concurring in part and concurring in the result in part.
I fully concur with the majority opinion except for the reasons set forth in the dissenting portion of my opinion filed 3 January 2006 in State v. Hanton, 175 N.C. App. 250, 623 S.E.2d 600 (2006). I conclude that upon remand, a determination of whether defendant’s out-of-state convictions are substantially similar to North Carolina offenses should be determined by the trial court in the event the trial court can conduct a comparison of the elements of the two states’ statutes without undertaking any type of factual analysis of the circumstances underlying defendant’s prior convictions. However, in the event a factual inquiry into, or analysis of, defendant’s conduct is necessary to resolve whether defendant would have been convicted under a similar North Carolina law, that determination must be made by a jury under Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296, 159 L. Ed. 2d 403 (2004), and Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. -, 161 L. Ed. 205 (2005).