The opinion
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 1 of 14
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Eleventh Circuit
____________________
No. 24-12004
Non-Argument Calendar
____________________
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
GERARD ERIC BEASLEY,
Defendant-Appellant.
____________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
D.C. Docket No. 8:23-cr-00140-KKM-AAS-1
____________________
Before LAGOA, ANDERSON, and WILSON, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Gerard Eric Beasley appeals his conviction for possession of
a firearm by a convicted felon. On appeal, Beasley first argues that
the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 2 of 14
2 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
of his second confession because that confession was involuntary,
and the Miranda 1 warning he received before that second confes-
sion did not cleanse the taint from his first involuntary confession,
which the court had suppressed. Second, Beasley argues that 18
U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) is unconstitutional under the Second Amend-
ment both facially and as applied to him.
I.
We review the district court’s denial of a motion to suppress
evidence under a mixed standard, reviewing the district court’s
factfinding for clear error and the district court’s application of the
law to the facts de novo. United States v. Lewis, 674 F.3d 1298, 1302-
03 (11th Cir. 2012). We grant substantial deference to both the ex-
plicit and implicit credibility determinations of the district court
acting as factfinder, construing all facts in the light most favorable
to the prevailing party below. Id. at 1303. We must accept the
version of events adopted by the district court “unless it is contrary
to the laws of nature, or is so inconsistent or improbable on its face
that no reasonable factfinder could accept it.” United States v.
Ramirez-Chilel, 289 F.3d 744, 749 (11th Cir. 2002) (quotation marks
omitted).
We review de novo whether a statement was voluntary, giv-
ing deference to the district court’s factual findings. United States v.
Lall, 607 F.3d 1277, 1285 (11th Cir. 2010). The government must
establish voluntariness by a preponderance of the evidence. Id.
1 Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966).
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 3 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 3
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), protects a defendant’s Fifth
Amendment right against self-incrimination by requiring that law
enforcement officers advise the “person subject to custodial inter-
rogation of certain rights and to respect the person’s invocation of
those rights.” United States v. Bernal-Benitez, 594 F.3d 1303, 1318
(11th Cir. 2010).
The admission of evidence obtained in violation of Miranda
is subject to harmless-error analysis. Lall, 607 F.3d at 1292. “An
error is harmless unless there is a reasonable likelihood that it af-
fected the defendant’s substantial rights.” United States v. Hands, 184
F.3d 1322, 1329 (11th Cir. 1999) (quotation marks omitted and al-
terations adopted). There is no need to reverse if any error did not
substantially influence the outcome of the case and “sufficient evi-
dence uninfected by error supports the verdict.” Id. “The ques-
tion . . . is whether there is a reasonable possibility that the evi-
dence complained of might have contributed to the conviction.”
United States v. Khoury, 901 F.2d 948, 960 (11th Cir. 1990) (quotation
marks omitted). Reversal is warranted only where an error had
“substantial and injurious effect or influence” on the verdict, and
overwhelming evidence of guilt may be considered in finding
harmless error. United States v. Phanikone, 605 F.3d 1099, 1109 (11th
Cir. 2010) (quotation marks omitted). When reviewing a trial
court’s denial of a suppression motion, we may consider any evi-
dence presented at the trial of the case, and we are not limited to
the evidence introduced at the hearing on the motion. United States
v. Villabona-Garnica, 63 F.3d 1051, 1056 (11th Cir. 1995).
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 4 of 14
4 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
The Fifth Amendment provides that “[n]o person . . . shall
be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.”
U.S. Const. amend. V. To protect a person’s Fifth Amendment
privilege against self-incrimination, before the start of a custodial
interrogation, an individual must be warned “that he has the right
to remain silent, that anything he says can be used against him in a
court of law, that he has the right to the presence of an attorney,
and that if he cannot afford an attorney one will be appointed for
him prior to any questioning if he so desires.” Miranda, 384 U.S.
at 478-79. A defendant may waive these rights, but only if “the
waiver is made voluntarily, knowingly and intelligently.” Id.
at 444. To determine whether a defendant’s waiver of his Miranda
rights was voluntary, a two-part inquiry is required: (1) “the relin-
quishment of the right must have been voluntary in the sense that
it was the product of a free and deliberate choice rather than intim-
idation, coercion, or deception,” and (2) “the waiver must have
been made with a full awareness of both the nature of the right
being abandoned and the consequences of the decision to abandon
it.” Bernal-Benitez, 594 F.3d at 1318 (quoting Moran v. Burbine, 475
U.S. 412, 421 (1986)). A waiver is effective where the “totality of
the circumstances surrounding the interrogation reveal both an un-
coerced choice and the requisite level of comprehension.” Id. (quo-
tation marks omitted).
We consider whether a Miranda waiver was voluntary under
the totality of the circumstances, including the details of the inter-
rogation and the defendant’s characteristics. United States v.
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 5 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 5
Ransfer, 749 F.3d 914, 935 (11th Cir. 2014). Factors considered in-
clude “the defendant’s lack of education or low intelligence, failure
to appraise the defendant of his rights, the length of detention, the
repeated and prolonged nature of the questioning, and the use of
physical punishment such as the deprivation of food or sleep.” Id.
(quotation marks omitted). A waiver may be considered voluntary
if the record is devoid of any suggestion that police resorted to
physical or psychological pressure to elicit the defendant’s state-
ments. United States v. Phillips, 812 F.2d 1355, 1362 (11th Cir. 1987).
Further, the use of deception to obtain a confession is an important
factor when considering the totality of the circumstances. Lall, 607
F.3d at 1285. While misrepresentations of facts are not enough to
render a suspect’s subsequent confession involuntary or to under-
mine a suspect’s Miranda waiver, misrepresentations of law are
more likely to render a confession involuntary. Id. Moreover, we
have held that law enforcement’s promise that nothing the defend-
ant said would be used to prosecute him rendered the defendant’s
subsequent confession involuntary because it completely under-
mined the previously administered Miranda warning’s prophylactic
effect. Id. at 1287.
When the police do not have probable cause to arrest the
accused, and the initial seizure is illegal, any confession subse-
quently acquired by the police must be excluded “unless interven-
ing events break the causal connection between the illegal arrest
and the confession so that the confession is sufficiently an act of
free will to purge the primary taint.” Taylor v. Alabama, 457 U.S.
687, 690 (1982) (quotation marks omitted). When considering
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 6 of 14
6 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
whether such intervening events occurred, we consider the totality
of the circumstances, including: (1) the “temporal proximity of the
arrest and the confession;” (2) whether any intervening circum-
stances occurred and the significance of those circumstances; and
(3) “particularly, the purpose and flagrancy” of the initial miscon-
duct. Brown v. Illinois, 422 U.S. 590, 603-04 (1975). Whether Mi-
randa warnings were administered prior to the confession is rele-
vant, but not determinative. Id. at 604.
However, this exclusionary rule is subject to an exception.
Under the inevitable discovery exception, if the pros-
ecution can establish by a preponderance of the evi-
dence that the information would have ultimately
been recovered by lawful means, the evidence will be
admissible. Nix [v. Williams], 467 U.S. [431] at 434, 104
S. Ct. at 2509. However, the mere assertion by law
enforcement that the information would have been
inevitably discovered is not enough. United States v.
Brookins, 614 F.2d 1037, 1048 (5th Cir. 1980). This cir-
cuit also requires the prosecution to show that “the
lawful means which made discovery inevitable were
being actively pursued prior to the occurrence of the
illegal conduct.” Jefferson [v. Fountain], 382 F.3d [1286]
at 1296 [(11th Cir. 2004)] (emphasis added).
United States v. Virden, 488 F.3d 1317, 1322 (11th Cir. 2007).
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 7 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 7
In this case, we need not decide whether the district court
correctly held that the taint from the illegality of Beasley’s first con-
fession2 was purged, because we affirm the district court’s alterna-
tive holding that the discovery of the firearm in Beasley’s posses-
sion was inevitable. The record evidence demonstrated that—
prior to any of Beasley’s statements about the firearm—Officer
Cincotta had decided to initiate the vehicle search based upon the
smell of marijuana and Beasley’s acknowledgment that he did not
have a medical marijuana card. Thus, in this case, the means which
made discovery inevitable were already being actively pursued
prior to the occurrence of the allegedly illegal conduct. Before the
bench trial, Beasley stipulated that law enforcement discovered the
firearm in the search of the vehicle Beasley was driving, and that,
at the time he was found in possession of the firearm, Beasley knew
that he had been convicted of at least one felony.
Accordingly, even if the district court did err in admitting
Beasley’s second confession—an issue we do not decide—the error
was harmless. Hands, 184 F.3d at 1329.
II.
We review the constitutionality of a statute de novo. United
States v. Wright, 607 F.3d 708, 715 (11th Cir. 2010). “A party aban-
dons an issue when he makes only passing references to it or raises
2 Nor need we decide whether the district court correctly held that the first
confession was illegal, a decision the district court characterized as very close.
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 8 of 14
8 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
it in a perfunctory manner without supporting arguments and au-
thority.” United States v. Harding, 104 F.4th 1291, 1300 (11th Cir.
2024) (quotation marks and citation omitted).
We are bound to adhere to our prior panel precedent unless
that precedent has been abrogated by this Court sitting en banc or
by the Supreme Court. United States v. White, 837 F.3d 1225, 1228
(11th Cir. 2016). “To constitute an overruling for the purposes of
th[e] prior panel precedent rule, the Supreme Court decision must
be clearly on point.” United States v. Kaley, 579 F.3d 1246, 1255 (11th
Cir. 2009) (quotation marks and citation omitted). To abrogate a
prior panel precedent, the Supreme Court must also “demolish and
eviscerate each of its fundamental props.” United States v. Dubois,
139 F.4th 887, 893 (11th Cir. 2025) (“Dubois II”) (quotation marks
and citation omitted).
The Second Amendment reads: “A well-regulated Militia,
being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the peo-
ple to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.” U.S. Const.
amend. II. Section 922(g) of Title 18 of the U.S. Code prohibits
anyone who has been convicted of a crime punishable by more
than one year of imprisonment from possessing a firearm or am-
munition. 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). To obtain a conviction under
§ 922(g)(1), the government must prove “both that the defendant
knew he possessed a firearm and that he knew he belonged to the
relevant category of persons barred from possessing a firearm.” Re-
haif v. United States, 588 U.S. 225. 237 (2019).
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 9 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 9
In District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court consid-
ered a Second Amendment challenge to a District of Columbia law
that barred the private possession of handguns in homes. 554 U.S.
570, 574-75 (2008). After considering both the text and history of
the Second Amendment, the Court concluded that it granted an
individual a right to keep and bear arms. Id. at 595. The Supreme
Court ultimately held that the ban on handgun possession in the
home violated the Second Amendment. Id. at 635. However, the
Court acknowledged that the Second Amendment right to keep
and bear arms was “not unlimited,” emphasizing that “nothing in
[its] opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohi-
bitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill.”
Id. at 626. The Supreme Court labeled these restrictions as “pre-
sumptively lawful.” Id. at 627 n.26. It specifically ruled that the
District of Columbia had to allow Heller to carry his handgun in
his home “[a]ssuming that Heller [was] not disqualified from the
exercise of Second Amendment rights[.]” Id. at 635.
After Heller, we considered, and rejected, a constitutional
challenge to § 922(g)(1)’s prohibition on felons possessing firearms.
See United States v. Rozier, 598 F.3d 768, 770-71 (11th Cir. 2010).
“[T]he first question to be asked” under Heller, we explained, was
“whether one is qualified to possess a firearm.” Id. at 770 (emphasis
in original). We observed that Heller’s clarification that it should
not be read to cast doubt on prohibitions on possession of firearms
by felons “suggest[ed] that statutes disqualifying felons from pos-
sessing a firearm under any and all circumstances do not offend the
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 10 of 14
10 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
Second Amendment.” Id. at 771. We also noted that Heller recog-
nized that prohibiting felons from possessing firearms was a “pre-
sumptively lawful longstanding prohibition.” Id. (quotation marks
omitted). Therefore, we held that § 922(g)(1) was a constitutional
avenue to restrict the Second Amendment rights of convicted fel-
ons as a class of people disqualified from possessing firearms. Id.
In a footnote, we rejected Rozier’s argument that the state-
ment from Heller that “nothing in our opinion should be taken to
cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of fire-
arms by felons” was merely dicta and should not be afforded au-
thoritative weight. Id. at 771 n.6. We reasoned that (1) to the ex-
tent that the statement “limit[ed] the Court’s opinion to possession
of firearms by law-abiding and qualified individuals,” it was neces-
sary to the decision reached; and (2) even if the statement were su-
perfluous to Heller’s central holding, we would still afford it “con-
siderable weight,” as dicta from the Supreme Court is not to be
lightly ignored. Id. Ultimately, we concluded that Rozier’s pur-
pose for possessing a firearm and the fact that the firearm was con-
strained to his home were immaterial because felons as a class
could be excluded from firearm possession. Id. at 771.
Several years later, the Supreme Court in New York States Ri-
fle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022), considered a Sec-
ond Amendment challenge to New York’s gun-licensing regime
that limited when a law-abiding citizen could obtain a license to
carry a firearm outside the home. The Court recognized that “the
Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual’s right
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 11 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 11
to carry a handgun for self-defense outside the home.” Id. at 10.
The Court explained that, to determine whether a restriction on
firearms was constitutional, courts must begin by asking whether
the firearm regulation at issue governs conduct that falls within the
plain text of the Second Amendment. Id. at 17. If the regulation
does cover such conduct, the court may uphold it only if the gov-
ernment “affirmatively 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 restrictions. See id. at 39 (applying “Heller’s text-and-history
standard” to the challenged statute). And, like Heller, Bruen de-
scribed Second Amendment rights as extending to “law-abiding, re-
sponsible citizens . . . for self-defense.” Id. at 26 (quotation marks
omitted).
After Bruen, we rejected a defendant’s Second Amendment
challenge to § 922(g)(1). United States v. Dubois, 94 F.4th 1284, 1291-
93 (11th Cir. 2024) (“Dubois I”), cert. granted, judgment vacated sub
nom., Dubois v. United States, 145 S. Ct. 1041 (2025), reinstated by Du-
bois II, 139 F.4th 887, cert. denied, (U.S. Jan. 20, 2026) (No. 25-6281).
We held that the challenge was foreclosed by Rozier, which “inter-
preted Heller as limiting the [Second Amendment] 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. at 1293 (quotation marks omitted). Alt-
hough the defendant argued that Bruen abrogated Rozier, we ob-
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 12 of 14
12 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
served that, even in Bruen, the Supreme Court continued to de-
scribe the right to bear arms as extending only to “law abiding, re-
sponsible citizens.” Id. (quotation marks omitted). We also re-
jected the defendant’s argument that Bruen abrogated all prior Sec-
ond Amendment precedent based on a two-step, means-end scru-
tiny test because Rozier was not based on that framework. Id. In-
stead, Rozier was based on our understanding that Heller limited the
Second Amendment’s protections “to law-abiding and qualified in-
dividuals” and excluded “felons from those categories[.]” Id. (quo-
tation marks omitted). Because Bruen “repeatedly stated that its
decision was faithful to Heller,” we held that Bruen did not abrogate
Rozier based on Rozier’s reliance on Heller. Id. We concluded that
we were bound by Rozier and, because Rozier foreclosed a Second
Amendment challenge to § 922(g)(1), we affirmed the defendant’s
conviction. Id.
In United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), the Supreme
Court considered a Second Amendment challenge to § 922(g)(8),
the federal statute that prohibits an individual who is subject to a
domestic violence restraining order from possessing a firearm
when the order includes a finding that he represents a credible
threat to the safety of an intimate partner, a child of that partner,
or individual. The Court also held that this firearm restriction was
constitutional. Id. at 693. It also, once again, declared that the pro-
hibition on “the possession of firearms by ‘felons and the mentally
ill’ are ‘presumptively lawful.’” Id. at 699 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S.
at 626-27 & n.26). The Court rejected the government’s argument
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 13 of 14
24-12004 Opinion of the Court 13
that a person could be disarmed because they were not “responsi-
ble,” reasoning that the term was vague and was used in Heller and
Bruen simply to describe the class of ordinary citizens who un-
doubtedly enjoy the Second Amendment right and those cases did
not define the term or say anything about the status of citizens who
were not “responsible.” Id. at 701-02.
On January 13, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certi-
orari in Dubois I and vacated and remanded the case to us for fur-
ther consideration in light of Rahimi. Dubois v. United States, 145
S. Ct. 1041 (2025). On June 2, 2025, we issued our opinion in Dubois
II on remand, holding that “Rahimi—like . . . Bruen . . . —did not
abrogate our holding in Rozier that section 922(g)(1) is constitu-
tional under the Second Amendment.” Dubois II, 139 F.4th at 889.
Accordingly, we reinstated our prior opinion and affirmed Du-
bois’s convictions and sentence. Id. Thus, we reaffirmed the prec-
edential authority of Rozier over Second Amendment challenges to
§ 922(g)(1). Id. at 893. We noted that the only time that Rahimi
mentioned felons was to reiterate Heller’s conclusion that prohibit-
ing felons from possessing firearms is presumptively lawful. Id. at
892-93. “This endorsement of the underlying basis for our prior
holding that section 922(g)(1) does not violate the Second Amend-
ment suggests that Rahimi reinforced—not undermined—Rozier.”
Id. at 893. We stated that we needed “clearer instruction from the
Supreme Court before we may reconsider the constitutionality of
section 922(g)(1).” Id. The Supreme Court recently denied Du-
bois’s petition for writ of certiorari. Dubois v. United States, (U.S.
Jan. 20, 2026) (No. 25-6281).
USCA11 Case: 24-12004 Document: 43-1 Date Filed: 04/07/2026 Page: 14 of 14
14 Opinion of the Court 24-12004
More recently, we held that Rozier and Dubois II continue to
foreclose constitutional challenges to § 922(g)(1) as a violation of
the Second Amendment pursuant to the prior-panel-precedent
rule. United States v. Hicks, 166 F.4th 933, 939 (11th Cir. 2026).
Here, both Beasley’s facial and as-applied challenges to the
constitutionality of § 922(g)(1) under the Second Amendment are
foreclosed by our precedent in Rozier.
AFFIRMED.