In Boston v. United States, No. 17-13870 (Sept. 30,
2019) (William Pryor, Jill Pryor, Robreno), the Court upheld the denial
of the movant's Johnson/ACCA claim.
The Court held that the movant's Florida
principal-to-robbery-with-a-firearm convictions satisfied the ACCA's elements
clause. Under Florida law, an aidor and
abettor is punished the same as a principal offender, and so he necessarily
commits all of the elements of principal Florida armed robbery. The Court relied on its decision in In re
Colon, which applied the same logic to aiding and abetting a Hobbs Act
robbery.
Judge Jill Pryor concurred in the judgment, expressing
doubts that In re Colon was correctly decided. She emphasized that, under Florida law, an
aidor and abettor does not have to be physically or constructively present at
the commission of the offense. She
criticized In re Colon for taking the legal fiction—that one who aids
and abets a robbery by driving the getaway car is deemed to have committed
robbery itself—and using that to say that the getaway driver committed a crime
involving the element of force. She
believed that this result was contrary to the text and puprose of the ACCA.
