Phillip Alphonso Mayes, a 74-year-old resident of the District of Columbia, was sentenced on Apr. 1 to ten months in prison for unlawfully possessing two loaded revolvers and ammunition, as well as six months for resisting arrest, according to an announcement by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
The sentencing follows Mayes’s guilty plea on Dec. 1, 2025 before Judge Trevor N. McFadden to charges of unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition by a convicted felon and resisting arrest. In addition to the prison sentence, Judge McFadden ordered that Mayes serve one year of supervised release.
Court documents show that on Aug. 22, 2025, police responded to a report at a multiunit housing building in the 3800 block of W Street SE after a .38 Special revolver was found in a mailbox. As an officer guarded the weapon, Mayes attempted to retrieve it from the mailbox and said “that’s mine” before being stopped by police. During his attempted arrest, Mayes struggled with the officer—pushing her against a wall and pulling her up two flights of stairs—before she managed to break free with minor injuries.
After his arrest, officers searched Mayes’s apartment and found another loaded firearm—a .357 Magnum revolver—hidden in a closet bag. Mayes admitted ownership of both weapons.
Mayes was barred from owning firearms due to prior felony convictions: he had been convicted in Illinois in 2001 for possession of a controlled substance (serving two years) and twice convicted in Michigan in 1992 for retail fraud and habitual offender status (serving between sixteen months and two years).
The case was investigated by the Metropolitan Police Department along with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Washington Field Division. It was prosecuted under the Make D.C. Safe Again initiative supporting President Trump’s Executive Order targeting gun violence.
