This week, we have a guest blogger – Deputy Federal Public Defender Sam Josephs. Sam clerked for both District Judge William Pauley in New York and Ninth Circuit Judge M. Smith. Sam had the good sense to choose California over New York and has been a deputy with the Federal Public Defender in Los Angeles […]

BLOG BULLETS: Research the federal definition and the state statute. Don’t assume words mean what you – and most everyone else – think they mean. Don’t assume the same words mean the same thing: A rose by any other name . . . NOW THE BLOG: I’ve talked in prior posts about the categorical approach […]

In my last post, I wrote about the categorical and modified categorical approaches to judging whether a prior conviction qualifies as an enhancement conviction under various federal sentencing enhancement statutes. One example of a potential argument that many might not think of can be found in two appeals I presently have pending in the Ninth […]

Enhancement provisions in various federal criminal statutes and the sentencing guidelines have become ubiquitous over the last 20 years. Among the more important examples are the Armed Career Criminal Act in 18 U.S.C. § 924(e); the career offender guideline in § 4B1.1 of the sentencing guidelines, which is also incorporated by reference into the base […]