Anthony Lomax v. United States

In Stinson v. United States, 508 U.S. 36 (1993), this Court held that commentary by the United States Sentencing Commission interpreting or explaining the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines is subject to Seminole Rock deference, now known as Auer deference. Id. at

1. In Kisor v. Wilkie, 139 S. Ct. 2400 (2019), the Court identified strict limits on the Seminole Rock and Auer deference upon which Stinson is based, confirming that courts should defer only to reasonable interpretations of regulations that are “genuinely ambiguous.” Id. at 2415. The questions presented are:

2. Pursuant to Kisor, are courts obligated first to determine whether a sentencing guideline is ambiguous before affording deference to the Sentencing Commission’s commentary interpreting the guideline?

3. U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2(a)(2) defines “crime of violence” to include only specified completed offenses. May courts defer to the Sentencing Commission’s commentary to that guideline, which expands the definition to include inchoate offenses?