Whether a prior Massachusetts state drug offense that carried a maximum term of imprisonment of two and a half years as charged can constitute a serious drug offense' under the ACCA merely because prosecutors could have charged the defendant in a different state court where the offense carries a maximum term of imprisonment of ten years

QUESTION PRESENTED The Court’s decision in United States v. Rodriquez, which it clarified in CarachuriRosendo v. Holder, instructs lower courts to look to the record of the charging document, the plea colloquy, and the judgment—when determining whether a prior state drug offense was punishable by imprisonment up to ten years or more, such that it constitutes a “serious drug offense” under the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”) of 1984, 18 U.S.C. 924(e), and not to consider the punishment that the defendant hypothetically could have faced had he been charged differently. While some circuits have heeded that guidance, the First Circuit has not. The question presented is: Whether a prior Massachusetts state drug offense that carried a maximum term of imprisonment of two and a half years as charged can constitute a “serious drug offense” under the ACCA merely because prosecutors could have charged the defendant in a different state court where the offense carries a maximum term of imprisonment of ten years. i