UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff—Appellee, versus GEORGE PETERSON, Defendant—Appellant.
No. 24-30043
United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
August 27, 2025
Lyle W. Cayce, Clerk
Before ELROD, Chief Judge, and HIGGINBOTHAM and SOUTHWICK, Circuit Judges.
JENNIFER WALKER ELROD, Chief Judge:
Following a law enforcement raid on his home and place of business, George Peterson pleaded guilty to possessing an unregistered suppressor in violation of various provisions of the National Firearms Act (NFA). On appeal, he challenges the denial of two pretrial motions: a motion to dismiss his indictment on Second Amendment grounds and a motion to suppress evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds.
Assuming without deciding that the Second Amendment protects suppressors, we AFFIRM the district court‘s denial of Peterson‘s motion
I
A
In the summer of 2022, federal and state law enforcement officers executed a warrant at PDW Solutions, LLC, Peterson‘s firearm business that he operated out of his home. An Eastern District of Louisiana magistrate judge issued that warrant based on an affidavit submitted by a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) officer.
According to the officer, the ATF had spent several months investigating Peterson before seeking the warrant. In one instance, the ATF sent a Jefferson Parish Sherriff‘s Office deputy into PDW to purchase two handguns. Peterson sold the officer the guns, but he did not report the transaction to the ATF despite
In light of this information, the magistrate judge issued a warrant authorizing a search of Peterson‘s home (where the ATF alleged he stored his inventory) and of another structure attached to his home (where it alleged he conducted business). The warrant also authorized seizure of PDW‘s transactional and financial records, proceeds from firearm sales, firearms themselves, and computers and other digital devices, among other things.
The ATF executed the warrant the next day. During the search, ATF agents discovered a firearm suppressor inside Peterson‘s bedroom-closet safe. Peterson did not purchase this suppressor from a manufacturer; he acquired materials and a kit to make it himself. The suppressor was in working condition, but it neither had a serial number nor was registered in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record.
B
An Eastern District of Louisiana grand jury indicted Peterson for possession of an unregistered suppressor under
In response, Peterson filed a motion to dismiss the indictment and a motion to suppress the evidence obtained through the ATF‘s search of his property. Peterson argued: (1) that the indictment should be dismissed because the NFA‘s registration scheme violates the Second Amendment as applied to him; and (2) that the evidence obtained from the ATF‘s search of his home should be suppressed because that search violated the Fourth Amendment.
The district court denied both motions, and Peterson agreed to enter a conditional guilty plea. He reserved the right to appeal the denial of his motion to dismiss and of his motion to suppress.
The district court sentenced Peterson to twenty-four months of imprisonment, and he timely appealed his two preserved issues.
II
Peterson first challenges the district court‘s denial of his motion to dismiss. Specifically, he argues that the NFA‘s suppressor-registration requirement unconstitutionally burdens his Second Amendment rights. We first provide background on suppressors and the NFA before turning to Peterson‘s Second Amendment argument.
A
A suppressor is “a device that attaches to the muzzle of a firearm and makes the firearm quieter when discharged.” Paxton v. Dettelbach, 105 F.4th 708, 710 (5th Cir. 2024); see also
Suppressors function by causing the gasses emanating from a fired weapon to do so more slowly and therefore more quietly. Id. at 41–42. Hiram Maxim (whom TIME Magazine affectionately labeled “Dr. Shush” and “noise‘s bogeyman“) is credited not only with inventing the suppressor but also with using the same sort of technology to abate the noise produced by early combustion engines. Id. at 41, 45 & n.79.
Many commentators have recognized the benefits of suppressors. For example, while many firearms produce “noise levels of between 140-160 decibels, at which level hearing can be permanently impaired,” suppressors can reduce the noise to around 135 decibels, at which level hearing loss is less likely to occur. See Robert J. Spitzer, Gun Accessories and the Second Amendment: Assault Weapons, Magazines, and Silencers, 83 Law & Contemp. Probs. 231, 249-50 (2020). Further, hunters may use suppressors to avoid spooking game and to reduce noise pollution in the jurisdictions that permit suppressors in the field. Halbrook, Firearm Sound Moderators, supra, at 35; see also id. at 76-78 (collecting European laws on suppressor use for hunting). Suppressors may also reduce “noise, recoil, and muzzle rise” in self-defense scenarios, giving the shooter an advantage. See id. at 69.
Commentators have also noted that criminals infrequently use suppressors, despite a historical “association of the use of silencers with criminal acts.” Spitzer, supra, at 249, 252. For example, in the ten-year period between 1995 and 2004, one researcher found “only two federal cases where a silencer was used in a murder.” Stephen P. Halbrook, The Power to Tax, the Second Amendment, and the Search for Which “Gangster” Weapons to Tax, 25 Wyo. L. Rev. 149, 185 (2025) [hereinafter Halbrook, The Power to Tax]. Another study revealed only sixteen “serious criminal cases” between 2011 and 2017 involving the use of a suppressor. Spitzer, supra, at 252. Scholars debate whether the lack of association between suppressors and criminality is due to criminals’ lack of interest in using suppressors, or whether the NFA has proven effective in keeping them out of the hands of criminals. Id. Either way, and despite the lack of correlation between suppressors and criminal activity, some oppose suppressors on the basis that they may inhibit detection of crime. See id. at 252–53.
At the federal level, the ATF regulates suppressors through enforcement of the NFA.1 The NFA instructs the Attorney General to “maintain a central registry of all firearms“—known as the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record—“in the United States which are not in the possession or under the control of the United States.”
To register a firearm under the NFA, the person making the firearm must complete an application identifying the firearm and the applicant and submit it to the ATF.
The NFA makes it unlawful for an individual to receive or possess a firearm when the firearm is not registered to him under the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record.
B
We now turn to Peterson‘s as-applied challenge to the NFA‘s suppressor-registration requirement under the Second Amendment. Peterson contends that suppressors are “Arms” protected under the Second Amendment and that the NFA is unconstitutional. The government agrees that the Second Amendment protects suppressors, but it maintains that the NFA is constitutional under New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass‘n v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022).
1
“We review de novo a district court‘s denial of a motion to dismiss an indictment, including any underlying constitutional claims.” United States v. Parrales-Guzman, 922 F.3d 706, 707 (5th Cir. 2019).
The Second Amendment protects “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms.”
In Bruen, the Supreme Court applied the foregoing approach when it considered the constitutionality of New York State‘s prohibition on possessing firearms without a license. Id. at 11-15. To obtain a license to carry a pistol outside of the home, New York law required an applicant to show “proper cause,” meaning a demonstrated “special need for self-protection distinguishable from that of the general community.” Id. at 12 (first quoting
Accordingly, the Court then proceeded to the second step, where it asked whether New York‘s licensing regime fit with our Nation‘s tradition of firearm regulation. The Court‘s detailed survey of the “Anglo-American history of public carry” revealed that historical restrictions touched on the “intent for which one could carry arms, the manner by which one carried
Relevant here, the Court in Bruen contrasted so-called “may-issue” licensing regimes like New York‘s with “shall-issue” regimes that require state authorities to issue licenses “whenever applicants satisfy certain threshold requirements.” Id. at 13. “Because these [shall-issue] licensing regimes do not require applicants to show an atypical need for armed self-defense, they do not necessarily prevent ‘law-abiding, responsible citizens’ from exercising their Second Amendment right to public carry.” Id. at 38 n.9 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 635). Rather, “shall-issue regimes, which often require applicants to undergo a background check or pass a firearms safety course, are designed to ensure only that those bearing arms in the jurisdiction are, in fact, ‘law-abiding, responsible citizens.‘” Id. (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 635). Shall-issue regimes do so by applying “narrow, objective, and definite standards” to guide licensing officials’ decisions. Id. (quoting Shuttlesworth v. Birmingham, 394 U.S. 147, 151 (1969)).
Because shall-issue regimes employ objective criteria, the Court noted that nothing in its analysis of the New York may-issue law “should be interpreted to suggest the unconstitutionality of the 43 States’ ‘shall-issue’ licensing regimes . . . .” Id. (citing Drake v. Filko, 724 F.3d 426, 442 (3d Cir. 2013) (Hardiman, J., dissenting)). Justice Kavanaugh likewise addressed the constitutionality of shall-issue regimes. Id. at 80 (Kavanaugh, J., concurring). He also listed some administrative conditions that shall-issue licensing
Even so, the Court cautioned that shall-issue licensing laws are not necessarily impregnable. As it explained, shall-issue regimes remain subject to as-applied challenges where “lengthy wait times in processing license applications or exorbitant fees deny ordinary citizens their right to public carry.” Id. at 38 n.9 (majority opinion). Justice Kavanaugh expressed similar concerns in concurrence, stating that “shall-issue licensing regimes are constitutionally permissible, subject of course to an as-applied challenge if a shall-issue licensing regime does not operate in that manner in practice.” Id. at 80 (Kavanaugh, J., concurring).
After Bruen, we considered a challenge to a background-check requirement and considered the following questions: “What part of Bruen controls our evaluation of a firearm regulation? Its imposition of an historical showing to be made by the government? Or its various assurances that it did not disturb common-place regulations in shall-issue regimes?” McRorey v. Garland, 99 F.4th 831, 834 (5th Cir. 2024). We answered, “the latter.” Id.
As we explained in McRorey, the Supreme Court in Heller “described ‘conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms’ as ‘presumptively lawful.‘” Id. at 836 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 626-27, 627 n.26). ”Bruen did nothing to disturb that part of Heller.” Id. So, we read Bruen to implement a “presumption” of constitutionality for shall-issue “ancillary firearm regulations such as background checks preceding sale.” Id. at 836–37; see also Md. Shall Issue, Inc. v. Moore, 116 F.4th 211, 216, 227 (4th Cir. 2024) (en banc) (concluding that a shall-issue licensing regime was “presumptively constitutional because it operates merely to ensure that
We then considered the McRorey plaintiffs’ challenge to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), under which federally licensed firearm dealers first acquire information from prospective firearm purchasers and then submit that information to NICS for a background check. Id. at 834. After conducting the background check, NICS provides a federal dealer one of three responses: (1) “Proceed,” if the proposed purchase would not place the purchaser in violation of
Turning to this case, we assume without deciding that suppressors constitute “arms” under the Second Amendment, as both parties now contend. Even so, the NFA suppressor-licensing scheme is presumptively constitutional because it is a shall-issue licensing regime, as Peterson‘s counsel conceded at oral argument. Oral Argument at 4:45. The NFA provides that the ATF will deny a firearm-making application if the “making or possession of the firearm would place the person making the firearm in violation of law.”
Peterson‘s merits brief does not address the applicability of the shall-issue presumption; in fact, it does not cite Bruen at all. Peterson has instead argued—both in this court and the district court—that the NFA is unconstitutional under the “two-step” means-end scrutiny that Bruen overruled almost two years before his appeal was lodged and more than one year before he filed his motion to dismiss.
Peterson mentions Bruen‘s shall-issue presumption only once, in his post-oral-argument briefing, where he dismisses the presumption as “dicta.” But we rejected that argument squarely in McRorey, a case that Peterson nowhere cites:
[Plaintiffs] characterize passages such as footnote 9 [of the Bruen opinion] as dicta. We, however, “are generally bound by Supreme Court dicta, especially when it is recent and detailed.” And it doesn‘t get more recent or detailed than Bruen.
McRorey, 99 F.4th at 837 (citation omitted). These challenged provisions are therefore “presumptively lawful.” Id. at 838-39.
2
We now turn to whether the NFA has been “put toward abusive ends” through “exorbitant fees” or “lengthy wait times in processing license
Here, Peterson neither alleges that he applied for an NFA license to make a suppressor, nor asserts that he paid the $200 tax, nor claims that the tax or application-processing times discouraged him from submitting an application to the ATF. Instead, he explains that he “simply forgot to do the paperwork after” he made the suppressor. The record is therefore devoid of any facts indicating that the NFA has been “put toward abusive ends” as applied to him. See United States v. Phillips, 645 F.3d 859, 863 (7th Cir. 2011) (“[W]hen we are presented with an as-applied challenge, we examine only the facts of the case before us and not any set of hypothetical facts under which the statute might be unconstitutional.“).3
In addition, the record does not reveal how long applicants must wait for the ATF to process their NFA applications. Peterson cites nothing to support his claim that current processing times for NFA license approval can be upwards of eight months. When pressed on his failure to produce evidence on this claim at oral argument, Peterson‘s counsel acknowledged the lack of evidence, Oral Argument at 6:03, and later offered to file a supplemental letter brief with the court containing support for his claim. He
* * *
In sum, Bruen‘s presumption of constitutionality for shall-issue licensing regimes applies to the NFA‘s application procedures. Peterson cannot overcome that presumption because the record does not reveal that the NFA has effectively “den[ied]” him his Second Amendment rights.5
In so holding, we do not foreclose the possibility that another litigant may successfully challenge the NFA‘s requirements. Here, in light of the parties’ agreement that suppressors are “Arms” for purposes of the Second Amendment, we decide only that Peterson has failed to “develop any argument” or record to show that the NFA is unconstitutional as applied to him. See United States v. Bridges, --- F.4th ---, No. 24-5874, 2025 WL 2250109, at *11 (6th Cir. Aug. 7, 2025) (Nalbandian, J., concurring). We need not, and therefore do not, go further. Id. at *9 (“If it is not necessary to decide more, it is necessary not to decide more.” (alteration and citation omitted)).
III
Next, Peterson challenges the denial of his motion to suppress the suppressor.
The district court concluded that the good-faith exception barred application of the exclusionary rule. On appeal, though, Peterson does not mention the good-faith exception. He instead argues “that the affidavit in
But we need not rest our conclusion on this basis because, as we explain infra, we would affirm the district court‘s good-faith-exception decision even if Peterson‘s argument were preserved. That is, irrespective of whether the underlying affidavit actually gave rise to probable cause, we conclude that it was reasonable for the officers executing the warrant to rely on it. Accordingly, the exclusionary rule does not serve to bar admission of the suppressor, and the district court rightly denied Peterson‘s motion to suppress.
A
When considering appeals of motion-to-suppress rulings, we review “factual findings for clear error and legal conclusions de novo, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prevailing party.” United States v. Martinez, 102 F.4th 677, 683 (5th Cir. 2024). “The district court‘s determination of the reasonableness of a law enforcement officer‘s reliance upon a warrant issued by a magistrate [judge]—for purposes of determining the applicability of the good-faith exception . . . —is also reviewed de novo.” United States v. Cherna, 184 F.3d 403, 406–07 (5th Cir. 1999) (italics added).
If the good-faith exception applies, we “affirm the district court‘s denial of the motion to suppress.” Sibley, 448 F.3d at 757.
B
As the district court correctly reasoned, “[t]he good-faith exception allows reliance on [a] warrant even if the search warrant is defective as long as that reliance is objectively reasonable.” “Issuance of a warrant by a magistrate [judge] normally suffices to establish good faith on the part of law enforcement officers who conduct a search pursuant to the warrant.” United States v. Craig, 861 F.2d 818, 821 (5th Cir. 1988). But the “exception does not apply when: (1) the magistrate [judge] issuing the warrant was misled by information in an affidavit that the affiant knew or should have known was false; (2) the issuing magistrate [judge] abandoned the judicial role; (3) the warrant was based on an affidavit so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render belief in its existence entirely unreasonable; or (4) the warrant was so facially deficient that the executing officers could not have reasonably presumed it to be valid.” Sibley, 448 F.3d at 757.
The district court rightly construed Peterson‘s argument as getting closest to addressing the third exception to the exception. And we agree that, despite Peterson‘s protests, neither it nor any of the other exceptions apply. As the government relates, the warrant described “Peterson‘s false representation to the ATF that he would not store or sell guns on his property; three separate law enforcement purchases from PDW; [and] PDW‘s failure to ever file a multiple sales report.” Regardless of whether these facts would actually give rise to probable cause, they at least present “indicia of probable cause” sufficient to render belief in its existence reasonable. See Sibley, 448 F.3d at 757. Indeed, the affidavit at issue here stands in stark contrast to the sorts of “bare bones” affidavits that have been deemed insufficient. See United States v. Brown, 941 F.2d 1300, 1303 n.1 (5th Cir. 1991) (collecting examples). Accordingly, we conclude that the officers who executed the warrant acted reasonably in relying on it. And because none of the exceptions to the good-faith exception apply, it bars application
IV
For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the district court‘s denial of Peterson‘s motion to dismiss and its denial of his motion to suppress.