plus a term of supervised release. Mitchell appeals, renewing his 

challenge to the constitutionality of § 922(g)(1). 

II.

We review the constitutionality of a statute de novo. United 

States v. Wright, 607 F.3d 708, 715 (11th Cir. 2010). Our priorUSCA11 Case: 23-10780 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 12/04/2024 Page: 2 of 4
23-10780 Opinion of the Court 3

precedent rule requires us to follow our precedent unless it is overruled by an en banc decision or by the Supreme Court. United States 

v. White, 837 F.3d 1225, 1228 (11th Cir. 2016). “An intervening Supreme Court decision abrogates our precedent only if the intervening decision is both clearly on point and clearly contrary to our earlier decision.” United States v. Dubois, 94 F.4th 1284 (11th Cir. 2024) 

(quotation marks omitted). 

The Second Amendment protects “the right of the people to 

keep and bear Arms.” U.S. Const. amend. II. Section 922(g)(1) 

makes it a crime for any person who has been convicted of a felony 

to possess firearms or ammunition. 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). 

In Bruen, the Supreme Court held that Second Amendment 

challenges must be analyzed under a text-and-history standard, rather than means-end scrutiny. See 597 U.S. at 18–19, 26–27. The 

central inquiry, in other words, is “whether modern firearms regulations are consistent with the Second Amendment’s text and historical understanding.” Id. at 26. If the amendment’s plain text covers the conduct, the government “must affirmatively prove that 

its firearms regulation is part of the historical tradition that delimits 

the outer bounds of the right to keep and bear arms.” Id. at 17, 19. 

Mitchell maintains that § 922(g)(1) is unconstitutional under 

Bruen because (1) felons are among “the people” protected by the 

text of the Second Amendment, and (2) the United States has no 

historical tradition of disarming those convicted of felonies. 

Our precedent forecloses Mitchell’s facial Second Amendment challenge to § 922(g)(1). After the Supreme Court’s decision 

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4 Opinion of the Court 23-10780

in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 626 (2008), we upheld 

§ 922(g)(1) on the threshold ground that felons are categorically 

“disqualified” from exercising their Second Amendment right. 

United States v. Rozier, 598 F.3d 768, 770–71 (11th Cir. 2010). 

Then, in Dubois, we rejected the argument that Bruen abrogated Rozier and reaffirmed that Rozier remained binding precedent. See 94 F.4th at 1293. We explained that, in Rozier, we “interpreted Heller as limiting the right to ‘law-abiding and qualified individuals’ and as clearly excluding felons from those categories by 

referring to felon-in-possession bans as presumptively lawful.” Id. 

And we concluded that Bruen did not contradict that holding, noting that Bruen “repeatedly stated that its decision was faithful to 

Heller,” which itself “did not cast doubt on felon-in-possession prohibitions.” Id.

Because our prior precedent forecloses Mitchell’s challenge

to the facial constitutionality of § 922(g)(1), we affirm.1

AFFIRMED.

1 The Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Rahimi does not 

change our analysis. 144 S. Ct. 1889 (2024). Rahimi did not “demolish” or 

“eviscerate” the “fundamental props” of Rozier or Dubois. See Dubois, 94 F.4th 

at 1292. Rahimi did not discuss section 922(g)(1) or undermine our interpretation of Heller. To the contrary, Rahimi reiterated that prohibitions on the “possession of firearms by ‘felons and the mentally ill,’ are ‘presumptively lawful.’” 

Rahimi, 144 S. Ct. at 1902 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 626, 627 n.26).

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