William Lee HUNTER, AKA William Leigh Hunter, Petitioner-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Respondent-Appellee
Opinion
Opinion
The National Firearms Act makes it unlawful for private citizens to possess unregistered firearms, and mandates denial of any application for registration of a firearm the possession of which is illegal. 26 U.S.C. §§ 5812 , 5822. The Firearm Owners’ Protection Act makes it illegal for any person to possess a machine gun that was not lawfully possessed before the statute’s effective date of May 19,1986, 18 U.S.C. § 922 (o), and thus makes it impossible to comply with the National Firearms Act’s registration requirement with respect to machine guns not lawfully possessed before May 19,1986.
William Hunter pled guilty to possession of an unregistered machine gun in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861 (d). He subsequently filed a § 2255 motion to vacate his sentence on the ground that the statute under which he was convicted, read in the light of section 922(o), was unconstitutional. The district court denied the motion, and we affirm.
I.
Relying on United States v. Dalton, 960 F.2d 121 (10th Cir.1992), Hunter contends that criminalizing possession of an unregistered machine gun is fundamentally unfair because the statute prevents him from complying with the registration requirement, and…