Martin v. United States

The Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion to vacate his sentence. Defendant argued that he did not have the requisite three prior violent felony convictions under the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) because his two Arkansas convictions for first-degree terroristic threatening were not violent felonies. The court held that it's decision in United States v. Myers, 896 F.3d 866 (8th Cir. 2018), that Section 5-13-301(a)(1)(A), the Arkansas first-degree terroristic threatening statute, is divisible and requires the modified categorical approach was controlling in this case where the state court documents that may be examined established that defendant was twice convicted of the ACCA violent felony of threatening to use physical force against another person. The court also held, in the alternative, that Descamps v. United States, 570 U.S. 254 (2013), and Mathis v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 2243 (2016), did not announce a new rule of constitutional law made retroactive to cases on collateral review. View "Martin v. United States" on Justia Law