United States of America v. Jerome Deuntia Morris

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 24-3165
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United States of America
Plaintiff - Appellee
v.
Jerome Deuntia Morris
Defendant - Appellant
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Arkansas - Central
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Submitted: February 9, 2026
Filed: May 27, 2026
[Unpublished]
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Before LOKEN, SMITH, and STRAS, Circuit Judges.
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PER CURIAM.
Jerome Morris challenges an enhancement he received for having “three
previous convictions . . . for a violent felony.” 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1). At issue is a
conviction of second-degree sexual assault, which he committed through “sexual
contact . . . by forcible compulsion.” Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-125(a)(1). As we have
already concluded, this version of the crime is a “violent felony.” United States v.

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Dawn, 685 F.3d 790, 796, 797 n.5 (8th Cir. 2012) (holding that it “is necessarily a
crime of violence,” which overlaps with the “violent felony” definition (citation
omitted)), abrogated on other grounds by Lofton v. United States, 920 F.3d 572, 575
(8th Cir. 2019).
For the first time on appeal, Morris argues that Arkansas’s definition of
“physical force,” see Ark. Code Ann. § 5-14-101(2) (stating that “forcible
compulsion” includes “physical force”), is overbroad. Compare Strawhacker v.
State, 804 S.W.2d 720, 723 (Ark. 1991) (defining “physical force” as “any bodily
impact, restraint or confinement, or the threat thereof” (emphasis added) (citation
omitted)), with Johnson v. United States, 559 U.S. 133, 140 (2010) (requiring
“violent force—that is, force capable of causing physical pain or injury to another
person”). Despite the differences in wording, we conclude that Dawn necessarily
means that any error in counting Morris’s second-degree sexual-assault conviction
could not have been plain. See United States v. Solis, 915 F.3d 1172, 1177 (8th Cir.
2019) (“Usually, for an error to be plain, it must be in contravention of either
Supreme Court or controlling circuit precedent.” (emphases added) (citation
omitted)).
We accordingly affirm the judgment of the district court.1
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1 The Honorable James M. Moody, Jr., United States District Judge for the
Eastern District of Arkansas.

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