Foreign nationals arrested in the United States have a right to consult with diplomatic personnel from their home countries, but failure of the US to allow such consultation does not warrant the exclusion of any incriminating statements from their trial.

In a 6-to-3 decision announced Wednesday, the US Supreme Court ruled that an international treaty calling for consulate access to arrestees does not authorize the broad use of the so-called exclusionary rule.

Instead, alleged violations of an international treaty must be dealt with via remedies available under state and federal laws, the court said.

"Under our domestic law, the exclusionary rule is not a remedy we apply lightly," writes Chief Justice John Roberts for the majority.

The ruling comes in two consolidated cases involving a Mexican national and a Honduran national. Both men were convicted of serious crimes in the US, and both were never told that they had a right to meet with consular officials after their arrest.

Lawyers for the men argued that the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations empowered their clients to seek a remedy in American courts.

In one case, lawyers suggested that the appropriate remedy would be to bar all statements their client had made to police from use as evidence at his trial.

The Supreme Court disagreed, saying such a remedy would be "vastly disproportionate" to the alleged treaty violation. Chief Justice Roberts said there was nothing in Article 36 of the Vienna Convention authorizing exclusion of evidence as a remedy for a treaty violation.

"If we were to require suppression for Article 36 violations without some authority in the convention, we would in effect be supplementing those terms by enlarging the obligations of the United States under the convention," Roberts writes. "This is entirely inconsistent with the judicial function."

Roberts adds, "Courts must apply the remedy as a requirement of federal law. But where a treaty does not provide a particular remedy ... it is not for the federal courts to impose one on the states through lawmaking of their own."

In a dissent, Justice Stephen Breyer said the majority was wrong to rule out suppression of evidence as a possible remedy to treaty violations. He said that sometimes such a remedy might be the best approach.

"I would hold that whether the convention requires a state court to suppress a confession obtained after an Article 36 violation depends on whether suppression is the only remedy available that will effectively cure the related prejudice," he writes.

Justice Breyer says the majority's approach "leaves states free to deny effective relief for convention violations."

He adds, "That approach risks weakening respect abroad for the rights of foreign nationals.... And it increases the difficulties faced by the United States and other nations who would, through binding treaties, strengthen the role that law can play in assuring all citizens, including American citizens, fair treatment throughout the world."

In an apparent response, Roberts writes: "Our holding in no way disparages the importance of the Vienna Convention.... It is no slight to the convention to deny petitioner's claims under the same principles we would apply to an act of Congress, or to the Constitution itself."

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