Wooden v. United States

142 S.Ct. 1063

William Dale WOODEN, Petitioner

v.UNITED STATES

No. 20-5279

Supreme Court of the United States.

Argued October 4, 2021

Decided March 7, 2022

Allon Kedem, Washington, DC, the Petitioner.

Erica L. Ross, Washington, DC, the Respondent.

Elizabeth B. Prelogar, Acting Solicitor General, Counsel of Record, Nicholas L. McQuaid, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Eric J. Feigin, Deputy Solicitor General, Erica L. Ross, Assistant to the Solicitor General, Paul T. Crane, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, DC, the Respondent.

Michael Roig, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP, New York, NY, Steven L. Mayer, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP, San Francisco, CA, R. Reeves Anderson, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP, Denver, CO, Allon Kedem, Counsel of Record, Andrew T. Tutt, Stephen K. Wirth, Jayce Born, John Swanson, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP, Washington, DC, the Petitioner.

Justice KAGAN delivered the opinion of the Court.

In the course of one evening, William Dale Wooden burglarized ten units in a single storage facility. He later pleaded guilty, for that night's work, to ten counts of burglary—one for each storage unit he had entered. Some two decades later, the courts below concluded that those convictions were enough to subject Wooden to enhanced criminal penalties under the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA). That statute mandates a 15-year minimum sentence for unlawful gun possession when the offender has three or more prior convictions for violent felonies like burglary "committed on occasions different from one another." 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1). The question presented is whether Wooden's prior convictions were for offenses occurring on different occasions, as the lower courts held, because the burglary of each unit happened at a distinct point in time, rather than simultaneously. The answer is no. Convictions arising from a single criminal episode, in the way Wooden's did, can count only once under ACCA.

I

Begin in 1997, when Wooden and three confederates unlawfully entered a one-building storage facility at 100 Williams Road in Dalton, Georgia, next door to Wooden's home. The burglars proceeded from unit to unit within the facility, "crushing the interior drywall" between them. App. 32 (indictment); see Addendum to Brief for Petitioner 6a (statement of Assistant District Attorney at plea hearing) ("[O]nce they made entry" into the facility, they "burrowed through from ... unit to unit"). The men stole items from, all told, ten different storage units. So Georgia prosecutors charged them with ten counts of burglary—though, as state law prescribes, in a single indictment. See Ga. Code Ann. § 16–1–7(b) (1996) (requiring "crimes arising from the same conduct" to be prosecuted together). Wooden pleaded guilty to all counts. The judge sentenced him to eight years' imprisonment for each conviction, with the ten terms to run concurrently.

Fast forward now to a cold November morning in 2014, when Wooden responded to a police officer's knock on his door. The officer asked to speak with Wooden's wife. And noting the chill in the air, the officer asked if he could step inside, to stay warm. Wooden agreed. But his good deed did not go unpunished. Once admitted to the house, the officer spotted several guns. Knowing that Wooden was a felon, the officer placed him under arrest. A jury later convicted him for being a felon in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g).

The penalty for that crime varies significantly depending on whether ACCA applies. Putting ACCA aside, the maximum sentence for violating § 922(g) is ten years in prison. See § 924(a)(2). But ACCA mandates a minimum sentence of fifteen years if the § 922(g) offender has three prior convictions for "violent felon[ies]" (like burglary) or "serious drug offense[s]" that were "committed on occasions different from one another." § 924(e)(1). In Wooden's own case, the record reveals the discrepancy as especially stark. Before the Government decided to seek an ACCA enhancement, its Probation Office recommended a sentence of 21 to 27 months. See App. 38–39, 42. The ACCA minimum sentence is about 13 years longer.

The District Court's sentencing hearing focused on whether Wooden's ten convictions for breaking into the storage facility sufficed to trigger ACCA. Wooden said they did not because he had burglarized the ten storage units on a single occasion, rather than "on occasions different from one another." § 924(e)(1). The burglaries, he explained, happened "during the same criminal episode," "at the same business location, under the same roof." App. 50. And given those facts, he continued, the burglaries were "charged in a single indictment." Ibid. But the District Court accepted the Government's view that every time Wooden busted into another storage unit, he commenced a new "occasion" of criminal activity. The court reasoned, relying on Circuit precedent, that the entry into "[e]ach separate [unit] provides a discrete point at which the first offense was completed and the second began and so on." Id ., at 59. Based on the ACCA enhancement, the court sentenced Wooden to 188 months (almost 16 years) in prison for unlawfully possessing a gun.

The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed the sentence, on the same reasoning. "[I]t is possible," the court stated, "to discern the point at which Wooden's first offense" was "completed and the subsequent point at which his second offense began." 945 F.3d 498, 505 (2019). After all, "Wooden could not be in two (let alone ten) of [the storage units] at once." Ibid. In the court's view, the sequential nature of Wooden's crimes—his progression from one unit in the storage facility to the next to the next—meant that the crimes were "committed on occasions different from one another." And so, the court concluded, Wooden qualified as a career offender under ACCA.

The Courts of Appeals have divided over the meaning of ACCA's "occasions" clause. Some Circuits, like the Sixth, deem the clause satisfied whenever crimes take place at different moments in time—that is, sequentially rather than simultaneously.¹ Other Circuits undertake a more holistic inquiry, considering not merely the precise timing but also other circumstances of the crimes.² We granted certiorari, 592 U.S. ––––, 141 S.Ct. 1370, 209 L.Ed.2d 118 (2021), to resolve that split of authority.³

II

Framed in terms of this case, the disputed question is whether Wooden committed his crimes on a single occasion or on ten separate ones.

The Government answers ten, relying on a legally fancified version of the Sixth Circuit's timing test. In the ACCA context, the Government argues, an "occasion" happens "at a particular point in time"—the moment "when [an offense's] elements are established." Brief for United States 9. So offenses "occur on different ‘occasions’ when the criminal conduct necessary to satisfy the offense elements occurs at different times." Id. , at 13. Applying that elements-based, "temporal-distinctness test" to this case, the Government explains that Wooden's burglaries were "quintessentially sequential, rather than simultaneous." Id. , at 10, 20. After all, a person can satisfy the elements of burglary only by entering (or remaining in) a structure with criminal intent. See, e.g. , Ga. Code Ann. § 16–7–1(a). And it would have been "physically impossible" for Wooden to have entered (or remained in) multiple storage units "at once." Brief for United States 12. Each of Wooden's ten entries thus counts (so says the Government) as another "occasion," triggering ACCA's stringent penalties more than three times over.

We think not. The ordinary meaning of the word "occasion"—essentially an episode or event—refutes the Government's single-minded focus on whether a crime's elements were established at a discrete moment in time. And ACCA's history and purpose do so too: The origin of the "occasions" clause confirms that multiple crimes may occur on one occasion even if not at the same moment. Wooden's night of crime is a perfect case in point. His one-after-another-after-another burglary of ten units in a single storage facility occurred on one "occasion," under a natural construction of that term and consistent with the reason it became part of ACCA.

A

Consider first how an ordinary person (a reporter; a police officer; yes, even a lawyer) might describe Wooden's ten burglaries—and how she would not. The observer might say: "On one occasion, Wooden burglarized ten units in a storage facility." By contrast, she would never say: "On ten occasions, Wooden burglarized a unit in the facility." Nor would she say anything like: "On one occasion, Wooden burglarized a storage unit; on a second occasion, he burglarized another unit; on a third occasion, he burglarized yet another; and so on." She would, using language in its normal way, group his entries into the storage units, even though not simultaneous, all together—as happening on a single occasion, rather than on ten "occasions different from one another." § 924(e)(1).

That usage fits the ordinary meaning of "occasion." The word commonly refers to an event, occurrence, happening, or episode. See, e.g. , American Heritage Dictionary 908 (1981); Webster's Third New International Dictionary 1560 (3d ed. 1986). And such an event, occurrence, happening, or episode—which is simply to say, such an occasion—may itself encompass multiple, temporally distinct activities. The occasion of a wedding, for example, often includes a ceremony, cocktail hour, dinner, and dancing. Those doings are proximate in time and place, and have a shared theme (celebrating the happy couple); their connections are, indeed, what makes them part of a single event. But they do not occur at the same moment: The newlyweds would surely take offense if a guest organized a conga line in the middle of their vows. That is because an occasion may—and the hypothesized one does—encompass a number of non-simultaneous activities; it...