Gabriel J. Chin is Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law at UC Davis School of Law.
In Smith v. United States, a unanimous court held on Thursday that when an appellate court finds that venue for a criminal trial was improper, the conviction should be vacated with the possibility of a retrial.
At the oral argument in Smith v. United States, there was no dispute that in the tradition of both English and U.S. law, venue was a fact issue presented to juries, and decided as part of their general verdict of guilty or not guilty.
It might be fairly said that in recent decades venue in criminal cases has not been the hottest topic on the court’s docket. Nevertheless, as the briefs in Smith v. United States emphasize, the criminal venue right was so significant to the Framers that the Constitution addressed it twice.
Congress provided that noncitizens who have been removed from the country but are found back in the United States should be expeditiously removed again. The second deportation occurs through a reinstatement of the first removal order, normally without further hearing, procedure or review.
The following is a series of questions posed by Professor Gabriel “Jack” Chin, University of California, Davis School of Law, to Professor Amanda Frost, American University Washington College of Law, on Frost’s new book, You Are Not American: Citizenship Stripping from Dred Scott to the Dreamers.
The Supreme Court heard argument on Monday by telephone in Pham v. Guzman Chavez, which raises a complex question about bond for migrants in removal proceedings. The justices asked hard questions of both sides.
Pham v. Guzman Chavez, which will be argued on Jan. 11, addresses the right of certain noncitizens to be released on bond while they are in the process of removal from the United States.
The Supreme Court today resolved United States v. Sineneng-Smith without reaching the merits of the underlying First Amendment question, instead holding that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit improperly injected the issue into the case.
Yesterday the Supreme Court heard argument in United States v. Sineneng-Smith, a government appeal from a reversal of criminal convictions by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit.
Few lawyers would accuse the Immigration and Nationality Act of being well drafted. The current law was enacted in 1952, but includes bits and pieces dating back to the founding era, along with major new features that are not always well integrated into the whole.
Gabriel J. Chin is Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law at UC Davis School of Law. As is customary, the Court’s per curiam affirmance of the Fifth Circuit by an equally divided court was a one-line opinion.