Background
Defendant Jimmie L. Wallace was a passenger in a vehicle stopped by Pekin Police Department officers at approximately 2 a.m. after the driver, Julie Pokorny, was found to have a suspended license. Under department towing policy, Pokorny’s vehicle had to be impounded. When officers asked Wallace to exit the vehicle for an inventory search, he attempted to remove a backpack from between his legs but was told to leave it inside.
During the inventory search, an officer located a jar containing white crystal residue consistent with methamphetamine. Treating this as probable cause, the officer then searched the backpack and discovered a loaded Glock 22 handgun. Wallace was charged with unlawful possession of a weapon by a felon (UPWF) under 720 ILCS 5/24-1.1(a), based on a prior felony conviction for unlawful delivery of a controlled substance. Following a stipulated bench trial, he was convicted and sentenced to three years and two months in prison.
On appeal, Wallace raised two challenges: first, that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence obtained during the search; and second, that the UPWF statute is unconstitutional under the Second Amendment framework established in New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022), both facially and as applied to him.
The Court’s Holding
The Fourth District affirmed on both grounds. On the suppression issue, the court found that the trial court did not err. Although officers did not complete an itemized inventory log as required by department policy, the court determined the search was conducted in good faith for a legitimate purpose — protecting property and shielding both the department and the tow company from liability. The court further held that Vicary’s instruction to leave the backpack inside the vehicle was a reasonable officer-safety measure, not an unlawful seizure of Wallace’s property.
On the constitutional challenge, the court adhered to its prior holdings in People v. Burns, 2024 IL App (4th) 230428, and People v. Cadengo, 2025 IL App (4th) 240568. The court held that as a convicted felon, Wallace is not a “law-abiding citizen” whose conduct is presumptively protected under Bruen‘s first step. Even under alternative analyses applied by other districts, the court noted that modern felon-in-possession statutes are consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation under Bruen‘s second step.
The court also rejected Wallace’s as-applied challenge based on the nonviolent nature of his predicate offense, declining to distinguish between violent and nonviolent felonies for Second Amendment purposes.
Key Takeaways
- An inventory search may be upheld even where officers do not complete an itemized inventory log, so long as the search was conducted in good faith for a legitimate purpose.
- The Fourth District continues to hold that felons fall outside the scope of Bruen‘s protections entirely, regardless of whether their predicate offenses were violent or nonviolent.
- An officer’s instruction to a passenger to leave personal property inside a vehicle during a lawful inventory search does not constitute an independent seizure requiring separate Fourth Amendment justification.
Why It Matters
This opinion reaffirms the Fourth District’s consistent position — now supported by multiple districts across Illinois — that post-Bruen Second Amendment challenges to felon-in-possession statutes lack merit. For criminal defense practitioners, the case also clarifies the bounds of inventory-search compliance: while police should follow their own documented procedures, minor deviations (such as failing to complete an itemized log) will not invalidate an otherwise good-faith search conducted pursuant to a lawful impoundment.
The decision contributes to a growing body of Illinois case law establishing that Bruen does not extend Second Amendment protections to individuals with prior felony convictions, regardless of whether those convictions involve violence.