United States v. Jerome Morris

Opinion

United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit

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No. 24-3165

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United States of America

Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

Jerome Deuntia Morris

Defendant - Appellant

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Appeal from United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas - Central

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Submitted: February 9, 2026 Filed: May 27, 2026

[Unpublished]

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Before LOKEN, SMITH, and STRAS, Circuit Judges.

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PER CURIAM.

Jerome Morris challenges an enhancement he received for having “three previous convictions . . . for a violent felony.” 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1). At issue is a conviction of second-degree sexual assault, which he committed through “sexual contact . . . by forcible compulsion.” Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-125(a)(1). As we have already concluded, this version of the crime is a “violent felony.” United States v.

Dawn, 685 F.3d 790, 796, 797 n.5 (8th Cir. 2012) (holding that it “is necessarily a crime of violence,” which overlaps with the “violent felony” definition (citation omitted)), abrogated on other grounds by Lofton v. United States, 920 F.3d 572, 575 (8th Cir. 2019).

For the first time on appeal, Morris argues that Arkansas’s definition of “physical force,” see Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-101(2) (stating that “forcible compulsion” includes “physical force”), is overbroad. Compare Strawhacker v. State, 804 S.W.2d 720, 723 (Ark. 1991) (defining “physical force” as “any bodily impact, restraint or confinement, or the threat thereof” (emphasis added) (citation omitted)), with Johnson v. United States, 559 U.S. 133, 140 (2010) (requiring “violent force—that is, force capable of causing physical pain or injury to another person”). Despite the differences in wording, we conclude that Dawn necessarily means that any error in counting Morris’s second-degree sexual-assault conviction could not have been plain. See United States v. Solis, 915 F.3d 1172, 1177 (8th Cir. 2019) (“Usually, for an error to be plain, it must be in contravention of either Supreme Court or controlling circuit precedent.” (emphases added) (citation omitted)).

We accordingly affirm the judgment of the district court.1

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1 The Honorable James M. Moody, Jr., United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas.