U.S. v. Turner

Dist. Ct. did not err in sentencing defendant as armed career offender under Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) to 20-year term of incarceration on drug and firearm charges, where armed career offender finding was based, in part, on two Wisconsin drug trafficking convictions. Defendant argued that said convictions did not qualify as “serious drug offenses” under ACCA because, under categorical approach, said state offenses made it crime to deal in two substances, i.e., narcotic analogs of cocaine and esters and salts of esters of cocaine, that federal law did not reach. However, record showed that substances identified by defendant as being not covered under federal law did not and could not possibly exist. As such, there was no actual “overbreath” between state and federal drug offenses that would disqualify defendant from armed career offender treatment. Ct. further found that under ACCA, categorical mismatch cannot be based on truly impossible conduct.