Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/22-49_d18e.pdf
Page Number: 5

Cite as:  599 U. S. ____ (2023) 

3 

Opinion of the Court 

II 
A 

This case concerns federal laws that criminalize the use, 
carrying, and possession of firearms in connection with cer-
tain crimes.  The relevant parts of that scheme are spread
across two subsections of 18 U. S. C. §924. 

Subsection (c) lays out a set of offenses and their corre-
sponding penalties.  It begins by making it a crime either to 
“us[e] or carr[y] a firearm” “during and in relation to any
crime of violence or drug trafficking crime,” or to “posses[s]
a firearm” “in furtherance of any such crime.”  §924(c)(1)(A).
The provision then prescribes “a term of imprisonment” for
that offense: a minimum of five years.  §924(c)(1)(A)(i).

Other (more serious) offense elements and “term[s] of im-
prisonment” follow within subsection (c).  If the firearm is 
“brandished,” the “term of imprisonment” jumps to a mini-
mum of seven years.  §924(c)(1)(A)(ii).  If the firearm is “dis-
charged,” the minimum becomes 10 years; if the firearm is
a  “machinegun,”  30  years;  and  so  on.    §§924(c)(1)(A)–(C), 
(c)(5).

Subsection  (c)  also  provides  that  “no  term  of  imprison-
ment imposed on a person under this subsection shall run
concurrently with any other term of imprisonment imposed 
on the person.”  §924(c)(1)(D)(ii).  In other words, the sen-
tence must run consecutively, not concurrently, in relation
to  other  sentences.    This  concurrent-sentence  bar  (or
consecutive-sentence mandate) is at issue in this case.

Subsection (j) was added decades after subsection (c) and
its consecutive-sentence mandate.2  Subsection (j) likewise 
lays out offense elements and corresponding penalties.  It 
provides: 

—————— 

2 See  82  Stat.  1224  (enacting  subsection  (c)  in  1968);  84  Stat.  1889–
1890 (adding subsection (c)’s consecutive-sentence mandate in 1971); 108
Stat.  1973  (enacting  subsection  (j),  originally  designated  as  subsection
(i), in 1994); 110 Stat. 3505 (redesignating as subsection (j) in 1996).