A drug user who bought thirty-one firearms, at least twenty-four of which were for other people, was sentenced on May 13, 2022, to five years in federal prison.
Chevelle Manuel Daudinot, Jr., age 27, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received the prison term after a December 9, 2021 guilty plea to one count of possession of a firearm by an unlawful user of a controlled substance.
Information from a plea agreement and at sentencing showed that Daudinot purchased thirty-one firearms between August 2020 and April 2021. Daudinot falsely stated on the paperwork he filled out to buy the guns that he was not an unlawful user of marijuana. On the paperwork for twenty-four of the firearms, Daudinot falsely stated the firearms were for himself when he was really buying them for other people. When law enforcement agents searched Daudinot’s residence in May 2021, he only had three of the firearms still in his possession. Daudinot’s cell phone contained text messages regarding his firearms dealing, including messages soliciting firearms from him, negotiating prices for firearms, and setting meetings to exchange firearms. Other text messages showed that, in addition to using marijuana, Daudinot was distributing marijuana.
Four guns that Daudinot purchased were recovered during other criminal investigations. In April 2021, Chicago police officers recovered one from a car occupied by a felon and a minor. Through ballistics testing, the firearm was linked to a homicide that occurred in Chicago in March 2021 in which a victim died of three gunshot wounds.
Daudinot was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Judge C.J. Williams. Daudinot was sentenced to 60 months’ imprisonment. He must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term. There is no parole in the federal system.
Daudinot was released on the bond previously set and is to surrender to the United States Marshal on May 27, 2022.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN). PSN is the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts. PSN is an evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime. Through PSN, a broad spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them. As part of this strategy, PSN focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime
The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Kyndra Lundquist and investigated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, the Cedar Rapids Police Department, and the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement.
Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.
The case file number is 21-CR-51.
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