United States v. Kimbrough

319 F. Supp. 3d 912
District Court, M.D. Tennessee·Decided June 26, 2018·No. No. 3:15–cr–00147·Published·Cited by 1 cases

Opinion

WAVERLY D. CRENSHAW, JR., CHIEF UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

The Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment is violated when the federal government "tak[es] away someone's life, liberty, or property under a criminal law so vague that it fails to give ordinary people fair notice of the conduct it punishes, or so standardless that it invites arbitrary enforcement." Johnson v. United States, --- U.S. ----, 135 S.Ct. 2551, 2556, 192 L.Ed.2d 569 (2015) (citing Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352, 357-358, 103 S.Ct. 1855, 75 L.Ed.2d 903 (1983) ). Such was found to be the case in Johnson where the residual clause of the Armed Career Criminal Act of 1984 ("ACCA") defined the term "violent felony" to include any felony that "involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another." 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(2)(B). It was also the case in Sessions v. Dimaya, --- U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 1204, 1210, 200 L.Ed.2d 549 (2018) where the Immigration and Nationality Act ("INA") defined "aggravated felony" by referencing 18 U.S.C. § 16(b)'s "crime of violence" definition that includes a felony which, "by its nature, involves a substantial risk that physical force against the person or property of another may be used in the course of committing the offense."

The question now before the Court in the form of Terrance Kimbrough's Second Amended Motion to Dismiss (Doc. No. 472) is whether the same should be said about 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3). That statute makes it unlawful for any person "who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance ... to or possess in or affecting commerce, any firearm or ammunition[.]"

Having fully considered the applicable law and the arguments of the parties, the Court finds that 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3) is not facially void for vagueness and, accordingly, Kimbrough's Motion to Dismiss will be denied. That denial will be without prejudice to Kimbrough asserting an "as applied" challenged should the evidence at trial so warrant.

I. Johnson and Dimaya

Johnson involved a Minnesota statue that made it unlawful to posses a sawed-off shot gun, and was the fifth time the Supreme Court addressed the residual clause of the ACCA in an "attempt[ ] to discern its meaning." 135 S.Ct. at 2556. Twice it found that a state law was covered by the clause: James v. United States, 550 U.S. 192, 127 S.Ct. 1586, 167 L.Ed.2d 532 (2007) (Florida's offense of attempted burglary);

*914and Sykes v. United States, 564 U.S. 1, 131 S.Ct. 2267, 180 L.Ed.2d 60 (2011) (Indiana's offense of vehicular flight from police). Twice it found the state law not covered by the clause: Begay v. United States, 553 U.S. 137, 128 S.Ct. 1581, 170 L.Ed.2d 490 (2008) (New Mexico's offense of driving under the influence); and Chambers v. United States, 555 U.S. 122, 129 S.Ct. 687, 172 L.Ed.2d 484 (2009) (Illinois' offense of failing to report to prison). "Nine years' experience trying to derive meaning from the residual clause convince[d]" the Supreme Court that it "ha[d] embarked upon a failed enterprise" because the clause was "shapeless" and required "guesswork." Johnson, 135 S.Ct. at 2560.

In the Supreme Court's view, "[t]wo features of the residual clause conspire[d] to make it unconstitutionally vague" Id. at 2557. On the one hand, it left "grave uncertainty about how to estimate the risk posed by a crime" because it "tie[d] the judicial assessment of risk to a judicially imagined 'ordinary case' of a crime, not to real-world facts or statutory elements." Id.

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United States v. Kimbrough, 319 F. Supp. 3d 912 (M.D. Tenn. 2018).

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