Section 924(c)

On remand after the Court’s en banc decision in Ovalles, the panel held that Ms. Ovalles’s attempted car-jacking was a “crime of violence” under § 924(c)(3)(A)’s elements clause, as it requires that a defendant have an intent to cause death or bodily harm and that he take a substantial step towards commission of that crime.

The Court held that the residual clause of § 924(c), which defines a “crime of violence,” was not void-for-vagueness after invoking the canon of constitutional doubt to support a narrower reading of the provision, one that qualifies a defendant’s offense as a “crime of violence” based on the defendant’s underlying conduct in that offense.