Tahlequah Resident Sentenced For Federal Firearm Charge

MUSKOGEE, OKLAHOMA – The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announces that Christopher Andrew Loveall, age 30, of Tahlequah, Oklahoma, was sentenced to 27 months imprisonment for illegally possessing a firearm.

The charge arose from investigations by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office, and the Tahlequah Police Department.

On May 15, 2023, Loveall pleaded guilty to one count of Felon in Possession of Firearm.  According to investigators, on January 16, 2023, officers observed Loveall fire a gun from the front passenger seat of a vehicle before the vehicle drove away at a high rate of speed.  Officers pulled the vehicle over and found a firearm magazine on the floorboard.  During a search of the nearby roadside along the vehicle's path, officers found a 380 semi-automatic handgun.  Loveall knew when he possessed the firearm that he had been previously convicted of a crime punishable by a term of imprisonment exceeding one year.

The Honorable Ronald A. White, Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, presided over the hearing.  Loveall will remain in custody of the U.S. Marshal pending transportation to a designated United States Bureau of Prisons facility to serve a non-paroleable sentence of incarceration.

Assistant United States Attorney T. Cameron McEwen represented the United States.