holding that a defendant who pleaded guilty did not waive his Second Amendment chal- lenge to a statute of conviction when the claim did not “contradict the terms of the indictment or the written plea agreement”
How later courts described this case
- holding that a defendant who pleaded guilty did not waive his Second Amendment chal- lenge to a statute of conviction when the claim did not “contradict the terms of the indictment or the written plea agreement”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
USCA11 Case: 24-10353 Document: 31-1 Date Filed: 12/03/2025 Page: 1 of 7
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Eleventh Circuit
____________________
No. 24-10353
____________________
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
RAHEEM MORRISSETTE,
Defendant-Appellant.
____________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Alabama
D.C. Docket No. 1:23-cr-00143-JB-MU-1
____________________
ON REMAND FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF THE
UNITED STATES
Before JILL PRYOR, NEWSOM, and GRANT, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
USCA11 Case: 24-10353 Document: 31-1 Date Filed: 12/03/2025 Page: 2 of 7
2 Opinion of the Court 24-10353
Raheem Morrissette appeals his conviction for possession of
a firearm as a felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). He argues
that § 922(g)(1) is unconstitutional, both on its face and as applied
to him. After we affirmed his conviction, the Supreme Court va-
cated our decision and remanded the case for further consideration
in light of its decision in United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024).
See United States v. Morrissette, No. 24-10353, 2024 WL 4709935
(11th Cir. Nov. 7, 2024) (unpublished), vacated, 145 S. Ct. 1468
(2025). After further consideration, we affirm Morrissette’s convic-
tion.
I.
This case arises out of an incident in which a police officer
saw Morrissette commit a traffic infraction while driving and initi-
ated a traffic stop. During the stop, the officer smelled marijuana
coming from the vehicle. He searched the vehicle and found mari-
juana and a pistol.
Morrissette, who had previous felony convictions, was
charged with one count of possessing a firearm as a convicted
felon. See 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). He initially pleaded not guilty and
filed a motion to dismiss the indictment, arguing that the statutory
ban on felons possessing firearms violated the Second Amendment.
After the district court denied the motion to dismiss, Morrissette
pleaded guilty. The district court ultimately imposed a 57-month
sentence.
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24-10353 Opinion of the Court 3
II.
Ordinarily, when a defendant enters a valid guilty plea, he
waives any non-jurisdictional defects in the proceedings. United
States v. Brown, 752 F.3d 1344, 1347 (11th Cir. 2014). But Morris-
sette’s guilty plea did not waive his constitutional challenge to the
statutory prohibition on felons’ possession of firearms. See Class v.
United States, 583 U.S. 174, 181 (2018) (holding that a defendant
who pleaded guilty did not waive his Second Amendment chal-
lenge to a statute of conviction when the claim did not “contradict
the terms of the indictment or the written plea agreement”).
We review de novo the constitutionality of a statute. United
States v. Gruezo, 66 F.4th 1284, 1292 (11th Cir. 2023).
III.
Morrissette challenges as unconstitutional 18 U.S.C.
§ 922(g)(1), which generally prohibits individuals with felony con-
victions from possessing firearms. According to Morrissette, this
prohibition, both on its face and as applied to him, runs afoul of the
Second Amendment.
To assess the constitutionality of the prohibition on felons
possessing firearms, we begin with the Supreme Court’s decision
in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008). In Heller, the
Court considered a Second Amendment challenge to a District of
Columbia law that barred the private possession of handguns in
homes. Id. at 635. After considering both the text and history of the
Second Amendment, the Court concluded that it conferred on an
individual a right to keep and bear arms. Id. at 595. The Court held
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4 Opinion of the Court 24-10353
that the ban on handgun possession in the home violated the Sec-
ond Amendment. Id. at 635. But the Court acknowledged that the
right to keep and bear arms was “not unlimited,” emphasizing that
“nothing in [its] opinion should be taken to cast doubt on
longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons
and the mentally ill.” Id. at 626. Indeed, the Court labeled such re-
strictions as “presumptively lawful.” Id. at 627 n.26.
After Heller, we considered a constitutional challenge to
§ 922(g)(1)’s prohibition on felons’ possession of firearms. See
United States v. Rozier, 598 F.3d 768 (11th Cir. 2010). We explained
that “the first question to be asked” under Heller “is whether one is
qualified to possess a firearm” and noted that a convicted felon’s
Second Amendment right to bear arms “is not weighed in the same
manner as that of a law-abiding citizen.” Id. at 770–71 (emphasis
omitted). We looked to the Supreme Court’s statement in Heller
that prohibiting felons from possessing firearms was a “presump-
tively lawful longstanding prohibition.” Id. at 771 (citation modi-
fied). This language “suggest[ed] that statutes disqualifying felons
from possessing a firearm under any and all circumstances do not
offend the Second Amendment.” Id. We thus concluded that
§ 922(g)(1) was a “constitutional avenue to restrict the Second
Amendment right of certain classes of people,” including those
with felony convictions. Id.
Several years later, the Supreme Court considered a Second
Amendment challenge to New York’s gun-licensing regime that
limited when a law-abiding citizen could obtain a license to carry a
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24-10353 Opinion of the Court 5
firearm outside the home. See N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen,
597 U.S. 1, 11 (2022). The Court recognized that “the Second and
Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual’s right to carry a
handgun for self-defense outside the home.” Id. at 10. It explained
that to determine whether a restriction on the possession of fire-
arms was constitutional, a court must begin by asking whether the
restriction at issue governs conduct that falls within the plain text
of the Second Amendment. Id. at 17. If the restriction covers such
conduct, the court may uphold it only if the government “affirma-
tively prove[s] 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 19. Bruen emphasized that Heller established the
correct test for determining the constitutionality of gun re-
strictions. See id. at 26. And, like Heller, Bruen described Second
Amendment rights as extending to “law-abiding, responsible citi-
zens.” Id. (citation modified).
After Bruen, we considered another Second Amendment
challenge to § 922(g)(1). See United States v. Dubois (Dubois I),
94 F.4th 1284 (11th Cir. 2024), vacated, Dubois v. United States (Du-
bois II), 145 S. Ct. 1041 (2025), reinstated by, United States v. Dubois
(Dubois III), 139 F.4th 887 (11th Cir. 2025). In Dubois I, we held that
a defendant’s Second Amendment challenge was foreclosed by
Rozier, which “interpreted Heller as limiting the [Second Amend-
ment] right to law-abiding and qualified individuals and as clearly
excluding felons from those categories by referring to felon-in-pos-
session bans as presumptively lawful.” Id. at 1293 (citation modi-
fied). We rejected the defendant’s argument that Bruen abrogated
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6 Opinion of the Court 24-10353
our decision in Rozier. Id. We explained that in Bruen the Supreme
Court continued to describe the right to bear arms “as extending
only to law-abiding, responsible citizens.” Id. (citation modified).
We stated that “clearer instruction from the Supreme Court” was
needed before we could reconsider § 922(g)(1)’s constitutionality.
Id. Accordingly, we held that we remained bound by Rozier. Id.
In Rahimi, the Supreme Court considered a Second Amend-
ment challenge to a federal statute prohibiting an individual who is
subject to a domestic violence restraining order from possessing a
firearm when the order includes a finding that the individual rep-
resents a credible threat to the safety of an intimate partner or a
child of that partner or individual. See 602 U.S. at 684–85, 693 (citing
18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8)). It held that this restriction was constitu-
tional. And it once again declared that the prohibition on “the pos-
session of firearms by ‘felons’ . . . [is] ‘presumptively lawful.’” Id. at
699 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 626, 627 n.26).
After deciding Rahimi, the Supreme Court vacated our deci-
sion in Dubois I and remanded the case for further consideration.
See Dubois II, 145 S. Ct. at 1041–42. On remand, we held that Rahimi
“did not abrogate our holding in Rozier that section 922(g)(1) is con-
stitutional under the Second Amendment.” Dubois III, 139 F.4th at
889. We reasoned that “[t]he only time that the Rahimi majority
mentioned felons was to reiterate Heller’s conclusion that prohibi-
tions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill
are presumptively lawful.” Id. at 893 (citation modified). We ex-
plained that “Rahimi reinforced—not undermined—Rozier.” Id.
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24-10353 Opinion of the Court 7
We “reinstate[d] our prior decision and affirm[ed]” the defendant’s
convictions and sentence. Id. at 894.
We conclude that Morrissette’s facial and as-applied Second
Amendment challenges to § 922(g)(1) fail. We reach this conclu-
sion based on our decision in Rozier, in which we held that
§ 922(g)(1) does not violate the Second Amendment, Rozier,
598 F.3d at 770–71, as well as our decision in Dubois III, in which
we held that neither Bruen nor Rahimi abrogated Rozier, Dubois III,
139 F.4th at 889. Our prior-panel-precedent rule requires us to fol-
low Rozier and Dubois III because they have not been overruled by
this Court sitting en banc or abrogated by the Supreme Court. See
United States v. White, 837 F.3d 1225, 1228 (11th Cir. 2016). We thus
affirm Morrissette’s conviction.
AFFIRMED.