Since the Memphis Safe Task Force began making arrests in the Bluff City nearly a year ago, more than 400 criminal cases have been filed in federal court, with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Tennessee filing nearly 40 criminal cases per month since October 2025.
The monthly caseload reflects a 94% increase in criminal filings compared to the previous year, though that increase could be larger due to cases from June, July and August not yet populating the federal court docket, which can happen for a variety of reasons that often are not explained. But more cases being filed has not led to longer sentences compared to the year prior.
The Task Force was billed as a "tough on crime" operation to counteract Republicans' perceived
failings of the Shelby County District Attorney's Office and nation-leading crime numbers. At its launch, U.S. Attorney Mike Dunavant for the Western District of Tennessee said federal courts have stiffer penalties and the ability to outright deny a defendant bail.
He also promised to prosecute as many cases federally as his office could manage.
As the one-year mark of the Task Force’s operations in Memphis nears, The Commercial Appeal reviewed every federal case filed between October 2025 and the end of August to see the results of federal prosecutions.
In total, The CA documented 407 criminal cases filed in that 11-month time frame. Each case was reviewed individually by a reporter. Some cases were not complete as of Sept. 1, when The CA stopped reviewing and updating case statuses, and may have changed by the time of this article’s publication.
Just under half of the cases filed since the Task Force arrived have reached some sort of completion, called a “disposition” in court parlance, with the rest of those cases still pending.
And, of those 200 cases that have reached an endpoint, the data mirrors that of Shelby County’s criminal court system. Only about 3% of federal cases that have ended went to trial, and only half of those trials ended with a guilty verdict.
The vast majority of completed cases, about 74.5%, ended in a plea bargain. And 22.5% of federal criminal cases ended with a dismissal of all charges.
The CA also took a three-month sample comparing federal criminal charges filed from Oct. 1-Dec. 31, 2025 (after the Task Force arrived) with criminal charges filed from Oct. 1-Dec. 31, 2024. That data showed 43 cases filed in 2024 and 160 filed in 2025.
Most defendants had not yet been sentenced in the 2025 cases. But of those who had been sentenced, the sentences levied against defendants in cases since the Task Force arrived were nearly 60% shorter on average than the year prior.
"There were a lot of arrests of what I'd like to call low-hanging fruit," Dunavant said of the Task Force's first three months. "We know what's creating violent crime in this city. It's the guns. It's the illegal guns. I have often said that the most dangerous person on the streets of Memphis today is a 17-year-old or 18-year-old with a gun. They don't have any prior, significant criminal history, and criminal history is what drives sentencing."
Dunavant went on to say those early cases were for more minor offenses, like felon in possession of a handgun charges, which he said might not result in a very long prison stint but would result in some amount of time off the street.
That decrease, he said, also reflects his decision to charge more defendants with federal crimes when his predecessor may have only focused on prosecuting fewer cases that had considerably more evidence.
"I have different ideas about what constitutes a proper use of federal government resources to target a certain violent and dangerous population than previous administrations," Dunavant said. "They'll have to live with their record, and I'll have to live with mine."
The data reviewed by The CA only included cases filed in the Memphis division of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee because most, if not all, Memphis Safe Task Force cases would be prosecuted there.
But focusing on the Memphis division still leaves difficulties distinguishing with certainty which cases involved the Task Force and which featured non-Task Force-related law enforcement. Federal law enforcement agencies have long operated within Memphis, with the FBI and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) working closely with Memphis police even prior to the Task Force’s arrival.
State agencies, like the Tennessee Highway Patrol, have also had a presence in Memphis.
The Task Force is made up of at least 30 federal agencies, the Tennessee Highway Patrol, Memphis Police Department and Shelby County Sheriff’s Office. It is spearheaded by the U.S. Marshals Service, which has worked with MPD and SCSO to serve warrants and hunt down fugitives.
How has the Task Force impacted the federal court system?
To get a closer look at the federal cases since the Task Force arrived, the CA took a random 20% sample of the cases filed between October 2025 and August this year. Of the 40 cases in that random sample, 15 of them were concretely identified as having Task Force involvement.
Each of those cases was clearly distinguished as Task Force cases because they were initially filed with a criminal complaint and law enforcement affidavit. Those affidavits provide a narrative of why a person was arrested and, in those affidavits, the Task Force’s involvement was clearly stated.
There were 12 cases in which it was not clear whether the Task Force was involved. Each of those cases, except for one, was started through an indictment. In federal court, indictments rarely contain descriptions of which agencies made an arrest and, as such, it is unclear what agencies were involved in the case.
One of the cases where it was unclear if the Task Force was involved did have a criminal complaint, but that complaint was sealed from the public.
Finally, there were 13 cases where Task Force involvement was not clearly designated, but agencies involved in the Task Force — including the Tennessee Highway Patrol, FBI, Drug Enforcement Agency, Marshals Service, ATF and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement — were named as responsible for the arrests.
The Memphis Police Department was also involved in some arrests.
According to Dunavant, most of the cases filed were related to Task Force arrests. As of Sept. 15, when he spoke with The CA, Dunavant said the Task Force was involved in arresting 535 defendants and charging them with federal crimes.
The number of defendants and cases filed can have similarities, but some cases have multiple defendants. For most of this project, The CA tracked the number of cases filed as opposed to the number of defendants charged.
With nearly a quarter of cases dismissed, is the task force making weaker cases?
Nearly a quarter of completed federal cases were dismissed over the last year, many of them being dismissed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office with no clear explanation.
A closer look at one case showed a judge suppressed evidence due to an illegal stop and search of a person. Law enforcement found the person in possession of a handgun, and confirmed they had a prior felony, but the judge overseeing the case said there was no probable cause to stop the person.
A month later, federal prosecutors dropped the case.
“The court finds that the officers here simply saw (the defendant) walking outside, in the middle of the day, in a high-crime area, in the opposite direction, and assumed that him clutching his bag meant that he had a gun,” U.S. District Court Chief Judge Sheryl H. Lipman for the Western District of Tennessee wrote. “That assumption was not tethered to a specific fact implying criminal conduct."
Of the dismissed cases, at least four others were dismissed after defense attorneys filed motions to suppress evidence. That made up about 11% of all dismissals.
Two dismissals were conducted by judges who found there was not probable cause to make an arrest and two others were dismissed by judges after defense attorneys alleged prosecutors did not move quickly enough to prosecute a case.
Some of the dismissals likely stemmed from the U.S. Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Hemani. For years, federal prosecutors have been able to charge marijuana users as an “unlawful user” of a firearm.
In June, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that casual marijuana users cannot be prosecuted for owning a firearm. The ruling did not completely invalidate the law but added barriers for prosecutors before it could be invoked.
At least six cases reviewed by the CA were dismissed after the Supreme Court ruling and involved a defendant charged with being a drug user in possession of a firearm.
Dunavant said his office, and the Department of Justice as a whole, reviewed the Supreme Court's decision and updated its policies. He also said his office is now "applying [the ruling] into our charging decisions."
Immigration cases make up some dismissals; actual proceedings sealed
Most immigration cases, if they escape from immigration court, are handled in civil court. But some of the criminal cases filed since the Task Force arrived have involved criminal immigration offenses or involved immigrants.
At least three of the dismissed cases involved immigrants who agreed to self-deport. In two of those dismissals, federal prosecutors started prosecuting the case like it would any other, but ran into problems with ICE.
Both cases featured a defendant who was given bail and was immediately detained by ICE after posting it.
In one case, Mauro Hernandez-Gonzalez told investigators he was in the country without protected status and owned a gun. He was then charged with being an illegal alien in possession of a firearm. He posted bond in that case and was immediately detained by ICE.
According to a motion to dismiss filed by his attorney, ICE agreed to forego criminal charges if Hernandez-Gonzales would self-deport. Nearly a week after that motion was filed, the U.S. Attorney's Office voluntarily dismissed the case. No explanation was given in the government's motion to dismiss.
Another similar case resulted in the dismissal of criminal charges when a defendant was not present for his first report date due to ICE having detained him. The prosecutor in that case told the court they did not know ICE had detained the defendant.
He would be brought to court for his next court date, but ultimately deported in April, and his case was subsequently dismissed.
The two cases point to some amount of confusion between federal agencies, with ICE not informing prosecutors of deals between it and potential deportees. Dunavant said those instances of miscommunication were not widespread, adding he has made arrangements to bring people to and from ICE detention facilities for court.
Dunavant also emphasized that his office only sees a "fairly small subset" of immigration-related cases. Immigration offenses are not criminal offenses, with the exception of illegal entry into the country, illegal re-entry into the country after being previously deported, and illegal alien in possession of a handgun.
In those three instances, Dunavant said he wants to prosecute them, have them serve their sentence, and then deport them. For the rest of the government's deportation efforts, he said he has not been involved with those cases since they are administrative infractions.
"I'm really only interested in those cases where we have an illegal re-entry involving someone who's continuing to commit crimes and victimize people here in this community," he said. "That's a fairly small subset of those persons who are being taken into custody by ICE."
Lucas Finton covers crime, policing, jails, the courts and criminal justice policy for The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached by phone or email: (901)208-3922 and Lucas.Finton@commercialappeal.com, and followed on X @LucasFinton.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Memphis Safe Task Force approaches 1 year. What has happened in court?
