Waterloo Man Sent to Federal Prison for Shooting at an Occupied Home

A man who discharged a gun at an occupied house was sentenced today to 46 months in federal prison.

Montrell Anderson, age 20, from Waterloo, Iowa, received the prison term after an April 3, 2023 guilty plea to possession of a firearm by a drug user and possession of a stolen firearm.

Information at the sentencing hearing showed that on April 24, 2022, Anderson twice shot a stolen gun into a neighboring occupied house, nearly hitting one of the residents.  At the time, he was under the influence of marijuana.  Five months later, in September 2022, officers found three more guns belonging to Anderson.  Two of the firearms were stolen.  Anderson’s urine tested positive for marijuana metabolites, opiates, and benzodiazepines.

Anderson was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Judge C.J. Williams.  Anderson was sentenced to 46 months’ imprisonment and must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term.  There is no parole in the federal system.  Anderson 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 results.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Liz Dupuich and Special Assistant United States Attorney Devra Hake, and it was investigated by the Waterloo Police Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation. 

Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl. 

The case file number is 23-CR-2012.

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