Case ID: f-appx_714/html/0721-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ronald David JONES, Jr., Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 17-55131
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Argued and Submitted February 12, 2018 Pasadena, California
    Filed March 1, 2018
    Helen H. Hong, Assistant U.S. Attorney, Office of the US Attorney, San Diego, CA, for Plaintiff-Appellee
    . Kara Hartzler, Federal Defenders of San Diego, Inc., San Diego, CA, for Defendant-Appellant
    Before: McKEOWN and WARDLAW, Circuit Judges, and QUIST, District Judge.
    
      
       The Honorable Gordon J. Quist, United States District Judge for the Western District of Michigan, sitting by designation.
    
   MEMORANDUM

Defendant, Ronald David Jones, Jr., appeals from the district court’s order denying his motion pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review the denial of a section 2255 motion de novo, United States v. Reves, 774 F.3d 562, 564 (9th Cir. 2014), and we affirm.

In 1994, following convictions of armed bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a) and (d), knowing use of a firearm during the bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c), and felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(g), the district court sentenced Jones as an armed career criminal pursuant to the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”), 18 U.S.C. § 922(e). Jones’s three ACCA predicate convictions included robbery and attempted robbery in violation of California Penal Code §§211 and 611/211. Jones argues that after Johnson v. United States, — U.S.-, 135 S.Ct. 2551, 192 L.Ed.2d 569 (2015), and Welch v. United States, — U.S. -, 136 S.Ct. 1257, 194 L.Ed.2d 387 (2016), he no longer has three qualifying convictions required to trigger the enhanced sentence under the ACCA. Jones further argues that federal armed bank robbery is not a “crime of violence” under the force/elements clause in 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(A).

Jones may not rely on the rule announced in Johnson to attack his California robbery convictions as ACCA predicates because the district court relied “on a constitutionally valid legal theory” in sentencing Jones. United States v. Geozos, 870 F.3d 890, 895 (9th Cir. 2017). Although the district court “suppose[d] [that] it’s safer to say [that attempted robbery] presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another because you’re talking about an attempt,” in the end, the court held that “attempted robbery ... is in fact a predicate violent felony under 18 U.S.C. 924(e) either (1) or (2).” The district court’s reliance on an invalid ground as well does not undermine its finding of a violent felony because a predicate conviction need only meet one of the ACCA’s definitions of “violent felony.”

Finally, our recent decision in United States v. Watson, 881 F.3d 782 (9th Cir. 2018), forecloses Jones’s argument that armed bank robbery is not a “crime of violence” under the force/elements clause of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3).

AFFIRMED. 
      
       This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.