United States v. Wehunt

230 F. Supp. 3d 838, 2017 WL 347544, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12540
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Tennessee
DecidedJanuary 24, 2017
DocketCase No. 1:16-cr-17-1
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 230 F. Supp. 3d 838 (United States v. Wehunt) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Tennessee primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Wehunt, 230 F. Supp. 3d 838, 2017 WL 347544, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12540 (E.D. Tenn. 2017).

Opinion

ORDER

HARRY S. MATTICE, JR., UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

Before the Court is Defendant’s Motion to Withdraw Guilty Plea (Doc. 39). For the reasons stated herein, the Court will REJECT the Parties’ plea agreement. Accordingly, Defendant’s Motion (Doc. 39) is MOOT.

I. BACKGROUND

On February 23, 2016, Defendant was indicted for one count of armed bank rob[840]*840bery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2, 2113(a), and 2113(d). (Doc. 9). The United States and the Defendant entered into a plea agreement pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(c)(1)(C) on July 14, 2016. (Doc. 27). Therein, the Parties agreed that a sentence. of 188 months’ imprisonment “is the appropriate disposition of this case,” and that “the proposed sentence is based on a Guidelines sentencing range based on the career offender guideline.” (Id. at 3-4). Defendant’s predicate offenses for his agreed upon career offender status include a 2007 Tennessee Aggravated Robbery conviction, and a 2007 Tennessee Reckless Aggravated Assault conviction.1 (Doc. 41 at 3).

On October 7, 2016, the United States Probation Office (“USPO”) released its Presentence Investigation Report (“PSR”). (Doc. 37). Contrary to the Patties’ original belief, the PSR stated that, pursuant to United States v. Cooper, 739 F.3d 873 (6th Cir. 2014), Reckless Aggravated Assault does not categorically qualify as a crime of violence. (Doc. 37 at 10, 20). Accordingly, the USPO determined that Defendant was not a career offender, and that the resulting Sentencing Guideline range was 84 to 105 months’ imprisonment. (Id. at 19). Given this finding, Defendant filed a Motion to Withdraw his Guilty plea. (Doc. 39).

Shortly thereafter, the United States filed an objection (Doc. 40) to the PSR, arguing that, pursuant to Voisine v. United States, — U.S. -, 136 S.Ct. 2272, 195 L.Ed.2d 736 (2016), Tennessee Reckless Aggravated Assault does, in fact, qualify as a predicate offense for career offender purposes, and that Defendant should therefore be sentenced as a career offender. Defendant filed a response in opposition to the Government’s objection on November 3, 2016. (Doc. 44). On November 7, 2016, the USPO released a Revised PSR in which it adopted the Government’s position that, pursuant to Voisine, Reckless Aggravated Assault qualifies as a predicate offense for career offender purposes. (Doc. 45 at 10). Accordingly, the Revised PSR labels Defendant a career offender, with a resulting Sentencing Guideline range of 188 to 235 months’ imprisonment. (Id. at 19). Defendant subsequently filed an objection (Doc. 47) to the Revised PSR in which he asks the Court to consider his response in opposition (Doc. 44) to the Government’s original objection as an objection to the Revised PSR’s characterization of Defendant as a career offender.

II. ANALYSIS

The sole question before the Court is whether Tennessee Reckless Aggravated Assault (hereinafter “Reckless Aggravated Assault”) qualifies as a predicate offense under U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2(a)(1). Defendant argues that Reckless Aggravated Assault does not qualify as a predicate offense for career offender purposes. Specifically, he claims that the mens rea of recklessness precludes its inclusion under the “use-of-force” clause, defining a “crime of violence.”2 U.S.S.G. §§ 4B1.1 and 4B1.2(a)(1). In support, Defendant relies primarily on United States v. McMurray, [841]*841653 F.3d 367 (6th Cir. 2011), in which the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit analyzed the identically worded “use-of-force” clause in the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”). The Sixth Circuit ultimately held that “pursuant to Leocal and Pórtela, we conclude that the ‘use of physical force’ clause of the ACCA, § 924(e)(2)(B)(i), requires more than reckless conduct.” Id. at 374-75; see also Cooper, 739 F.3d at 879 (“To its credit, the government concedes that Adams’s prior conviction [for Tennessee Aggravated Assault] does not categorically qualify as a crime of violence under either the [use-of-force clause] or the residual [clause], according to our past decisions, because the statute criminalizes reckless conduct.”)3 (internal quotation marks omitted); McMurray, 653 F.3d at 375 (“We conclude that the Tennessee crime of aggravated assault is not a ‘violent felony under the ‘use of physical force’ clause of the ACCA.”); United States v. McFalls, 592 F.3d 707, 716 (6th Cir. 2010) (“South Carolina’s common-law crime of ABHAN is also not categorically a crime of violence. This is because ABHAN applies not only to intentional conduct, but also to reckless conduct. We have squarely held that under the Guidelines definition of ‘crime of violence’ contained in U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(1)(E), cmt. 1(B)(iii), which is materially indistinguishable from the definition that we apply today (U.S.S.G. § 4B 1.2(a) & cmt. 1), a crime requiring only recklessness does not qualify. Other circuits have reached the same conclusion under the indistinguishable words of the Armed Career Criminal Act.”) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted); United States v. Portela, 469 F.3d 496, 499 (6th Cir. 2006) (“We now follow the ‘considered dicta’ of Leocal ... and the reasoning of our two sister circuits to hold that a crime requiring only recklessness does not qualify as a ‘crime of violence’ under 18 U.S.C. § 16. Because the catchall clause of U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(1) uses identical language, Portela’s conviction for reckless vehicular assault is not a ‘crime of violence’ under that clause, and because it is not, the district court lacked support for its 16-level increase in Portela’s sentence.”); Cutshaw v. United States, 2016 WL 3212269 at *2 (E.D. Tenn. June 7, 2016) (“Two of Petitioner’s four predicate offenses were for Class D aggravated assault [i.e., Reckless Aggravated Assault] and felony evading arrest. Neither offense qualifies as a violent felony under the ACCA’s use-of-force clause .... ”).

The Government, however, argues that these binding decisions have been effectively overruled by Voisine, — U.S. -, 136 S.Ct. 2272, 195 L.Ed.2d 736. The Court, therefore, must turn to Voisine and several lower courts’ interpretations thereof in order to resolve the legal question at hand.

A. Voisine v. United States, — U.S. -, 136 S.Ct. 2272, 195 L.Ed.2d 736 (2016)

18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9) prohibits any person convicted of a “misdemeanor crime of

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Mitchell v. United States
257 F. Supp. 3d 996 (W.D. Tennessee, 2017)
United States v. Bennett
868 F.3d 1 (First Circuit, 2017)
Davis v. United States
262 F. Supp. 3d 539 (E.D. Tennessee, 2017)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
230 F. Supp. 3d 838, 2017 WL 347544, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12540, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-wehunt-tned-2017.