Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 1 of 1
Full-Text Articles in Law
The Johnson & Johnson Problem: The Supreme Court Limited The Armed Career Criminal Act's "Violent Felony" Provision—And Our Children Are Paying, Shelby Burns
Pepperdine Law Review
The Armed Career Criminal Act and United States Sentencing Guidelines prescribe sentence enhancements based upon a defendant’s prior convictions. In particular, these federal sentencing tools contain violent felony provisions that outline the requirements a state criminal statute must satisfy for a conviction to constitute a violent felony, making the convicted person eligible for a federal sentence enhancement. However, the Supreme Court’s holdings in Johnson v. United States, 559 U.S. 133 (2010) and Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015) severely limited the scope of both sentencing tools’ violent felony provisions, making it more difficult for certain crimes to …