In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
No. 08-1691
U NITED S TATES OF A MERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
C HARLES T. D UNSON,
Defendant-Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division.
No. 1:06-cr-00147-TF-01—John Daniel Tinder, Judge.
S UBMITTED F EBRUARY 18, 2009—D ECIDED A PRIL 30, 2010
Before B AUER, R IPPLE and K ANNE, Circuit Judges.
P ER C URIAM. Charles Dunson pleaded guilty to pos-
sessing a firearm as a felon. See 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). The
district court, over Dunson’s objection, set a base
offense level of 24 on the assumption that his prior Indiana
conviction for fleeing a police officer in a vehicle, see IND.
C ODE § 35-44-3-3(a)(3), (b)(1)(A), is a conviction for a
“crime of violence,” see U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(a)(2) & cmt. n.1,
4B1.2(a). The court sentenced Dunson to 110 months’
2 No. 08-1691
imprisonment, below the Guidelines range. Dunson
now appeals.
Shortly after Dunson filed this appeal, we held in
United States v. Spells, 537 F.3d 743, 752 (7th Cir. 2008), that
the Indiana crime at issue is a “violent felony” for pur-
poses of the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”), see
18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1), (2)(B)(ii). “Taking flight calls the
officer to give chase,” we reasoned, and “dares the
officer to needlessly endanger himself in pursuit.” Spells,
537 F.3d at 752. Our decision was informed by Begay v.
United States, 553 U.S. 137 (2008), and is not undermined
by the Supreme Court’s most recent application of
Begay, see Chambers v. United States, 129 S. Ct. 687 (2009)
(holding that passively failing to report for service of a
criminal sentence is not a “violent felony”).
The defendant in United States v. Sykes, 598 F.3d 334
(7th Cir. 2010), asked us to overrule Spells in light of the
Eleventh Circuit’s conclusion in United States v. Harrison,
558 F.3d 1280 (11th Cir. 2009), that fleeing from police in
a vehicle is not a violent felony under the ACCA. We
reexamined our approach but concluded that it was
“neither unworkable nor unsound.” Id. at 338. Someone
who violates § 35-44-3-3(b)(1)(A), we explained, makes a
“purposeful decision to do something that is inherently
likely to lead to violent confrontation,” even though the
statute does not “require that an offender actually en-
danger others through his flight.” Id. at 336-37.
Although Dunson was not sentenced as an armed
career criminal, we interpret “violent felony” as used in
§ 2K2.1 the same way as “crime of violence” in § 924(e). See,
No. 08-1691 3
e.g., United States v. Templeton, 543 F.3d 378, 380 (7th Cir.
2008). So Spells and Sykes are squarely on point, and the
district court properly classified Dunson’s prior convic-
tion for fleeing a police officer in a vehicle as a crime of
violence.
A FFIRMED.
4-30-10