United States v. John Melton

── United States v. John Melton ── Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit Date: June 02, 2026 Category: NEW USCA11 Case: 24-13674 Document: 36-1 Date Filed: 06/02/2026 Page: 1 of 11 NOT FOR PUBLICATION In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 24-13674 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus JOHN DAVID MELTON, a.k.a. David Melton, Defendant-Appellant. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia D.C. Docket No. 4:20-cr-00081-RSB-BKE-4 ____________________ Before ROSENBAUM, GRANT, and MARCUS, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: John David Melton (“David”) appeals his conviction for con- spiracy to violate the Sherman Act arising out of his involvement USCA11 Case: 24-13674 Document: 36-1 Date Filed: 06/02/2026 Page: 2 of 11 2 Opinion of the Court 24-13674 in the ready-mix concrete industry. Ready-mix concrete is a prod- uct made on demand and used in construction projects. Due to transportation costs and its perishable nature, concrete firms have “restricted geographic marketing areas” around individual produc- tion plants. The indictment charged several concrete companies and their representatives -- including Greg Melton (“Greg”), a divi- sion manager for the Argos company; James Pedrick, a cement salesman for Argos; the appellant David, the general manager for Elite Concrete, a competitor of Argos; and the Evans Concrete company and Timothy Strickland -- with participating in a conspir- acy to coordinate price increases, rig bids, and allocate jobs in their local ready-mix concrete industry in the Southern District of Geor- gia. After a four-day trial, the jury found David guilty of the con- spiracy count. He was sentenced to 26 months’ imprisonment, fol- lowed by three years of supervised release. On appeal, David argues that the district court: (1) erred by denying his motion for a judgment of acquittal after the close of the government’s evidence because the evidence was insufficient to establish that he was part of an agreement to fix prices, rig bids, or allocate markets; (2) abused its discretion by denying his motion for a new trial based on the prejudicially harmful testimony from two sales people (Argos salesman Pedrick and former Argos em- ployee, Chris Young) that -- based on their corporate antitrust train- ing -- David and his co-defendants engaged in “illegal” conduct; and (3) erred by denying David’s motion to dismiss the indictment based on the grand jury being improperly comprised during the COVID-19 pandemic. After careful review, we affirm. USCA11 Case: 24-13674 Document: 36-1 Date Filed: 06/02/2026 Page: 3 of 11 24-13674 Opinion of the Court 3 I. We review de novo a district court’s order denying a motion for a judgment of acquittal based on sufficiency of the evidence. United States v. Pirela Pirela, 809 F.3d 1195, 1198 (11th Cir. 2015). We review a district court’s denial of a motion for a new trial under Rule 33 for abuse of d