United States v. Serrano
United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
191 F.Supp.3d 2016 (2016)
Pedro Serrano (defendant), previously convicted of robbery, was indicted for possessing body armor as a felon convicted of a crime of violence, but the indictment never alleged that the body armor was sold or offered for sale in interstate commerce, a requirement embedded in the statute's cross-referenced definition of body armor. Serrano moved to dismiss on Second Amendment, vagueness, and Commerce Clause grounds, and separately argued the indictment failed to allege the interstate-commerce element required for the offense.
Whether an indictment for felon possession of body armor must expressly allege the statute's implicit interstate-commerce element, where that element is derived only indirectly from a cross-referenced definition rather than stated directly in the charging statute.