A man who was previously sentenced in state court for obstruction of justice based on his involvement with a murder was sentenced on December 29, 2025, to more than three years in federal prison. Marshawn Ladarius Jeffries, age 22, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received the prison term after an August 5, 2025, guilty plea to possession of a firearm by a felon.Information from the plea and sentencing showed that on February 28, 2025, Jeffries was a passenger in a rideshare car when the driver was pulled over for a nonworking taillight. Officers smelled marijuana coming from the car and had Jeffries step out. Officers patted Jeffries down after noticing that he seemed nervous and as if he was trying to conceal his waistband.
An officer located a 9mm pistol equipped with a high-capacity magazine in Jeffries’s waistband. The firearm had been previously reported stolen. Earlier that month, on February 2, 2025, Jeffries led police officers on a high-speed chase before he crashed his car into the wall of an apartment building. In sentencing Jeffries, Chief Judge C.J.
Williams noted that this was Jeffries’s fifth criminal involvement with a gun and that he was a real and present danger to the community. Jeffries was previously convicted of obstruction of justice for his involvement in a murder that took place at a home in Cedar Rapids in June 2020. Jeffries’s associate shot and killed the victim. Jeffries was also carrying a gun on the night of the murder.
After Jeffries’s associate killed the victim, Jeffries fled with the murderer, disposed of clothing, and made false denials to police officers. Jeffries was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Chief Judge C.J. Williams. Jeffries was sentenced to 42 months’ imprisonment.
He must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term. There is no parole in the federal system.Jeffries is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and gun violence, and to make our neighborhoods safer for everyone. On May 26, 2021, the Department launched a violent crime reduction strategy strengthening PSN based on these core principles: fostering trust and legitimacy in our communities, supporting community-based organizations that help prevent violence from occurring in the first place, setting focused and strategic enforcement priorities, and measuring the resultsThis case is part of Operation Take Back America a nationwide initiative that marshals the full resources of the Department of Justice to repel the invasion of illegal immigration, achieve the total elimination of cartels and transnational criminal organizations (TCOs), and protect our communities from the perpetrators of violent crime.The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Kyndra Lundquist and investigated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement, and the Iowa State Patrol. Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.The case file number is 25-CR-0038.Follow us on X @USAO_NDIA.