US v. Pittman: In 2020 Pittman pleaded guilty to an information to aiding and abetting the malicious damage by fire of the Market House, a historic building in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Prior to sentencing, Pittman filed a motion to dismiss that count, arguing that 18 U.S.C. §844(f) required a nexus between federal financial assistance and the property damaged and that the information itself was invalid for failing to allege such nexus. Pittman did not move to withdraw his guilty plea. The motion to dismiss was denied and Pittman was sentenced to 60 months in prison.
On appeal, the Fourth Circuit affirmed the denial of Pittman’s motion to dismiss, upholding his conviction and sentence. The court rejected Pittman’s argument, based on the Supreme Court’s decision in Class, that his guilty plea did not waive his challenge to the scope of the statute, holding that Pittman’s unconditional guilty plea “necessarily admitted that his conduct violated the statute.” While the unconditional guilty plea also arguably waived Pittman’s as-applied constitutional challenge to the statute, the court held that it “need not resolve that issue” because Pittman could not meet the requirements of plain error review. Specifically, any error that might have occurred was not plain.
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