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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
_________________
No. 18–6662
_________________
EDDIE LEE SHULAR, PETITIONER
v. UNITED
STATES
on writ of certiorari to the united states
court of appeals for the eleventh circuit
[February 26, 2020]
Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the
Court.
The Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA), 18
U. S. C. §924(e), mandates a 15-year minimum sentence of
imprisonment for certain defendants with prior convictions for a
“serious drug offense.” A state offense ranks as a “serious drug
offense” only if it “involv[es] manufacturing, distributing, or
possessing with intent to manufacture or dis- tribute, a controlled
substance.” §924(e)(2)(A)(ii). This case concerns the methodology
courts use to apply that definition.
While the parties agree that a court should look
to the state offense’s elements, they disagree over what the court
should measure those elements against. In the Government’s view,
the court should ask whether those elements involve the conduct
identified in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii)—namely, “manufacturing,
distributing, or possessing with intent to manufacture or
distribute, a controlled substance.” Petitioner Eddie Lee Shular,
however, contends that the terms employed in the statute identify
not conduct, but offenses. In his view, those terms are shorthand
for the elements of the offenses as commonly understood. According
to Shular, the court must first identify the elements of the
“generic” offense, then ask whether the elements of the state
offense match those of the generic crime.
Under the approach he advances, Shular argues,
his sentence is not subject to ACCA enhancement. The generic
offenses named in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii), as Shular understands them,
include a
mens rea element of knowledge that the substance
is illicit. He emphasizes that his prior convictions were for state
offenses that do not make knowledge of the substance’s illegality
an element of the offense; the state offenses, he therefore
maintains, do not match the generic offenses in
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii).
The question presented: Does §924(e)(2)(A)(ii)’s
“serious drug offense” definition call for a comparison to a
generic offense? We hold it does not. The “serious drug offense”
definition requires only that the state offense involve the conduct
specified in the federal statute; it does not require that the
state offense match certain generic offenses.
I
Ordinarily, a defendant convicted of being a
felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of §922(g)(1), faces
a maximum sentence of ten years. §924(a)(2). If the offender’s
prior criminal record includes at least three convictions for
“serious drug offense[s]” or “violent felon[ies],” however, ACCA
mandates a minimum sentence of 15 years. §924(e)(1).
To determine whether an offender’s prior
convictions qualify for ACCA enhancement, we have used a
“categorical approach,” under which we look “only to the statutory
definitions of the prior offenses.”
Taylor v.
United
States,
495 U.S.
575, 600 (1990). Under this approach, we consider neither “the
particular facts underlying the prior convictions” nor “the label a
State assigns to [the] crime[s].”
Mathis v.
United
States, 579 U. S. ___, ___ (2016) (slip op., at 8)
(internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). So, for
example, to apply ACCA’s provision defining “violent felony” to
include “burglary,” §924(e)(2)(B)(ii), we ask only whether the
elements of the prior conviction constitute burglary; we do not ask
what the person did or whether the offense of conviction was named
“burglary.”
Under some statutes, using a categorical
approach requires the court to come up with a “generic” version of
a crime—that is, the elements of “the offense as commonly
understood,”
id., at ___ (slip op., at 1).[
1] We have required that step when the
statute refers generally to an offense without specifying its
elements. In that situation, the court must define the offense so
that it can compare elements, not labels. For example, in
Taylor, confronted with ACCA’s unadorned reference to
“burglary,” we identified the elements of “generic burglary” based
on the “sense in which the term is now used in the criminal codes
of most States.” 495 U. S., at 598–599; §924(e)(2)(B)(ii). We
then inquired whether the elements of the offense of conviction
matched those of the generic crime.
Id., at 602. See also,
e.g.,
Esquivel-Quintana v.
Sessions, 581
U. S. ___, ___ (2017) (slip op., at 4) (“generic federal
definition of sexual abuse of a minor” for purposes of 8
U. S. C. §1101(a)(43)(A)).
In contrast, other statutes calling for a
categorical approach ask the court to determine not whether the
prior conviction was for a certain offense, but whether the
conviction meets some other criterion. For example, in
Kawashima v.
Holder,
565 U.S.
478 (2012), we applied a categorical approach to a statute
assigning immigration consequences to prior convictions for “an
offense that . . . involves fraud or deceit” with a loss
exceeding $10,000. §1101(a)(43)(M)(i). The quoted language, we
held, “mean[s] offenses with elements that necessarily entail
fraudulent or deceitful
conduct.”
Id., at 484
(emphasis added). Consequently, no identification of generic
offense elements was necessary; we simply asked whether the prior
convictions before us met that measure.
Id., at 483–485. See
also,
e.g.,
Stokeling v.
United States, 586
U. S. ___, ___–___ (2019) (slip op., at 12–13) (determining
whether an offense “has as an element the use, attempted use, or
threatened use of physical force against the person of another,” 18
U. S. C. §924(e)(2)(B)(i)).
This case invites us to decide which of the two
categorical methodologies just described applies in determining
whether a state offense is a “serious drug offense” under ACCA.
ACCA defines that term to include:
“an offense under State law, involving
manufacturing, distributing, or possessing with intent to
manufacture or distribute, a controlled substance (as defined in
section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U. S. C.
[§]802)), for which a maximum term of imprisonment of ten years or
more is prescribed by law.” 18 U. S. C.
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii).
II
Shular pleaded guilty in the United States
District Court for the Northern District of Florida to possessing a
firearm after having been convicted of a felony, in violation of
§922(g)(1), and possessing with intent to distribute cocaine and
cocaine base, in violation of 21 U. S. C. §841(a)(1) and
(b)(1)(C). The District Court sentenced Shular to imprisonment for
15 years, the mandatory minimum under ACCA, to be followed by three
years of supervised release.
In imposing that enhanced sentence, the District
Court took account of Shular’s prior convictions under Florida law.
In 2012, Shular pleaded guilty to five counts of selling cocaine
and one count of possessing cocaine with intent to sell, all in
violation of Fla. Stat. §893.13(1)(a). That law makes it a crime to
“sell, manufacture, or deliver, or possess with intent to sell,
manufacture, or deliver, a controlled substance.”
Ibid. For
those offenses, “knowledge of the illicit nature of a controlled
substance is not an element,” but lack of such knowledge “is an
affirmative defense.” §893.101(2). Shular’s six convictions under
that Florida law, the District Court concluded, qualified as
“serious drug offense[s]” triggering ACCA enhancement under 18
U. S. C. §924(e)(2)(A)(ii).
The United States Court of Appeals for the
Eleventh Circuit affirmed the sentence. 736 Fed. Appx. 876 (2018).
It relied on Circuit precedent holding that a court applying
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii) “need not search for the elements of ‘generic’
definitions” of any offense, because the statute “require[s] only
that the predicate offense ‘involv[e]’ . . . certain
activities.”
United States v.
Smith, 775 F.3d 1262,
1267 (2014).
Courts of Appeals have divided on whether
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii)’s “serious drug offense” definition requires a
comparison to a generic offense. Compare,
e.g.,
id.,
at 1267 (no generic-offense comparison), with
United States
v.
Franklin, 904 F.3d 793, 800 (CA9 2018) (court must define
a generic crime). We granted certiorari to resolve this conflict,
588 U. S. ___ (2019), and now affirm the Eleventh Circuit’s
judgment.
III
A
The parties here agree that §924(e)(2)(A)(ii)
requires a categorical approach. A court must look only to the
state offense’s elements, not the facts of the case or labels
pinned to the state conviction.
They differ, however, on what comparison
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii) requires. Shular would require “a generic-offense
matching exercise”: A court should define the elements of the
generic
offenses identified in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii), then
compare those elements to the elements of the state offense. Brief
for Petitioner 13–14. In the Government’s view, a court should
apply “the
Kawashima categorical approach”: It should ask
whether the state offense’s elements “necessarily entail one of the
types of
conduct” identified in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii). Brief for
United States 13, 20 (emphasis added).
This methodological dispute is occasioned by an
interpretive disagreement over §924(e)(2)(A)(ii)’s reference to
“manufacturing, distributing, or possessing with intent to
manufacture or distribute, a controlled substance.” Those terms, in
the Government’s view, describe conduct a court can compare
directly against the state crime’s elements. Shular sees them
instead as offenses whose elements a court must first expound.
B
The Government’s reading, we are convinced,
correctly interprets the statutory text and context. Two features
of §924(e)(2)(A)(ii), compared against a neighboring provision
referring to offenses, §924(e)(2)(B)(ii), show that
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii) refers to conduct.
First, the terms in
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii)—“manufacturing, distributing, or possessing with
intent to manufacture or distribute, a controlled substance”—are
unlikely names for generic offenses. Those words undoubtedly can be
used to describe conduct. But as Shular acknowledges, they are not
universal names of offenses; instead, States define “core drug
offenses with all manner of terminology, including: trafficking,
selling, giving, dispensing, distributing, delivering, promoting,
and producing.” Reply Brief 7.
Contrast §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) with
§924(e)(2)(B)(ii), the enumerated-offense clause of ACCA’s “violent
felony” definition, appearing in the same section of the Career
Criminals Amendment Act of 1986, 100Stat. 3207–39 to 3207–40. That
provision, which refers to a crime that “is burglary, arson, or
extortion,” requires a generic-offense analysis. See
Mathis,
579 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 2). The terms “burglary,”
“arson,” and “extortion”—given their common-law history and
widespread usage—un- ambiguously name offenses. Cf.,
e.g.,
Taylor, 495 U. S., at 590–599 (discussing “burglary”).
Drug offenses, Shular admits, lack “the same heritage and the same
established lexicon.” Brief for Petitioner 14.
Second, by speaking of activities a state-law
drug offense “involv[es],” §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) suggests that the
descriptive terms immediately following the word “involving”
identify conduct. The parties agree that “involve” means
“necessarily requir[e].” Brief for Petitioner 14 (citing Random
House Dictionary of the English Language 1005 (2d ed. 1987) (“to
include as a necessary circumstance, condition, or consequence”));
Brief for United States 21 (same). It is natural to say that an
offense “involves” or “requires” certain conduct.
E.g.,
§924(e)(2)(B)(ii) (addressing a crime “involv[ing] conduct that
presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another”);
Mathis, 579 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 5) (“The
generic offense [of burglary] requires unlawful entry into a
building or other structure.” (internal quotation marks
omitted)).
To refer to offenses as Shular urges, it would
have been far more natural for the drafter to follow the
enumerated-offense clause in using “is,” not “involving.” See
§924(e)(2)(B)(ii) (crime that “is burglary, arson, or extortion”).
There, the word “is” indicates a congruence between “crime” and the
terms that follow, terms that are also crimes. See American
Heritage Dictionary 114 (def. 7a) (1981) (“To equal in meaning or
identity”). Yet Congress did not adopt that formulation in
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii), opting instead for language suited to
conduct.
C
Shular principally urges that at the time of
§924(e)(2)(A)(ii)’s enactment, federal and state criminal laws
widely prohibited the “core conduct” of manufacturing,
distributing, and possessing with intent to manufacture or
distribute drugs. Brief for Petitioner 10–12. Some laws, Shular
observes, used those very terms. See,
e.g., 21
U. S. C. §841(a)(1) (1982 ed.). But even if the substance
of state drug laws was well established—rather than their
nomenclature, which Shular concedes was not—Congress could capture
that substance by reference to conduct, rather than offenses.
Shular points out that the word “involving” can
accommodate a generic-offense approach. Cf.
Scheidler v.
National Organization for Women, Inc.,
537 U.S.
393, 409 (2003) (“act or threat involving . . .
extortion,” 18 U. S. C. §1961(1), contemplates
“ ‘generic’ extortion” (some internal quotation marks
omitted)). But we have no reason to think Congress intended that
approach for §924(e)(2)(A)(ii)—which uses no deeply rooted offense
name like “extortion” and contrasts with the offense-oriented
language of a neighboring provision.
Endeavoring to explain why Congress might have
chosen “involving” over “is” in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii), Shular suggests
that variation in state drug-offense terminology required a word
more approximate than “is.” But if Congress was concerned that
state drug offenses lacked clear, universally employed names, the
evident solution was to identify them instead by conduct. Using
“involving” rather than “is” does not clarify that the terms are
names of offenses; quite the opposite. See
supra, at 7.
Shular asserts that to describe conduct rather
than offenses, Congress would have used the language of the
elements clause of the “violent felony” definition, which captures
a crime that “
has as an element the use, attempted use, or
threatened use of physical force against the person of another.”
§924(e)(2)(B)(i) (emphasis added). It would have been awkward,
however, to describe “possessing with intent to manufacture or
distribute”—requiring both possession and intent—as “an element.”
Congress may also have wanted to clarify that the state offense
need not include the identified conduct as a formal element. Cf.
Kawashima, 565 U. S., at 483–484 (the statutory phrase
“an offense that . . . involves fraud or deceit” “is not
limited to offenses that include fraud or deceit as formal
elements” but extends to offenses “that necessarily entail
fraudulent or deceitful conduct”). Whatever the reason, Congress’
choice not to describe each term in §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) as “an
element” neither refutes that those terms refer to conduct nor
shows that they refer to offenses.
Nor does the other clause of the “serious drug
offense” definition shed light on the question before us. Section
924(e)(2)(A)(i) includes as “serious drug offenses” “offense[s]
under” specific portions of the U. S. Code.[
2] That provision, Shular observes, refers to
fully defined crimes. But “the divergent text of the two
provisions” of the serious-drug-offense definition, as the
Government explains, “makes any divergence in their application
unremarkable.” Brief for United States 22. Congress’ decision to
identify federal offenses by reference to the U. S. Code does
not speak to whether it identified state offenses by reference to
named offenses or conduct.
D
Shular expresses concern that rejecting a
generic-offense approach would yield an anomalous result. Unlike
other drug laws, Shular contends, the Florida law under which he
was previously convicted does not require that the defendant know
the substance is illicit. Unless §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) takes into
account all the elements of the offense as commonly understood,
Shular maintains, defendants would face ACCA enhancement based on
outlier state laws.
As an initial matter, Shular overstates
Florida’s disregard for
mens rea. Charged under Fla. Stat.
§893.13(1)(a), a defendant unaware of the substance’s illicit
nature can raise that unawareness as an affirmative defense, in
which case the standard jury instructions require a finding of
knowledge beyond a reasonable doubt. §893.101(2); Fla. Crim. Jury
Instr. §25.2 (2020), https://
www . floridasupremecourt . org / content / download / 568865/
6425767/file/EntireDocument.rtf.
In any event, both parties’ interpretations of
18 U. S. C. §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) achieve a measure of
consistency. Resolving this case requires us to determine which
form of consistency Congress intended: application of ACCA to all
offenders who engaged in certain conduct or to all who committed
certain generic offenses (in either reading, judging only by the
elements of their prior convictions). For the reasons explained, we
are persuaded that Congress chose the former.
E
Shular urges us to apply the rule of lenity in
determining whether §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) requires a
generic-offense-matching analysis. The rule “applies only when,
after consulting traditional canons of statutory construction, we
are left with an ambiguous statute.”
United States v.
Shabani,
513 U.S.
10, 17 (1994). Here, we are left with no ambiguity for the rule
of lenity to resolve. Section 924(e)(2)(A)(ii)’s text and context
leave no doubt that it refers to an offense involving the
conduct of “manufacturing, distributing, or possessing with
intent to manufacture or distribute, a controlled substance.”
Because those terms describe conduct and do not name offenses, a
court applying §924(e)(2)(A)(ii) need not delineate the elements of
generic offenses.[
3]
* * *
For the reasons stated, the judgment of the
Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is
Affirmed.
