Opinion ID: 779015
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The 1978 Conviction for Attempted Aggravated Burglary

Text: 20 The district court determined that this conviction did not count as a violent felony because an attempted aggravated burglary under Ohio law does not necessarily require conduct that presents the serious potential for personal injury. We begin our review by examining this conviction under the categorical approach. The relevant portions of the statutes at issue (at the time of conviction) read: 2923.02 Attempt 21 Sec. 2923.02. (A) No person, purposely or knowingly, and when purpose or knowledge is sufficient culpability for the commission of an offense, shall engage in conduct which, if successful, would constitute or result in the offense.... 22 (E) Whoever violates this section is guilty of an attempt to commit an offense. 23 Ohio Rev.Code Ann. § 2923.02 (Anderson 1982) (amended 1983). 24 2911.11 Aggravated burglary. 25 (A) No person, by force, stealth, or deception, shall trespass in an occupied structure as defined in section 2909.01 of the Revised Code, or in a separately secured or separately occupied portion thereof, with purpose to commit therein any theft offense as defined in section 2913.01 of the Revised Code, or any felony, when any of the following apply: 26
27 (2) The offender has a deadly weapon or dangerous ordnance as defined in section 2923.11 of the Revised Code on or about his person or under his control. 28 (3) The occupied structure involved is the permanent or temporary habitation of any person, in which at the time any person is present or likely to be present. 29 (B) Whoever violates this section is guilty of aggravated burglary, a felony of the first degree. 30 Ohio Rev.Code Ann. § 2911.11 (Anderson 1982) (amended 1983). 31 The issue with respect to this conviction is not whether it meets the generic definition of burglary, but whether it meets the otherwise clause of § 924(e)(2)(B)(ii). 1 The district court held that it did not because an attempt conviction in Ohio requires only that defendant have the necessary mens rea and take a substantial step in a course of conduct planned to culminate in the commission of the crime, beyond mere planning. Thus, the court reasoned, a defendant who merely intended to commit a burglary and posted accomplices in vehicles near a house to serve as lookouts, or posed as a deliveryman to be certain nobody was home, or engaged in similar conduct could be convicted of attempted burglary, despite the fact that defendant's conduct did not significantly increase the potential for personal injury. We cannot agree with the district court. 32 We are bound by the decision of the Sixth Circuit in United States v. Lane, 909 F.2d 895 (6th Cir.1990). That case, employing the categorical approach, found that the crime of attempted burglary under Ohio law was a crime involving conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another, and therefore met the otherwise clause of § 924(e). Id. at 903. The holding in Lane was twice reaffirmed by the Sixth Circuit. Bureau, 52 F.3d at 591; United States v. Fish, 928 F.2d 185, 188 (6th Cir.1991). This circuit has repeatedly emphasized that in making § 924(e) violent felony determinations we employ a categorical approach. If, as Lane, Fish, and Bureau hold, the offense of attempted burglary categorically meets the otherwise clause of § 924, then logic dictates that a conviction for attempted aggravated burglary also categorically meets the otherwise clause. Regardless of whether Lane was wrongly decided, as the district court maintains, this panel is bound by that decision, as well as the later cases reaffirming it. 2 Those cases compel us to count Cooper's conviction for attempted aggravated burglary as a violent felony. The district court's attempt to distinguish Lane and Bureau by examining the specific substantial step that Cooper was charged with and pled guilty to (hiding in front of the house with burglar's tools) was error, in that it strayed from the categorical approach employed by this circuit.