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Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Ker Yang
Appellant

Document Text:

In the 

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ 

No. 14-3688 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v.

KER YANG, 

Defendant-Appellant. 

____________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Western District of Wisconsin. 

No. 3:14-CR-00070-001 — William M. Conley, Chief Judge. 

____________________ 

ARGUED MAY 27, 2015 — DECIDED AUGUST 21, 2015 

____________________ 

Before POSNER, MANION, and HAMILTON, Circuit Judges. 

HAMILTON, Circuit Judge. Ker Yang pled guilty to being a 

felon in possession of a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. 

§ 922(g)(1). The district court then found that Yang had three 

felony convictions that could be classified as violent under 

the Armed Career Criminal Act, often called ACCA. The 

court imposed the resulting mandatory minimum sentence 

of fifteen years in prison. 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1). Yang appeals, 

arguing that one of the three felony convictions cannot be a 

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2 No. 14-3688 

violent felony under ACCA. The state court document recording the conviction did not clearly identify the statute of 

conviction. Yang argues that the district court was not permitted to look beyond the face of the document to identify 

the statute of conviction and thereby impose the heavier 

ACCA sentence. 

We affirm. The conviction in question was for felony domestic assault in violation of Minnesota Statute § 609.224(4), 

which is a violent felony under ACCA. The district court 

could consult the relevant sentencing and plea transcripts to 

identify the statute of conviction without running afoul of 

ACCA or the Supreme Court’s decisions interpreting it. 

Before turning to what a district court may or must do 

with an ambiguous judgment of conviction, we first provide 

some background about how a sentencing court must determine whether a prior conviction qualifies under ACCA. 

The statute requires an enhanced sentence for a felon in possession of a firearm who “has three previous convictions ... for a violent felony or a serious drug offense.” 

§ 924(e)(1). The statute defines a “violent felony” as “any 

crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one 

year” that “(i) has as an element the use, attempted use, or 

threatened use of physical force against the person of another; or (ii) is burglary, arson, or extortion, [or] involves use of 

explosives.” § 924(e)(2)(B).1

 1 The Supreme Court recently invalidated as unconstitutionally 

vague ACCA’s so-called “residual clause” that had extended the definition of “violent felony” to include any felony that “otherwise involves 

conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another.” Johnson v. United States, 576 U.S. —, 135 S. Ct. 2551, 2563 (2015); 18 

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No. 14-3688 3

Determining which prior convictions were for violent 

felonies under ACCA can be difficult in some cases. In most 

cases, a federal sentencing court determines whether a prior 

conviction counts as a violent felony under ACCA by using 

the “categorical approach.” See Descamps v. United States, 570 

U.S. —, 133 S. Ct. 2276, 2281 (2013). Under the categorical 

approach, the sentencing court looks at the elements of the 

statute of conviction to determine if it “has as an element the 

use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force 

against the person of another,” see § 924(e)(2)(B)(i), or it has 

elements that are the same as, or narrower than, those of the 

“generic” crimes listed in § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii), burglary, arson, 

extortion, or a crime involving the use of explosives. 

The issue is “whether the elements of the offense are of the 

type” that makes the offense a violent felony, and the court 

must answer this question “without inquiring into the specific conduct of this particular offender.” United States v. 

Woods, 576 F.3d 400, 403 (7th Cir. 2009), quoting James v. 

United States, 550 U.S. 192, 202 (2007); see also id. at 405 (sentencing under ACCA “precludes deciding on a case-by-case 

basis whether a particular prior violation of a general statute 

posed the kind of risk of violence that would justify the recidivism enhancements provided by the ACCA”). The sentencing judge need not and may not consult any of the facts 

underlying the prior conviction. It does not matter if the defendant violated the statute of conviction in a particularly 

violent or non-violent way. The inquiry looks only at the 

statutory elements of the prior conviction to determine 

whether it qualifies as a violent felony. See Descamps, 133 S. 

 

U.S.C. § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). Yang’s case does not involve the residual clause, 

so Johnson does not affect him. 

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Ct. at 2285–86; Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13, 16 (2005); 

Taylor v. United States, 495 U.S. 575, 600 (1990); United States v. 

Misleveck, 735 F.3d 983, 984 (7th Cir. 2013). 

In some circumstances, however, ACCA permits the sentencing judge to look beyond the judgment and statute of 

conviction as part of this inquiry. Using what has been called 

the “modified categorical approach,” the court may look to a 

limited selection of additional documents, including charging documents, plea agreements, jury instructions, plea and 

sentencing transcripts, and findings of fact and conclusions 

of law from a bench trial, when necessary to determine the 

elements of conviction—as opposed to the facts underlying 

that conviction. See Descamps, 133 S. Ct. at 2281; Johnson v. 

United States, 559 U.S. 133, 144 (2010); Shepard, 544 U.S. at 16; 

United States v. Mathews, 453 F.3d 830, 835 (7th Cir. 2006).2

Resort to such materials is necessary when the prior conviction is for violating a “divisible” statute. Such statutes list 

one or more elements in the alternative, giving the prosecution multiple ways to prove the offense. If the judgment 

identifies only the statute of conviction, it will not specify 

which elements necessarily served as the basis for the conviction. If not all alternatives would qualify the conviction as 

 2 While the modified categorical approach allows a court to look beyond the judgment and the statute of conviction to documents such as 

plea agreements and transcripts of guilty pleas and sentencings, the 

court may not consider police reports, complaint applications, or other 

sources that do not reflect either the defendant’s own admissions or the 

findings of a judge or jury. Formal charging documents may be used, 

however, to identify just which elements of a crime were resolved by a 

judgment of conviction. See Shepard, 544 U.S. at 16; see also United States 

v. Black, 636 F.3d 893, 898 (7th Cir. 2011). 

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No. 14-3688 5

a violent felony under ACCA, a court may try to determine 

which alternative served as the basis of a defendant’s conviction. 

For this limited inquiry, these outside documents (often 

called “Shepard documents” after Shepard v. United States, 544 

U.S. 13) are available and can prove decisive. See Descamps, 

133 S. Ct. at 2281, 2284–85. Once the elements of conviction 

are definitively established, the inquiry is identical to the 

categorical approach described above: those elements are 

evaluated to determine whether they establish a violent felony under ACCA. Id. at 2281, 2285. Even when this modified 

categorical approach is used, the sentencing court may use 

these additional sources “only to determine which crime 

within a statute the defendant committed, not how he committed that crime.” Woods, 576 F.3d at 405. 

Against this backdrop, Yang argues that one of his three 

convictions relied upon by the district court could not qualify under ACCA because it was not clear from the judgment 

of conviction which provision of the Minnesota criminal 

code he had violated. The judgment is a printed form with 

handwriting. Its only identification of the crime of conviction is the handwritten note “felony domestic” for the 

charge, without any more specific citation to a state statute. 

Unless the district judge could tell what the statute was, 

Yang argues, it would be impossible for the judge to apply 

the categorical approach to determine whether the conviction counted as an ACCA predicate. Instead, as happened 

here, the judge would need to look beyond the judgment of 

conviction to the plea and sentencing transcripts to determine that he was convicted of felony domestic assault in violation of Minn. Stat. § 609.224(4). 

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Yang argues that Supreme Court precedent prohibited 

the sentencing judge from looking beyond the judgment unless the statute of conviction was divisible. In his view, only

when the sentencing court confronts a conviction under a 

divisible statute may the court consult the documents allowed under the modified categorical approach. Yang relies 

on Descamps, where the Court wrote: “A court may use the 

modified approach only to determine which alternative element in a divisible statute formed the basis of the defendant’s conviction.” 133 S. Ct. at 2293 (emphasis added). As 

Yang sees it, the modified approach was used here for a different purpose, so the district court erred by doing what 

Descamps prohibits. 

The government argues that the district court did not actually base its finding that the conviction was for a violent 

felony on anything other than the judgment of conviction 

and a look at the Minnesota criminal code, which is always 

permissible under ACCA. One can read the sentencing transcript that way, but it is also clear that the district judge did 

in fact consult the so-called Shepard documents at the very 

least to confirm his conclusion that Yang was convicted under the felony provision of § 609.224. 

We think the better approach here is to assume that the 

judge’s examination of the Shepard documents to confirm his 

research may well have been decisive. Even if those documents made a decisive difference, we find no error. A sentencing judge faced with an arguably ambiguous judgment 

of conviction may consult Shepard documents, such as plea 

and sentencing transcripts, to determine under which statute 

the defendant was convicted. Cf. United States v. Meherg, 714 

F.3d 457, 459 (7th Cir. 2013) (noting that defendant could 

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have disputed the interpretation of an unclear judgment by 

offering “evidence, such as a plea colloquy or sentencing 

transcript, indicating that he was convicted of a crime different from the one charged”). 

But what of the Descamps language quoted above saying 

the modified categorical approach may be used “only to determine which alternative element in a divisible statute 

formed the basis of the defendant’s conviction”? 133 S. Ct. at 

2293. Similar language has echoed through our opinions, as 

well. See Black, 636 F.3d at 899 (district court did not err 

when it declined to consider underlying documents, even in 

the face of ambiguity, because “the controlled substance 

statutes under which [defendant] was convicted are not divisible”); United States v. Ramirez, 606 F.3d 396, 399 (7th Cir. 

2010) (“When an offense is not divisible, plea colloquies, judicial admissions, judicial findings, and jury instructions 

from the prior prosecutions cannot be used to classify the 

prior convictions.”); Woods, 576 F.3d at 411 (“As we explained earlier, James, Taylor, and Shepard permit a court to 

go beyond the statutory definition of the crime to consult judicial records (charging documents, plea colloquy, etc.) only 

where the statute defining the crime is divisible.”). 

Yang’s argument illustrates the hazards of reading too literally the language in judicial opinions. The actual issue in 

Descamps was what a federal court could do when evaluating 

a conviction under California’s broad burglary statute, which 

does not require proof of an unlawful entry. The Supreme 

Court has treated unlawful entry as an essential element under ACCA’s use of a generic “burglary” as a predicate violent felony. See 133 S. Ct. at 2282. The Supreme Court held in 

Descamps that a sentencing court could not look at Shepard

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documents to determine if the prosecution had actually 

proven defendant’s unlawful entry even though no element, 

or alternative element, of the statute required such proof. See 

id. at 2287–88, 2293. In other words the Court held that a 

court may not consult sources outside the judgment and 

statute of conviction to determine whether or not a given defendant’s actions would be an ACCA violent felony. Id. at 

2293. 

The issue here is determining the identity of the statute of 

conviction, not the particular way in which it was violated. 

Looking to a limited set of outside sources—here the plea 

and sentencing transcripts—to identify the statute of conviction is consistent with the modified categorical approach and 

the limits ACCA places on federal sentencing courts. Despite 

the general language Yang quotes, the Supreme Court has 

made clear that a sentencing court may reach beyond the 

judgment of conviction when it needs to “determine which 

statutory phrase was the basis for the conviction.” Johnson v. 

United States, 559 U.S. 133, 144 (2010). 

The precise statutory basis for the conviction (the “statutory phrase”) can be ambiguous either because the statute 

lists elements in the alternative or (less often) because the 

statute is not identified clearly. We see no reason to distinguish between the two situations in deciding how the sentencing court may resolve the ambiguity. For the same reasons that the “modified categorical approach” may be used 

as a tool to determine the correct statutory subsection of conviction—in effect, to choose among several different 

crimes—it makes equal sense to use that tool to determine 

the correct statutory section of conviction. See Descamps, 133 

S. Ct. at 2285 (“All the modified approach adds is a mechaCase: 14-3688 Document: 23 Filed: 08/21/2015 Pages: 11
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nism for making that comparison when a statute lists multiple, alternative elements, and so effectively creates ‘several 

different Y crimes.’”), quoting Nijhawan v. Holder, 557 U.S. 29, 

41 (2009). Either way, the approach is used only to “identify, 

from among several alternatives, the crime of conviction” so 

that the court can correctly apply the categorical approach. 

Id. at 2285. 

If we read the language of Descamps too literally, without 

regard for the issue decided and the reasoning behind the 

decision, we would be attributing to the Supreme Court an 

imprudently wooden formalism with the language of its 

own opinions. The “language of an opinion is not always to 

be parsed as though we were dealing with language of a 

statute,” Reiter v. Sonotone Corp., 442 U.S. 330, 341 (1979), for 

“[j]udges expect their pronunciamentos to be read in context.” Wisehart v. Davis, 408 F.3d 321, 326 (7th Cir. 2005); see 

also Illinois v. Lidster, 540 U.S. 419, 424 (2004) (general language in judicial opinions must be read in context and not as 

“referring to quite different circumstances that the Court 

was not then considering”); Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. 264, 

399 (1821) (Marshall, C.J.) (“general expressions, in every 

opinion, are to be taken in connection with the case in which 

those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case, they 

may be respected, but ought not to control the judgment in a 

subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision.”). 

Extending the use of the Shepard documents from identifying the right statutory subsection to identifying the right 

statutory section does not threaten to transform the “elements-based” inquiry under the categorical approach to the 

“evidence-based” inquiry rejected in Descamps, 133 S. Ct. at 

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2287. When faced with an ambiguous judgment, the sentencing court will look to the approved sources to determine the 

statute of conviction—that is, the elements of the crime of 

conviction—to compare it to the requirements of ACCA. 

At no point does this approach permit the sentencing 

judge to look beyond the elements of the crime of conviction 

when determining whether the felony is violent. The use of 

Shepard documents is therefore nothing like the use prohibited in Descamps, where the government sought to use the additional materials to establish that the state had actually 

proven a violent felony as defined by ACCA even though the 

words of the underlying statute did not necessarily require 

the jury (or judge accepting a plea) to find that one of the 

ACCA-defined violent felony elements was met. See 133 S. 

Ct. at 2285–87. 

The district court properly determined that Yang was 

convicted of felony domestic assault under Minn. Stat. § 

609.224 and that the crime qualifies as a violent felony under 

ACCA. As it happens, § 609.224 can be violated in a number 

of ways: as a misdemeanor, as a “gross misdemeanor,” or as 

a felony. Using the same documents consulted to determine 

the overall statute of conviction—those permitted by the 

modified categorical approach—it is easy to find that Yang’s 

conviction was under the subdivision describing felony assault, § 609.224(4). Under the statute, an individual is guilty 

of felony domestic assault if he “(1) commits an act with an 

intent to cause fear in another of immediate bodily harm or 

death; or (2) intentionally inflicts or attempts to inflict bodily 

harm upon another” and does so within a specified amount 

of time of having committed other qualified domestic violence-related offenses. Minn. Stat. § 609.224(1), (4). A convicCase: 14-3688 Document: 23 Filed: 08/21/2015 Pages: 11
No. 14-3688 11

tion under this statute qualifies as a violent felony because it 

has “as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use 

of physical force against the person of another.” 18 U.S.C. 

§ 924(e)(2)(B)(i). 

The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED. 

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