The DCCA granted rehearing
en banc this past Friday in
Bado v. United States. Bado held that the defendant in a misdemeanor case had a right to a jury trial where a conviction would be deemed an "aggravated felony" under federal immigration law and render the defendant deportable. We first blogged about
Bado here. Given that
Bado managed to produce four different opinions (from only three judges), perhaps rehearing
en banc is not too surprising. The panel opinion has now been vacated, so for now defense counsel should be requesting jury trials (assuming a jury trial is in your client's interest) in any misdemeanor case in which deportation is a possible outcome.