Jacob Joshad Robinson v. United States

In November of 2023, Arlington Police responded to a call at a barber shop in Arlington, Texas. At the barber shop, they found Jacob Joshad Robinson with a gunshot wound to his leg and a pistol on the bathroom floor. Robinson previously had the pistol in his waistband. Robinson was on probation at the time for possession of marijuana of 5 pounds or less, a state offense for which he was placed on five years of deferred adjudication probation. Robinson was charged with 18 U.S.C. §922(g)(1)’s prohibition on possession of firearm by a felon. When Mr. Robinson attempted to challenge 922(g) as applied to his prior felony convictions, the Fifth Circuit declined to analyze whether those offenses could justify a permanent deprivation of Second Amendment rights. Instead, it held that Robinson could be disarmed constituent with historical tradition because he was on probation – which is not the basis for his §922(g)(1) conviction, or the 37-month sentence he has been ordered to serve. The question presented is: Whether courts should analyze as-applied Second Amendment challenges to 18 U.S.C. §922(g)(1) by examining whether historical tradition supports permanently disarming someone for the predicate offense(s) underlying the defendant’s conviction.