The Supreme Court majority continued in relevant part: Jackson’s presentence report identified several prior Florida convictions, including convictions in 1998 and 2004 for possession and distribution of cocaine. In 2015, the Federal Government amended the federal definition of cocaine, so the federal and Florida definitions no longer matched when Jackson committed his §922(g)(1) offense. Like Brown, Jackson argued that these prior convictions no longer qualified as “serious drug offenses.” In both cases, the District Courts disagreed and sentenced petitioners to enhanced sentences, and the respective appellate courts ultimately affirmed.
A state drug conviction counts as an ACCA predicate if it involved a drug on the federal schedules at the time of that offense. The parties propose three different answers to the question whether the federal and state definitions of a drug must match when the state crime is committed or at some later point in time. The Government argues that a prior state drug conviction qualifies if the federal and state definitions of the relevant drug matched when the defendant committed the state crime. Jackson argues instead that the definitions must match when the defendant violates the federal felon in-possession statute. Finally, Brown contends that the definitions must match when the defendant is sentenced for the federal felon-in possession offense.
Precedent and statutory context support the Government’s interpretation. ACCA gauges what a defendant’s “history of criminal activity” says about his or her “culpability and dangerousness.” McNeill v. United States, 563 U. S. 816, 823. In previous cases, the Court has held that ACCA requires sentencing courts to examine the law as it was when the defendant violated it. This “backward-looking” approach, id., at 820, supports the Government’s interpretation. And the plain language of the statute points to the same conclusion. Section 924(e)(2)(A)(i), which immediately precedes the provision at issue, defines a “serious drug offense” to include, among other things, “offenses under the Controlled Substances Act.” A later change in a federal drug schedule does not change the fact that an offense “under the [CSA]” is a “serious drug offense.”
Brown’s argument appears to be the weakest. It would allow a defendant to avoid an enhanced sentence by delaying his sentencing date. It would also reward defendants who fail to appear at their sentencing date in anticipation of a change in the law that would benefit them.
