SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 07–608
UNITED STATES, PETITIONER v. RANDY EDWARD
HAYES
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
[February 24, 2009]
JUSTICE GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court.*
The federal Gun Control Act of 1968, 18 U. S. C. §921 et seq., has long prohibited possession of a firearm by any person convicted of a felony. In 1996, Congress extended the prohibition to include persons convicted of “a misde-meanor crime of domestic violence.” §922(g)(9). The definition of “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence,” contained in §921(a)(33)(A), is at issue in this case. Does that term cover a misdemeanor battery whenever the battered victim was in fact the offender’s spouse (or otherrelation specified in §921(a)(33)(A))? Or, to trigger thepossession ban, must the predicate misdemeanor identifyas an element of the crime a domestic relationship be-tween aggressor and victim? We hold that the domestic relationship, although it must be established beyond areasonable doubt in a §922(g)(9) firearms possessionprosecution, need not be a defining element of the predi-cate offense.
In 2004, law enforcement officers in Marion County,West Virginia, came to the home of Randy Edward Hayes in response to a 911 call reporting domestic violence.Hayes consented to a search of his home, and the officers discovered a rifle. Further investigation revealed that Hayes had recently possessed several other firearms aswell. Based on this evidence, a federal grand jury re-turned an indictment in 2005, charging Hayes, under §§922(g)(9) and 924(a)(2), with three counts of possessingfirearms after having been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The indictment identified Hayes’s predicate misde-meanor crime of domestic violence as a 1994 conviction for battery in violation of West Virginia law.1 The victim of that battery, the indictment alleged, was Hayes’s then-wife—a person who “shared a child in common” withHayes and “who was cohabitating with . . . him as aspouse.” App. 3.2
Asserting that his 1994 West Virginia battery conviction —————— 1West Virginia’s battery statute provides: “[A]ny person [who] unlaw-fully and intentionally makes physical contact of an insulting or pro-voking nature with the person of another or unlawfully and intention-ally causes physical harm to another person, . . . shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.” W. Va. Code Ann. §61–2–9(c) (Lexis 2005). 2The indictment stated, in relevant part: “Defendant RANDY EDWARD HAYES’ February 24, 1994 Batteryconviction . . . constituted a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence because: “a. Battery is a misdemeanor under State law in West Virginia; “b. Battery has, as an element, the use and attempted use of physicalforce; “c. Defendant RANDY EDWARD HAYES committed the offense of Battery against the victim: “i. who was his current spouse; and “ii. who was a person with whom he shared a child in common; and “iii. who was cohabitating with and had cohabitated with him as aspouse.” App. 2–3 (bold typeface deleted).
did not qualify as a predicate offense under §922(g)(9),Hayes moved to dismiss the indictment. Section 922(g)(9),Hayes maintained, applies only to persons previously convicted of an offense that has as an element a domestic relationship between aggressor and victim. The West Virginia statute under which he was convicted in 1994,Hayes observed, was a generic battery proscription, not a law designating a domestic relationship between offender and victim as an element of the offense. The United States District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia rejected Hayes’s argument and denied his motion to dismiss the indictment. 377 F. Supp. 2d 540, 541–542 (2005). Hayes then entered a conditional guilty plea and appealed.
In a 2-to-1 decision, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit reversed. A §922(g)(9) predicate offense, the Court of Appeals held, must “have as an ele-ment a domestic relationship between the offender and thevictim.” 482 F. 3d 749, 751 (2007). In so ruling, theFourth Circuit created a split between itself and the nine other Courts of Appeals that had previously published opinions deciding the same question.3 According to thosecourts, §922(g)(9) does not require that the offense predi-cate to the defendant’s firearm possession conviction haveas an element a domestic relationship between offenderand victim. We granted certiorari, 552 U. S. ___ (2008), to resolve this conflict.