St. Louis Felon Receives 27-Year Sentence for Repeated Gun Possession

A federal judge sentenced Roosevelt Easley to 27 years in prison on May 7 for unlawful possession of firearms as a convicted felon, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.

Easley, of St. Louis, faced charges after officers recovered guns from him twice. The second arrest occurred after police pursued a vehicle he was driving; officers located a loaded firearm inside it. The first incident also involved recovery of a firearm from Easley.

Both events violated 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), the federal statute that prohibits convicted felons from possessing firearms or ammunition.

The 27-year term reflects sentencing enhancements available under federal law for defendants with prior felony convictions who repeatedly arm themselves. Easley will serve the sentence in the Federal Bureau of Prisons system with no parole; he must serve at least 85 percent of the term before release eligibility under current law.

The sentence removes Easley from the streets of St. Louis for more than a quarter century. Federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of Missouri have pursued similar cases against repeat offenders in the city, where local police report hundreds of illegal firearms recovered each year.

The conviction adds to the tally of felon-in-possession cases that trigger enhanced penalties once a defendant accumulates multiple violations or qualifying prior convictions.

Downstream, the Bureau of Prisons must now designate a facility and begin intake within weeks. The ruling also activates standard federal supervised release conditions that will govern Easley for five years after prison. Local law enforcement in St. Louis can treat the case as precedent when building future prosecutions against similarly situated defendants under the same statute.

This sentencing continues a pattern of multi-decade terms handed down in the Eastern District of Missouri for armed career criminals. The Department of Justice has used 18 U.S.C. § 922(g) and accompanying enhancements in hundreds of cases nationwide since the law’s original passage, with repeat offenders in urban jurisdictions forming a consistent share of the docket.