A convicted felon who was sent to prison for 15 years for possessing seven shotgun shells has failed in his bid to have the sentence overturned.
Edward Lamar Young of Hixson says the shells were in a chest of drawers he brought from his neighbor’s house while helping her clear out some of her late husband’s belongings. Young says he eventually discovered them, but didn’t think anything of it and put them away so his children wouldn’t find them.
In 2011, he was arrested for burglary and police discovered the shells. Because Young had other felony convictions from earlier in his life, it’s illegal for him to own firearms or ammunition. After pleading guilty, he was sentenced to 15 years without the possibility of parole, the mandatory minimum sentence under the Armed Criminal Career Act.
In upholding the sentence Thursday, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals suggested there’s nothing unconstitutional about Young’s sentence. But as Judge Jane Branstetter Stranch pointed out, “holding that a sentence is constitutional does not make the sentence just.”
“(Young) acquired the shotgun shells passively, he kept them without any criminal motive, and his knowledge extended only to his possession and not to its illegality,” the judges wrote in the majority opinion.
Young can appeal to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals to rehear his case or he can appeal it to the United States Supreme Court.