United States v. Gerome Young , 442 F. App'x 755 ( 2011 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 09-4801
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
GEROME ALEXANDER YOUNG,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Maryland, at Greenbelt. Peter J. Messitte, Senior District
Judge. (8:08-cr-00551-PJM-1)
SUBMITTED: May 19, 2011 Decided: August 8, 2011
Before TRAXLER, Chief Judge, and DUNCAN and WYNN, Circuit
Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
James Wyda, Federal Public Defender, Baltimore, Maryland, Meghan
S. Skelton, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER, Greenbelt,
Maryland, for Appellant. Rod J. Rosenstein, United States
Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, Jonathan C. Su, Assistant United
States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY,
Greenbelt, Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Gerome Alexander Young pleaded guilty to being a felon
in possession of a firearm. See 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). The
district court concluded that Young’s prior convictions required
him to be sentenced under the Armed Career Criminal Act, see 18
U.S.C. § 924(e), and the court sentenced Young to 195 months’
imprisonment. Young appeals, challenging his designation as an
armed career criminal.
A defendant who violates § 922(g) qualifies as an
armed career criminal if he has three prior convictions for
violent felonies or serious drug offenses. See id. § 924(e)(1).
Young concedes that he has two prior convictions that qualify as
violent felonies under the Act. He argues, however, that the
district court erred by concluding that his Maryland conviction
for resisting arrest qualifies as a violent felony. We
disagree.
A violent felony is one that “has as an element the
use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against
the person of another,” id. § 924(e)(2)(B)(i), or “is burglary,
arson, or extortion, involves use of explosives, or otherwise
involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of
physical injury to another,” id. § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). In United
States v. Jenkins, 631 F.3d 680 (4th Cir. 2011), we applied the
analysis set forth by the Supreme Court in Begay v. United
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States, 553 U.S. 137 (2008), and Chambers v. United States, 555
U.S. 122 (2009), and concluded that Maryland’s common-law
offense of resisting arrest was properly treated as a crime of
violence. See Jenkins, 631 F.3d at 685. * That conclusion is
likewise supported by the Supreme Court’s recent opinion in
Sykes v. United States, ___ U.S. ____, No. 09-11311 (filed
June 9, 2011).
Given our ruling in Jenkins, it is clear that the
district court properly treated Young’s conviction for resisting
arrest as a violent felony under the ACCA, and we therefore
affirm Young’s sentence. We dispense with oral argument because
the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the
materials before the court and argument would not aid the
decisional process.
AFFIRMED
*
Although Jenkins addressed the violent-felony question
in the context of the career-offender enhancement under the
Sentencing Guidelines, the Guidelines’ definition of the phrase
is substantively identical to that of the ACCA, and cases
arising under the Guidelines apply with equal force to cases
arising under the ACCA. See Jenkins, 631 F.3d at 683.
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