Cedar Rapids Felon with a Gun Sentenced to Over 7 Years in Prison

A convicted felon who possessed a gun while on supervised release was sentenced on December 2, 2025, to more than seven years in federal prison.

Marcus Dejohn Wallace, age 30, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received the prison term after a June 11, 2025, jury verdict finding him guilty of one count of possession of a firearm by a felon.

Evidence at trial showed that on September 5, 2024, Wallace led officers on a high-speed car chase through Cedar Rapids before pulling over in a residential neighborhood and running from officers.  As he ran, he threw a loaded gun, which hit a nearby roof before landing in the grass.  Police officers using a K-9 caught Wallace.  Officers found the loaded gun, which was missing a magazine.  Officers later found the missing magazine in the path Wallace had run.  Wallace was on supervised release at the time he possessed the gun because of a prior federal conviction for distribution of heroin resulting in serious bodily injury. 

Wallace was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Chief Judge C.J. Williams.  Wallace was sentenced to 70 months’ imprisonment, plus 18 months’ imprisonment for violating the terms of his supervised release, for a total of 88 months’ imprisonment.  Wallace must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term.  There is no parole in the federal system.

Wallace is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Devra T. Hake, Shawn Wehde, and Dan Tvedt, and it was investigated by the Cedar Rapids Police Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.

The case file number is 24-CR-90.

This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and gun violence, and to make our neighborhoods safer for everyone. On May 26, 2021, the Department launched a violent crime reduction strategy strengthening PSN based on these core principles: fostering trust and legitimacy in our communities, supporting community-based organizations that help prevent violence from occurring in the first place, setting focused and strategic enforcement priorities, and measuring the results.

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