Court upholds defendant right to choose lawyer

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A closely divided U.S. Supreme Court
ruled on Monday that a criminal conviction must be overturned
when a trial judge wrongly denies the defendant his right to be
represented by the lawyer of his choice.

The high court’s 5-4 ruling was a defeat for the U.S.
Justice Department, which argued that a defendant who had been
denied his counsel of choice must also prove that denial
adversely impacted his right to a fair trial.

The case involved Cuauhtemoc Gonzalez-Lopez, who was
charged in 2003 in St. Louis with conspiring to distribute
marijuana. He hired a California attorney, Joseph Low, to
represent him after hearing about Low’s reputation as a trial
attorney from other drug defendants.

Low was not admitted to practice before the federal
district court and the trial judge rejected his request for
permission to proceed with the case.

The judge said that in another case Low had improperly
contacted a defendant who already had a lawyer, interfered with
the defendant’s representation and attempted to circumvent a
ruling to continue that trial.

Gonzalez-Lopez then retained a local attorney, who had
never tried a criminal case. The trial judge rejected the local
attorney’s request that Low be allowed to sit at the table for
the defense lawyers.

The judge restricted Low to the spectator section of the
courtroom and barred any contact between Low and the local
attorney during the trial proceedings.

Gonzalez-Lopez was convicted and sentenced to more than 24
years in prison.

But a U.S. appeals court ruled that his constitutional
right to a lawyer of his choice had been violated and that the
error had been so serious it required the automatic reversal of
the conviction and a new trial.

The Supreme Court, in a majority opinion written by Justice
Antonin Scalia, agreed.

“A choice-of-counsel violation occurs whenever the
defendant’s choice is wrongly denied,” Scalia wrote. Although
the trial judge has broad discretion, the judge was wrong in
denying Gonzalez-Lopez his preferred lawyer, he added.

The conservative Scalia was joined by the court’s liberals,
Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg
and Stephen Breyer.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito,
Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas dissented.

In his dissenting opinion, Alito said a defendant should be
required to make at least some showing that the judge’s
erroneous ruling affected the quality of legal assistance he
received.

(additional reporting by Deborah Charles)