Geneva County Man Sentenced to More Than Nine Years in Prison for Federal Gun Charges

Montgomery, Alabama – On Wednesday, February 26, 2020, Jermaine Dale Jones, a 35-year-old man from Geneva County, Alabama, was sentenced to 112 months in prison for federal firearms charges, announced United States Attorney Louis V. Franklin, Sr. Following his prison sentence, Jones will be on supervised release for three years.

In November 2019, Jones pleaded guilty to charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm and possession of a firearm in connection with a drug trafficking crime. The charges arose out of two separate incidents.

According to court records, on May 20, 2018, officers in Enterprise, Alabama responded to a call about a man arguing with others and waving a firearm outside the window of a green Ford F-150 pickup truck near a local restaurant. When officers arrived at the location described by the caller, they observed two individuals sitting in a tan Chevy Tahoe. The officers approached the vehicle to speak to the occupants and saw the handle of a pistol next to Jones, who was in the passenger seat. Further investigation revealed there were two other firearms inside the vehicle and that Jones had purchased the weapons from the man who had been in the green F-150. Jones, who is a convicted felon, was indicted by a federal grand jury in February 2019 for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

On February 21, 2019, the United States Marshals Service and Gulf Coast Regional Fugitive Task Force officers went to Jones's residence in Geneva County to arrest him on the felon in possession of a firearm charge. During the arrest, officers saw marijuana and a handgun in plain view. A search warrant was obtained for the house and, during the search, drugs and additional firearms were found. Among the drugs seized were clonazepam, alprazolam, marijuana, hydrocodone, and methamphetamine hydrochloride. As a result of these discoveries, Jones was further charged with possession of a firearm in connection with a drug trafficking crime.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the Enterprise Police Department, and the United States Marshals Service (USMS) investigated this case. Assistant United States Attorney Robert Nichols prosecuted this case.