Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-18-04694/USCOURTS-ca4-18-04694-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Robert Demona Vance
Appellant

Document Text:

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 18-4694

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

ROBERT DEMONA VANCE,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at 

Anderson. Bruce H. Hendricks, District Judge. (8:17-cr-00318-BHH-1)

Submitted: December 19, 2019 Decided: December 23, 2019

Before NIEMEYER, AGEE, and QUATTLEBAUM, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Lora Blanchard, Assistant Federal Public Defender, OFFICE OF THE FEDERAL 

PUBLIC DEFENDER, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellant. Sherri A. Lydon, United 

States Attorney, William J. Watkins, Jr., Assistant United States Attorney, OFFICE OF 

THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Greenville, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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PER CURIAM:

Robert Demona Vance, who pled guilty without a plea agreement to being a felon 

in possession of a firearm and ammunition, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1), 924(a) 

(2018), appeals his 180-month sentence. Vance’s sole argument on appeal is that his 

sentence is unlawful because two of his prior South Carolina narcotics convictions are not 

“serious drug offenses” under the Armed Career Criminal Act, 18 U.S.C. § 924(e) (2018) 

(ACCA). We review de novo whether a state crime qualifies as a predicate offense under 

the ACCA. United States v. Burns-Johnson, 864 F.3d 313, 315 (4th Cir. 2017). Finding 

no error, we affirm.

As Vance readily acknowledges, this court recently confirmed that a district court 

may apply a modified categorical approach to convictions under the South Carolina statute 

underlying Vance’s prior narcotics convictions. See United States v. Furlow, 928 F.3d 

311, 317-22 (4th Cir. 2019) (holding that a modified categorical approach may be used to 

determine if a prior conviction under S.C. Code Ann. § 44-53-375(B) is a proper ACCA

predicate). Contrary to Vance’s assertion on appeal, however, the record clearly 

establishes that Vance twice pled guilty to possession with intent to distribute cocaine base, 

which is a proper ACCA predicate. See 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(2)(A)(i) (“[T]he terms ‘serious 

drug offense’ means . . . an offense under State law, involving manufacturing, distributing, 

or possessing with intent to manufacture or distribute, a controlled substance . . . for which 

a maximum term of imprisonment of ten years or more is prescribed by law[.]”).

Vance counters that the Government did not establish the ACCA predicate status of 

his prior convictions because, unlike in Furlow, it did not present guilty plea transcripts 

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establishing the elements that Vance admitted at the guilty plea hearings for his South 

Carolina convictions. But this Court has long relied on South Carolina sentencing sheets 

as Shepard*

-approved documents to determine the ACCA-predicate status of a prior South 

Carolina conviction. See, e.g., United States v. Bethea, 603 F.3d 254, 259 (4th Cir. 2010) 

(“Besides the statute[] itself, the only documents relating to Bethea’s escape conviction 

that we may consider are the indictment and the sentencing sheet.”). We thus discern no 

error in the district court’s reliance on the state court sentencing sheets related to Vance’s 

prior narcotics convictions to determine whether those convictions were proper ACCA 

predicates.

Based on the foregoing, we affirm the district court’s judgment. We dispense with 

oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the 

materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED

 * Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13 (2005).

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