Jury Convicts Fitchburg Man of Illegally Possessing Firearm

MADISON, WIS. – After a two-day jury trial, Malcolm Whiteside, 30, Fitchburg, Wisconsin, was found guilty yesterday of illegally possessing a firearm as a felon. The jury reached a verdict after just over 30 minutes of deliberation. The guilty verdict is announced by Timothy M. O’Shea, United States Attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin.

On August 12, 2024, Whiteside led police on a dangerous high-speed chase on a Madison highway and ultimately crashed the car he was driving into a semi-truck. From there, Whiteside fled on foot to the parking lot of a home improvement store, where a police officer found him hiding in a garden shed. Officers at the crash scene searched the vehicle Whiteside was driving and found a loaded firearm underneath the driver’s floormat. Later, an analyst from the Wisconsin State Crime Lab found Whiteside’s DNA on multiple locations on the firearm. Whiteside was previously convicted of illegally possessing a firearm as a felon in 2019.

Chief U.S. District Judge James D. Peterson scheduled sentencing for June 25. Whiteside faces a maximum penalty of 15 years in federal prison.

The case was investigated by the City of Monona Police Department, Madison Police Department, Wisconsin State Patrol, and the ATF Madison Crime Gun Task Force. The ATF Madison Crime Gun Task Force consists of federal agents from ATF and Task Force Officers from state and local agencies throughout the Western District of Wisconsin. The prosecution is being handled by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Chadwick M. Elgersma and Collen Lennon.