No. 20-1903

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Appellee,

v.

WILLIE RICHARD MINOR,

Defendant, Appellant.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MAINE

[Hon. D. Brock Hornby, U.S. District Judge]

Before

Barron, Chief Judge, Lynch, Thompson, Kayatta, Gelpí, and Montecalvo, Circuit Judges.

Karen A. Pickett for appellant. Joshua K. Handell, Attorney, Criminal Division, U.S. Department of Justice, with whom Darcie N. McElwee, United States Attorney, Benjamin M. Block, Assistant United States Attorney, Kenneth A. Polite, Jr., Assistant Attorney General, and Lisa H. Miller, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, were on brief, for appellee. Laura A. Foggan, Preetha Chakrabarti, and Crowell & Moring LLP on brief for amici curiae Battered Women's Justice Project, Illinois Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Indiana Coalition to End Domestic Violence, Kentucky Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Maine Coalition to End Domestic Violence, Maryland Network Against Domestic Violence, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and Standpoint. Iman K. Kholdebarin, Alan E. Schoenfeld, Emily Barnet, Joe D. Zabel, and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP on brief for amicus curiae Everytown for Gun Safety.

Opinion En Banc

March 24, 2023 KAYATTA, Circuit Judge. A jury convicted Willie Richard Minor under 18 U.S.C. § 924(a)(2) of knowingly violating 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), which prohibits nine categories of persons from possessing a firearm. On appeal, Minor asserts that the proceedings below were tainted by a series of errors relating to the mens rea required to establish a knowing violation of section 922(g).

In a divided opinion, a panel of this court vacated Minor's conviction on grounds of instructional error. United States v. Minor, 31 F.4th 9 (1st Cir. 2022), vacated, 49 F.4th 22. The panel focused its decision on Rehaif v. United States, 139 S. Ct. 2191 (2019), in which the Supreme Court held that convictions under section 924(a)(2) for knowingly violating section 922(g) require "the Government [to] prove both that the defendant knew he possessed a firearm and that he knew he belonged to the relevant category of persons barred from possessing a firearm." Id. at 2200. The "relevant category" in this instance is the category of persons who have been convicted of a "misdemeanor crime of domestic violence." 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9). The government charged Minor with belonging to this category based on his 2010 no-contest plea to a simple assault charge under Maine law, which he entered after refusing to plead guilty to a charge of domestic violence assault. The panel vacated Minor's conviction because "the jury was allowed to convict [him] of knowingly

- 3 - violating section 922(g)(9) without finding that he knew that his assault conviction placed him in the category of persons convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence." Minor, 31 F.4th at 11.

We granted the government's petition for rehearing en banc in order to reconsider the mens rea required for a conviction under sections 924(a)(2) and 922(g)(9), as well as whether the jury instructions here properly described the elements of that offense. United States v. Minor, 49 F.4th 22 (1st Cir. 2022). We once again vacate Minor's convicti