In United States v. Jews, No. 22-10502 (July 6, 2023) (Wilson, Newsom, Lagoa), the Court vacated the defendant’s sentence.
The Court held that the defendant’s Alabama youthful-offender adjudication was not an “adult” conviction under U.S.S.G. 2K2.1 or 4A1.2. The Court reached that conclusion after applying four factors from circuit precedent. First, state law did not deem the prior to be a conviction at all, let alone an adult conviction. Second, the nature of the proceedings was, under state law, different in various substantive and procedural ways than an adult criminal proceeding. Third, he received a three-year sentence, a factor that cut in favor of an “adult” conviction but was not decisive. Fourth, and finally, the record did not reveal the amount of time he actually served. On balance, then, the Court concluded that the first two factors meant that the conviction was not “adult” under the Guidelines.
