James Nemeth was indicted for possession of methamphetamine with intent to distribute and for possessing a firearm as a felon. The charges stemmed from a search of his motel room and vehicle after a trained narcotics dog alerted to the presence of drugs. Law enforcement had obtained a warrant based in part on the dog's alert at the motel room door. Nemeth moved to suppress the evidence, arguing the dog sniff violated his Fourth Amendment rights, and moved to dismiss the firearm charges, claiming the felon-in-possession statute was unconstitutional. The district court denied both motions. Nemeth then entered a conditional guilty plea, reserving his right to appeal the denial of the suppression motion, and was sentenced to sixty months in prison followed by four years of supervised release.
The Tenth Circuit addressed two primary issues. First, regarding the Fourth Amendment suppression motion, the court analyzed whether Nemeth had preserved his argument for appeal. The court distinguished between the argument Nemeth made in the district court and the one he raised on appeal. Below, Nemeth argued that the dog sniff violated his reasonable expectation of privacy in the motel hallway. On appeal, he reframed the argument, claiming the sniff violated his reasonable expectation of privacy inside the motel room itself. The court held that under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 12, this new argument was untimely and waived. The court declined to exercise its discretion to overlook the waiver because the legal question—whether a dog sniff at a dwelling door violates the occupant's privacy interest inside the dwelling—is an open question in the Supreme Court and the Tenth Circuit, with a split among sister circuits. Second, regarding the Second Amendment challenge to 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), the court noted that Nemeth acknowledged his challenge was foreclosed by binding circuit precedent. The court reaffirmed that its decision in Vincent v. Bondi, which upheld the constitutionality of the statute under the Bruen test, remains good law following the Supreme Court's decision in United States v. Rahimi. Consequently, the district court did not err in denying the motion to dismiss.
The decision affirms Nemeth's conviction and remands the case for sentencing. Practically, it reinforces the strict preservation requirements of Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 12, warning that appellate courts will not review suppression arguments that were not explicitly raised in the district court, even if the underlying facts are similar. It also confirms that the Tenth Circuit's precedent upholding felon-in-possession statutes remains binding despite recent Supreme Court rulings on the Second Amendment. The ruling leaves the specific legal question of whether a dog sniff at a dwelling door violates the occupant's privacy interest inside the dwelling unresolved for future litigation.
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