U.S. v. Woods

• Decision Date: 05 August 2009
• Docket Number: No. 07-3851.,07-3851.
• Citation: 576 F.3d 400
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Vernon WOODS, Defendant-Appellant.

576 F.3d 400

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Vernon WOODS, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 07-3851.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued January 6, 2009.

Decided August 5, 2009.

Joseph C. Pedersen, Attorney (argued), Office of the United States Attorney, Rockford, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Carol A. Brook, Attorney, Office of the Federal Defender Program, Chicago, IL, Haneef Omar, Attorney (argued), Federal Defender Program, Rockford, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before KANNE, WOOD, and SYKES, Circuit Judges.

WOOD, Circuit Judge.

Vernon Woods was convicted of two counts of distributing ecstasy, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), and one count of possession of a weapon by a felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g). The district court found that Woods was a career offender and thus was subject to an enhanced sentence under § 4B1.1 of the United States Sentencing Guidelines ("U.S.S.G."). The court imposed a sentence of 192 months, well above the 84-month sentence Woods might have received without the career offender enhancement. Woods now appeals his sentence, challenging whether, following the Supreme Court's decision in Begay v. United States, ___ U.S. ___, 128 S.Ct. 1581, 170 L.Ed.2d 490 (2008), and this court's decision in United States v. Smith, 544 F.3d 781 (7th Cir.2008), his prior conviction for involuntary manslaughter — which required only a finding of recklessness — qualifies as a prior violent felony conviction for the purpose of the Guidelines. We conclude that Begay and Smith resolve this question in Woods's favor, and we therefore vacate the judgment of the district court and remand for further proceedings.

I

After being caught in October and November 2006 distributing methylenedioxy-methamphetamine (commonly known as ecstasy) to an undercover police officer, Woods pleaded guilty both to that offense and the offense of being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition that had previously been transported in interstate commerce. In the presentence investigation report ("PSR"), the Probation Service concluded that Woods was a career offender as defined by U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1. In so doing, the Probation Service relied on two prior convictions in Woods's record: (1) a 1993 Illinois conviction for possession of cocaine with intent to deliver; and (2) a 2001 Illinois conviction for involuntary manslaughter. It is the second conviction that concerns us here.

The facts underlying Woods's earlier conviction for involuntary manslaughter were contested at crucial points. Woods had been babysitting his infant son for several days. At a change of plea hearing (held after a jury had failed to convict him upon a first trial), Woods admitted that the child was five weeks old, and that he called 911 on the afternoon of March 18, 1999, when the child became unresponsive. The emergency authorities responded and took the baby to the hospital; six months later, he died. The state was prepared to call the deputy medical examiner, who would have testified that the child died of water on the brain (hydrocephalus due to subdural hematoma) as a result of blunt head trauma. She also would have testified that there were other signs of "wanton cruelty," including a clinical history of cerebral palsy and a clinical history of severe mental retardation (although there is no explanation of how she came to the latter conclusion with respect to a five-week-old child). She described the manner of death as "homicide" — but as Woods notes, involuntary manslaughter is classified under Illinois law as a homicide offense. See 720 ILCS, Act 5, Part B, Article 9 (Homicide); 720 ILCS 5/9-3 (involuntary manslaughter).

One possible explanation of those facts is that Woods took violent action against the child, shaking him and causing injury that resulted in his death six months later. But Woods, in his response to the PSR, gave an alternative explanation. According to Woods, he had dropped the baby and never intended to hurt him. When the baby lost consciousness, he shook the baby in an effort to revive him, and then he called 911 and requested an ambulance.¹ Nothing in the plea colloquy before the state court resolved which version was true, nor were there any facts that might have shown whether the blunt head trauma could have resulted from being dropped as opposed to being shaken.

At the sentencing hearing, Woods objected to the Government's characterization of his involuntary manslaughter conviction as a crime of violence under the Guidelines. (He conceded that the first conviction fell within the definition of § 4B1.1 because it was a controlled substance offense.) Woods argued that his involuntary manslaughter offense was not a crime of violence for two principal reasons: first, because his actions did not create a "serious potential risk of physical injury to another"; and second, because the mens rea for involuntary manslaughter in Illinois requires only criminal recklessness, and recklessness was insufficient to trigger the enhanced sentencing range recommended by the Guidelines. Further, Woods argued that even if the court were to look beyond the statute of conviction, the transcript of the plea hearing did not demonstrate that he acted in a way that presented a serious potential risk of physical injury to another.

The district court rejected all of these arguments, holding that the involuntary manslaughter statute described behavior presenting a risk analogous to the Illinois offense of reckless discharge of a firearm. This court held that the latter offense fell within the scope of § 4B1.1 of the Guidelines in United States v. Newbern, 479 F.3d 506, 508 (7th Cir.2007). The district court also held that although Newbern did not require it to go any further, that it would if necessary find the underlying facts of Woods's conviction sufficient to support a finding that his conviction for involuntary manslaughter was a crime of violence as the Guidelines define that term. On November 16, 2007, the district court sentenced Woods to 192 months' imprisonment a sentence in the middle of the career offender range of 188 to 235 months. After Woods brought his appeal, the Supreme Court decided Begay, which cast new light on the Court's interpretation of career offender enhancements like the one found in § 4B1.1. Whether Woods is entitled to succeed or fail in this appeal turns on the proper understanding of the Supreme Court's decisions in Begay and the cases that have followed it.

II

The Sentencing Guidelines designate any defendant convicted of a "crime of violence or a controlled substance offense" who also has at least two prior felony convictions of either a crime of violence or a controlled substance offense as a "career offender." § 4B1.1. Career offenders are subject to an enhanced base offense level and are automatically assigned to Criminal History Category VI. A great deal therefore hangs on the proper characterization of a defendant's past encounters with the law. For Woods, it meant the difference between an advisory Guidelines range of 84 to 105 months (without career criminal status) and a range of 188 to 235 months (with career criminal status).²

In Woods's case, as in many, we are concerned with the question whether the defendant's prior offenses are properly characterized as crimes of violence. The Guidelines define a crime of violence as "any offense under federal or state law" that

(1) has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person of another, or

(2) is burglary of a dwelling, arson, or extortion, involves use of explosives, or otherwise involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another.

U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2(a). In deciding whether a crime fits that definition, the Supreme Court has instructed lower courts to use a categorical approach. In James v. United States, 550 U.S. 192, 127 S.Ct. 1586, 167 L.Ed.2d 532 (2007), a case dealing with the closely analogous Armed Career Criminal Act ("ACCA"), 18 U.S.C. § 924(e), the Court explained what it meant by a "categorical approach":

Under this approach, we "`look only to the fact of conviction and the statutory definition of the prior offense,'" and do not generally consider the "particular facts disclosed by the record of conviction." Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13, 17, 125 S.Ct. 1254, 161 L.Ed.2d 205 (2005) (quoting Taylor [v. United States], 495 U.S. [575, 602, 110 S.Ct. 2143, 109 L.Ed.2d 607 (1990)]). That is, we consider whether the elements of the offense are of the type that would justify its inclusion within the residual provision, without inquiring into the specific conduct of this particular offender.

550 U.S. at 202, 127 S.Ct. 1586. See also Begay, 128 S.Ct. at 1584. In United States v. Templeton, 543 F.3d 378 (7th Cir.2008), taking note of the identity of language between the ACCA and §§ 4B1.1 and 4B1.2, we held that the James analysis also applies to the Guidelines's career offender provisions. In the discussion that follows, we therefore refer to the ACCA and the career offender provisions of the Guidelines interchangeably.

In applying the categorical approach, James recognized that the specific facts underlying certain offenses might reflect either a greater or a lesser degree of violence. The Court rejected the idea that a crime can never be one of violence, using the categorical approach, unless "every conceivable factual offense covered by [the] statute must necessarily present a serious potential risk of injury...." 550 U.S. at 208, 127 S.Ct. 1586. Rather, it wrote, "the proper inquiry is whether the conduct encompassed by the elements of the offense, in the ordinary case, presents a serious potential risk of injury to another." Id. As we understand it, this means that a crime must be categorized as one of violence even if, through some freak chance, the conduct did not turn out to be violent in an unusual...