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Date: 01-14-2023
Case Style:
United States of America v. Trevis Avante Strawder
Case Number: 1:22-cr-00021
Judge: Allen C. Winsor
Court: United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida (Alachua County)
Plaintiff's Attorney: United States Attorney’s Office in Gainesville
Defendant's Attorney:
Description: Gainesville, Florida criminal defense lawyer represented Defendant charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
On August 17, 2021, Gainesville Police Department (GPD) officers responded to a 911 call reporting an armed disturbance at Woodland Park Apartments. The caller described that the male suspect with the firearm was leaving the scene in a vehicle and provided a description. Officers responding to the area located a vehicle matching the caller’s description and attempted to conduct a traffic stop on it. The suspect vehicle slowed in a residential neighborhood and Trevis Avante Strawder, age 28, of Fort White, Florida, exited the rear driver’s side door of the vehicle and fled on foot while carrying a black bag. Officers gave chase and were able to observe Strawder running into a wooded area while no longer wearing the black bag. A GPD K9 tracked from the scene of the attempted traffic stop to the location of a black bag, near where Strawder jumped the fence to get into the wooded area. The bag was ultimately searched and discovered to contain two loaded pistols and several different controlled substances (cocaine, crack cocaine, MDMA, MDPV, etc.).
Officers set up a perimeter in the area and were subsequently alerted that Strawder attempted to force entry into the residence of an elderly man. The homeowner was able to keep Strawder from gaining entry through the front door, and GPD officers were later able to locate and apprehend Strawder hiding in another part of the residence. Once he was apprehended, Strawder provided a false name to officers, but he was positively identified and taken into custody on charges stemming from this incident as well as other outstanding arrest warrants.
Strawder had multiple prior felony convictions, to include burglary, grand theft, drug possession, possession of a firearm by a felon, and battery on a detainee. The case was brought to the attention of the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, who adopted the case for federal prosecution. Assistant United States Attorney Christopher M. Elsey prosecuted the case.
This federal conviction is the result of the joint efforts of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies that form the Gainesville Gun Violence Initiative (GVI). The Gainesville GVI was established in April 2019, by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Florida in an effort to stem the escalating gun violence in Gainesville and the surrounding areas. As GVI partners, the State Attorney’s Office for the Eighth Judicial Circuit, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the Gainesville Police Department, the Alachua County Sheriff’s Office, the Alachua Police Department, the University of Florida Police Department, and the Florida Department of Corrections share this commitment to protecting public safety.
Outcome: Defendant was sentenced to 120 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, and was assessed $100.00
Plaintiff's Experts:
Defendant's Experts:
Comments: