So when do "high-speed, often dangerous police pursuits of fleeing motorists, videotaped and packaged into such shows as 'World's Wildest Police Chases,'" as CNN.com this morning referred to them as, "cross over into the realm of 'violent felonies' that could lead to increased jail time?"
This is the fourth time in the past four years the high court has tried to clarify the meaning of "violent felony" under the so-called residual clause of the federal law, the CNN article said, the Court enumerating James v. United States, 550 U. S. 192 (2007); Begay v. United States, 553 U. S. 137 (2008); Chambers v. United States, 555 U. S. 122 (2009).
This current case, Sykes v. U.S.,09-11311, was an appeal from an Indiana man who received an enhanced federal sentence because of prior serious offenses, one of which was for trying to escape in a vehicle. Having attempted to rob two people at gunpoint, Marcus Sykes had pleaded guilty to felony possession of a firearm, a federal offense, but had also had at least three prior felony convictions on his record, including armed robbery. The CNN article further said, "Sykes had received a mandatory minimum 15-year prison term for the gun possession charge, enhanced because of his past criminal record under the federal Armed Career Criminal Act." He appealed, admitting he had fled from police and that it was a felony, but that arguing that that was not "violent."
The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the trial court, which had been consistent with the rulings of the Courts of Appeals in the First, Fifth, Sixth, and Tenth Circuits; but was in conflict with a ruling by the Eleventh Circuit, and at least in tension, if not in conflict, with the reasoning of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and three separate cases from the Ninth Circuit. [Note:The Sixth Circuit case, here in Cincinnati, was U.S. v. LaCasse, decided initially on Nov. 6, 2007, but remanded by the United States Supreme Court, in LaCasse v. United States, 129 S. Ct. 992 (2009) with instructions to reconsider in light of Begay v. United States, 128 S. Ct.1581 (2008), and Chambers v. United States, 129 S. Ct. 687 (2009). Decided on remand on June 4, 2009 ]
The Court's majority here holds that "Under the residual clause in question so too is a crime that ‘otherwise involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another,’§924(e)(2)(B)(ii), i.e., a risk ‘comparable to that posed by its closest analog among’ the statute’s enumerated offenses…. When a perpetrator flees police in a car, his determination to elude capture makes a lack of concern for the safety of others an inherent part of the offense."
There were three dissents to the majority's opinion. Justice Antonin Scalia stood in opposition to the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) residual clause in general. Noting the three prior cases mentioned above along with the present case, Scalia wrote "As was perhaps predictable, instead of producing a clarification of the Delphic residual clause, today's opinion produces a fourth ad hoc judgment that will sow further confusion. Insanity, it has been said, is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results. Four times is enough. We should admit that ACCA's residual provision is a drafting failure and declare it void for vagueness."
Justice Elena Kagan, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, also dissented seperately, saying the states properly distinguish different types of efforts to escape police, and that the high court should have relied on those state standards to make its ruling, "rather than trying to parse the federal law's definition of 'violent' felony, which does not specifically include vehicular flight."
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