No lawyer? No one must warn you

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Monday that while people pleading guilty to crimes are entitled to an attorney, judges don't have to warn them of the disadvantages of not seeing a lawyer.

Justices used the case of an Iowa man convicted of drunken driving to clarify rights under the Constitution's Sixth Amendment, which guarantees legal assistance to those accused of crimes.

In its 9-0 ruling, the court reaffirmed that people facing prison time are entitled to attorneys at critical stages of the process, including a plea hearing.

But Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said from the bench that the court has not "prescribed any formula or script to be read to a defendant who states that he elects to plead guilty without counsel."

The high court overturned an Iowa Supreme Court decision that said judges must tell defendants of the disadvantages of pleading guilty without consulting a lawyer.

Ginsburg said that states are free to adopt their own rules but that such warnings are not required by the Constitution.

Iowa had appealed the state court's decision, with the backing of the Bush administration and more than 30 states.

At issue was the case of Felipe Tovar, who didn't hire a lawyer when he went to court on drunken driving charges - and didn't get the best deal possible.

The justices sent Tovar's case back to Iowa for more consideration.

The case is Iowa vs. Tovar.

WASHINGTON - The Constitution guarantees a criminal defendant may confront his accusers, and that right means prosecutors can't use a wife's taped statement to police to try to undermine her husband at trial, the Supreme Court ruled Monday.

The high court sided with a man convicted of assaulting an acquaintance he had accused of trying to rape his wife. Sylvia Crawford did not testify at Michael Crawford's trial, but prosecutors played a tape they said showed her story did not match his.

Michael Crawford's lawyers had no opportunity to cross-examine Sylvia Crawford about the tape, a unanimous Supreme Court said.

"That alone is sufficient to make out a violation of the Sixth Amendment," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote.

The Sixth Amendment guarantees that "in all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right ... to be confronted with the witnesses against him."

All nine justices agreed to throw out Michael Crawford's conviction and return the case to the state court system in Washington. Seven justices also took the unusual step of squarely overruling an earlier case that laid out complex rules for when statements can be used without the opportunity for cross-examination.

The 1980 case has needlessly complicated a fairly straightforward part of the Constitution, Scalia wrote. The Constitution's framers were wary of letting judges have too much power, he added.

Justices John Paul Stevens, Anthony M. Kennedy, David Souter, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer agreed with him.

The case is Crawford vs. Washington.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court refused Monday to hear an appeal from the Boy Scouts over what the organizations says is discrimination because of its policy against hiring gays.

The case revisited the gay rights fight surrounding the high court's ruling four years ago that the Boy Scouts have the right to ban openly homosexual scout leaders. This time, the question was whether states may treat the Scouts differently than other organizations because of that policy.

The Scouts asked the justices to hear a case from Connecticut, where officials dropped the group from a list of charities that receive donations through a state employee payroll deduction plan.

That's unconstitutional discrimination, the Boy Scouts argued.

"To exclude the Boy Scouts from a forum based on their values they hold and the conduct they require of their members is to exclude Boy Scouts based on viewpoint and identity," lawyers for the Scouts argued in their Supreme Court appeal.

The Scouts took in about $10,000 annually from the employee charity campaign, the filing said.

The Boy Scouts are pursuing a similar court fight in San Diego.

Connecticut officials also raised the issue of discrimination to explain why the Scouts were dropped from the State Employee Campaign Committee in 2000.

A state human rights commission had found that including the Boy Scouts of America in the employee donation program would violate Connecticut's gay rights law, state Connecticut attorney General Richard Blumenthal argued to the high court.

The case is Boy Scouts of America vs. Wyman.

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