NBA YoungBoy Gun case halted by judge until Supreme Court rules on Second Amendment battle

A criminal case against YoungBoy Never Broke Again on federal gun charges must be stayed until the U.S. Supreme Court decides a closely watched Second Amendment battle this spring, a federal judge says — likely delaying a trial that had been scheduled to begin on July .

In an order Wednesday (March 13), US District Judge Shelly Dick said he will wait to proceed until the justices issue their ruling on gun control, as the upcoming Supreme Court decision will likely touch on the same Second Amendment questions at play in the NBA YoungBoy case.

YoungBoy's attorneys say the law he's accused of violating — banning convicted felons from owning firearms — is unconstitutional under the Second Amendment, which protects the right to “keep and bear arms.” The pending Supreme Court case, meanwhile, will decide the constitutionality of a similar federal ban on gun ownership for domestic abusers.

After years of house arrest, YoungBoy (Kentrell DeSean Gaulden) was finally set for trial in July. Wednesday's order will likely delay that trial, as it could be June before the high court even rules on the pending case. But the delay may be worth it: If the Supreme Court rules against gun restrictions in this case, it could go a long way toward getting YoungBoy off the charges altogether.

The rapper's lawyer did not immediately return a request for comment.

YoungBoy was charged by federal prosecutors in March 2021 after he was allegedly found with two guns during a September 2020 incident in Baton Rouge, LA. He was charged with violating a longstanding federal law barring convicted felons from ever having guns again — a rule that applied to him because he was convicted in 2017 of aggravated assault with a firearm.

In a motion filed last month, the rapper's attorneys argued that the charges against YoungBoy should be dismissed without a trial because that federal ban violates the Second Amendment. They cited a landmark gun control ruling handed down by the high court in 2022 that struck down a New York state law that had placed strict restrictions on carrying guns outside the home.

Echoing the language of that ruling, YoungBoy's lawyers said the federal felon in possession statute was equally unconstitutional because it was “inconsistent with our nation's historic tradition of regulating firearms.”

“This prosecution seeks to limit and deny Mr. Gaulden's Second Amendment right to own a firearm based solely on his status as a felon and his alleged inability to comply with bureaucratic regulations,” the star's lawyers told the judge.

In a response this month, federal prosecutors strongly disagreed, arguing that the gun ban for convicted felons had already been upheld in “hundreds of cases” since the Supreme Court's 2022 decision. They acknowledged that few judges had ruled otherwise, but that the ” overwhelming majority of courts' continued to enforce the law.

In Wednesday's ruling, Judge Dick said she could not decide those arguments until the Supreme Court rules on United States v. Rahimi, the pending case challenging a federal law that bars firearms possession by people subject to domestic violence restraining orders. The case, which was argued last fall, is expected to be decided by June.

It's hard to predict how the Supreme Court might rule on a given case, but the tea leaves don't look good for YoungBoy's position. After arguments in the Rahimi case in November, Reuters said the court “seemed willing to uphold the legality” of domestic violence gun restrictions, with several justices suggesting that the Second Amendment would not prevent the government from banning “dangerous” people from owning guns.

Whenever the Supreme Court rules on the Rahimi case, YoungBoy and federal prosecutors will have 14 days to submit information about how the case will proceed.