By PETE YOST
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Monday ruled against a man sentenced to 25 years in prison who complained that his lawyer participated by speakerphone at a pivotal court proceeding.

Wisconsin officials had asked the justices to intervene after a federal appeals court ruled that Joseph Van Patten "didn't get even a warm body" standing next to him the day he entered a no-contest plea in the slaying.

The Supreme Court reversed the appeals court without ruling on the merits of whether Van Patten got adequate legal assistance by speakerphone.

"Even if we agree with Van Patten that a lawyer physically present will tend to perform better than one on the phone, it does not necessarily follow that mere phone contact amounted to total absence" or prevented assistance to the accused man, the court ruled in an unsigned opinion.

Hon. John Paul Stevens concurred in the judgment, saying that a Wisconsin court was not acting unreasonably under federal law when it ruled against Van Patten in the dispute. A previous court precedent, said Stevens, failed to clearly establish the full scope of a defendant's right to the presence of an attorney.

Van Patten pleaded no contest to a reduced charge of first-degree reckless homicide days before his trial was scheduled to begin.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled unanimously in 2006 that the arrangements made it impossible for Van Patten to have the assistance of counsel "in anything but the most perfunctory sense." The same appeals court ruled 2-1 in Van Patten's favor again last year.

The state of Wisconsin says it does not condone defense counsel assisting clients by telephone at court proceedings, but that the circumstances involving Van Patten do not meet the standards allowing federal review of a state-court conviction.

The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act allows federal-court review of a state-court conviction that is contrary to Supreme Court precedent. Yet the lower federal courts granted his petition "despite the lack of holdings" by the Supreme Court "on any claim or set of facts remotely resembling Van Patten's," the Wisconsin attorney general said.

Van Patten had been charged with killing a man by firing a bullet into the back of his head.

The case is Shawano County Sheriff v. Van Patten, 07-212.