The Washington state Court of Appeals ruled Monday that denying a juvenile the right to a lawyer from the outset violated constitutional requirements.

Dan Donohoe, a spokesman for the King County prosecutor's office, said the ruling was under review and no decision had been made on whether to appeal to the state Supreme Court.

If it stands, the decision could make Washington the first state in which a juvenile is entitled to counsel at the outset of court truancy proceedings that could lead to penalties, said Paul M. Holland, director of the Ronald A. Peterson Law Clinic at Seattle University, which represented the student in the case.

"I am not aware of any states that provide lawyers at the initial stage of truancy proceedings," Holland said. "That is the most noteworthy part of this ruling."

He said it also is part of a growing body of law that recognizes the right to an attorney in certain civil matters as well as the well-established requirement for representation in criminal cases.

Under the law, a juvenile with at least seven unexcused absences in a month or 10 in a school year could be ordered to appear in Juvenile Court on a petition by school officials or the youngster's parents without being represented by an attorney.

The appeals court's decision was hailed by the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed a brief supporting the juvenile, a Bellevue girl identified only as E.S. and described as an emotionally troubled member of a refugee family from Bosnia.

Taking a page from a similar program launched a year ago in New York, court administrators in this suburban St. Louis county plan to launch within weeks a new court designed to deal only with military veterans charged with nonviolent crimes.

The mission: Divert many of the veterans from the criminal courts to a program that, much like popular drug courts, will offer them treatment for underlying issues, perhaps sparing them a criminal conviction if they successfully complete the treatment.

"There are a lot of services out there; one thing the court will be able to do is get them connected" with veterans, ideally keeping them from becoming repeat offenders, Ann Callis, the county's chief judge, said Monday.

Veterans' participation in the new court will be voluntary and Callis said it will be staffed by veterans from virtually every branch of the military. The prosecutor will be former Marine Corps Cpl. Michael Stewart, the public defender former Navy Lt. Tyler Bateman — officials Callis hopes will have a better understanding of veterans' issues.

Callis said she hoped the veterans' court would be under way by the end of next month or early March, with no immediate expectations about how many veterans might take part.

No additional funding would be required for the court, and Madison County Bar Association lawyers will donate their services, Callis said. "Since we're not asking for any money and it's based on the spirit of volunteerism, we figured why don't we just give it a shot?" she said.

A New Jersey appeals court reversed a lower court ruling requiring the e-mails be made public and authorizing a judge to inspect the communications.

The Democratic governor has been fighting to keep the correspondence between himself, his staff and Carla Katz private since the e-mails were requested by a Republican leader and several news organizations, including The Associated Press.

A three-judge appeals panel said the e-mails are covered by executive privilege, which allows officials to withhold certain information in the interest of governing.

An appeal to the state Supreme Court is anticipated.

Attorney General Anne Milgram argued that Corzine would not be able to govern effectively if his private communications were open to the public. A lawyer for the GOP, Mark Sheridan, argued that the public has a right to view e-mails the governor's office and Katz exchanged during state worker contract talks.

Tom Wilson, the Republican state committee chairman, sought disclosure of all e-mails that were not strictly personal or concerning general state business. He questioned whether the state worker contract negotiations were tainted by the relationship between Corzine and Katz.

The two dated before Corzine became governor. She is president of the largest state worker local, Communications Workers of America Local 1034.

The justices are hearing arguments on whether an Alaska gold mine can dump metal waste into a nearby lake.

A ruling in favor of the mining company could allow the Clean Water Act to be interpreted to allow mining waste to be dumped into waterways throughout the United States, said Tom Waldo, a lawyer with the environmental group Earthjustice.

"The whole reason Congress passed the Clean Water Act was to stop turning our lakes and rivers into industrial waste dumps," Waldo said. "The Bush administration selected the Kensington mine to test the limits of the Clean Water Act."

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a permit for waste disposal at the proposed Kensington mine north of Juneau in 2005. Under the plan, tailings — waste left after metals are extracted from ore — would be dumped into Lower Slate Lake.

Environmentalists sued to halt the practice, saying it would kill fish. A federal appeals court blocked the permit, saying the dumping is barred by stringent Environmental Protection Agency requirements under the Clean Water Act of 1972. The EPA had agreed to a regulatory change in the case defining "fill" as "tailings or similar mining-related materials."

The mine's owner, Coeur Alaska Inc., said tailings are inert sandy material, and that almost half of the tailings created by the mine would be recycled back into mine operations. The remaining tailings would be placed in a small unproductive lake, which the company called the best option for disposal.

The delays paid off — for Brillon: A Vermont court threw out his conviction and freed him from prison last spring, saying his Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial had been violated.

Now, the U.S. Supreme Court is taking up the case this week, trying to decide if delays caused by public defenders can deprive a criminal defendant of that right. In particular: Whether governments can be blamed for such delays since they're the ones who assign and pay the lawyers for indigent defendants.

Forty states and 15 organizations — state governments, county governments, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, a victim's rights' group — are backing the Vermont prosecutor's appeal of the ruling, worried that if it stands criminal suspects will try to game the system and get the result Brillon did.

"You're greasing that slippery slope," said David Parkhurst, an attorney with the National Governors Association, which filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the prosecutor's appeal. "That's the big concern here."

Brillon, a 46-year-old construction worker whose criminal past includes convictions for sexual assault on a minor, felony obstruction of justice and cocaine possession, was charged with aggravated domestic assault over the 2001 incident with his girlfriend, who was the mother of his child.

Wisuth Setsawat, the owner of Santika Club, and club manager Suriya Ritrabue have been charged with negligence resulting in the death and injuries of others, Deputy National Police Commissioner Gen. Jongrak Jutanont said.

"More than 1,000 people were allowed into the building, which has a capacity for only 500 people," Jongrak said. "The safety measures were also dysfunctional. Fire exits were not clearly marked. Automatic fire extinguishers were not present."

Police have said the fire was likely sparked by a fireworks display on the nightclub's stage.

The two have also been charged with allowing in underage customers. A 17-year-old was found among the dead.

The maximum penalty for negligence is 10 years in prison and a fine of not more than 20,000 baht ($573). Allowing in underage customers carries a fine of 50,000 baht ($1,433).

The fire raced through the two-story building shortly after the New Year's countdown, sending hundreds of panicked guests running for the main entrance. Victims were killed by the blaze, smoke inhalation and crushed in the stampede to get out.

Among the dead were three Singaporeans, one Japanese and one Myanmar national.

Jongrak said several other people were being sought for questioning in the case, including staffers of the company hired to put on the fireworks display.