Opinion ID: 2582
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Modified Categorical Inquiry

Text: Where, as here, the statute of conviction is overly inclusive, we address whether the government has shown that the plea necessarily rested on the fact identifying the conviction as a predicate offense. Shepard, 544 U.S. at 21, 125 S.Ct. 1254. In conducting this modified categorical inquiry, we are constrained by  Taylor 's demand for certainty. Id. Accordingly, in the context of a conviction based on a plea, the inquiry is limited to the terms of the charging document, the terms of a plea agreement or transcript of colloquy between judge and defendant in which the factual basis for the plea was confirmed by the defendant, or to some comparable judicial record of this information. Id. at 26, 125 S.Ct. 1254. The determinative issue is whether the judicial record of the state conviction established with certainty that the guilty plea necessarily admitted elements of the [predicate] offense. Id. at 25, 26, 125 S.Ct. 1254; see Rosa, 507 F.3d at 161 (applying  Shepard 's requirement that district courts limit their consideration to particular documents that can identify the underlying facts of a prior conviction with certainty  (emphasis added)). We apply Shepard in determining whether a conviction qualified as a controlled substance offense for the purpose of a Guidelines sentencing enhancement. See Green, 480 F.3d at 632. The Shepard Court identified two types of proof, relevant here, that might suffice to establish that a plea necessarily rested on the elements of a predicate offense: (i) proof that the defendant admitted to predicate conduct when confirming the factual basis for a valid plea; (ii) proof that the charge was narrowed to include only predicate conduct. 544 U.S. at 21-22, 125 S.Ct. 1254. Because Savage entered an Alford plea in which he refused to admit his participation in the acts constituting the crime, Alford, 400 U.S. at 37, 91 S.Ct. 160, Savage did not, by design, confirm the factual basis for his plea. The state judge carefully explained this, by reassuring Savage that the plea would be accepted even though Savage did not agree with the facts. Thus, the government cannot rely on any factual admissions during the plea colloquy to establish the predicate nature of Savage's conviction. See Shepard, 544 U.S. at 20, 26, 125 S.Ct. 1254 (holding that factual admissions made by the defendant are made part of the conviction only when the factual basis for the plea was confirmed by the defendant and the admissions were made by the defendant upon entering the plea); see also Rosa, 507 F.3d at 158 (holding that factual findings by judge are made part of the conviction only when they are confirmed by the defendant upon entering the plea). Thus, the sole issue is whether the government has shown that the charge was narrowed to include only predicate conduct. Although the government has conceded that the charging document did not narrow the charge within the meaning of Shepard, the Shepard Court allowed proof of a narrowed charge to be made by a charging instrument or by some comparable judicial record of this information. 544 U.S. at 26, 125 S.Ct. 1254; see Green, 480 F.3d at 632. The government argues that the plea transcript is a comparable judicial record that establishes that Savage pleaded guilty to a narrowed charge. In deciding whether the plea colloquy can be used for this purpose, the dispositive question is whether the plea colloquy establishes, with certainty, that the plea ... `necessarily' rested on the fact, Shepard, 544 U.S. at 21, 125 S.Ct. 1254, identifying the conviction as a controlled substance offense. See Rosa, 507 F.3d at 155. We do not think that it did. The government first seeks to rely on the initial exchange between the state prosecutor and Savage, in which Savage pleaded guilty to the charge, as described by the prosecutor, in count one of the Information, sale of marijuana, in violation of Connecticut General Statute 21a-277(b). We need not decide whether this established, with certainty, that the charge was narrowed to a sale, as opposed to a generic violation of the statute, because even if the charge was so narrowed, this statement cannot establish that the charge was narrowed to predicate limits : as we have explained, the Connecticut Statute criminalizes non-predicate conduct by virtue of the broad definition given to sale under Connecticut law. Thus, by simply stating that Savage was charged with a sale, the prosecutor did not say anything that could establish that the charge was narrowed to its predicate limits. For similar reasons, even if one could find that Savage's exchanges with the state judge, wherein the judge described the charge as one for sale, were competent evidence under Shepard, these comments would not establish that Savage was convicted of a controlled substance offense. Finally, the government points to Savage's statement that someone else gave [the drugs] to the [the undercover] officer and contends that this established that Savage understood he was charged specifically with exchanging drugs for money. No such conclusion follows: in this exchange, Savage simply contested the state's recitation of the facts; just as such offhand remarks do not constitute factual admissions that define the nature of the conviction, see Rosa, 507 F.3d at 158, they equally do not define the nature of the conviction by establishing that Savage pleaded guilty to a narrowed charge. In sum, although everybody understood that the State alleged that Savage exchanged drugs for money, nothing in the plea colloquy established with certainty that Savage necessarily pleaded guilty to this fact. At the narrowest, Savage pleaded guilty to a sale of a controlled substance. Because a sale under Connecticut law includes a mere offer to sell drugs, and an offer to sell drugs is not a controlled substance offense, the conviction does not qualify as a controlled substance offense.