Chief Justice John Roberts taken to hospital after fall near home in Maine

Chief Justice John Roberts was taken by ambulance to a hospital on Monday after a fall on a dock near his summer home in Maine.

Supreme Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg said she did not know how he fell or what injuries he might have suffered. She said he was taken to the hospital as a precaution.

Roberts, 52, bought a home last year in Port Clyde on Maine's Hupper Island. Port Clyde, which is part of the town of St. George, is about 90 miles by car northeast of Portland, midway up the coast of Maine.

The incident occurred around 2 p.m. EDT, said St. George Fire Chief Tim Polky. Roberts was taken by private boat to the mainland and then transferred to an ambulance, Polky said.

"He was conscious and alert when they put him in the rescue (vehicle) and took him to Penobscot Bay Medical Center," Polky said. A spokesman at the Rockport hospital did not immediately return a call from The Associated Press.

Named to the court by President Bush in 2005, Roberts is the youngest justice on a court in which the senior member, John Paul Stevens, is 87. Bush was informed of the hospitalization by his chief of staff, Josh Bolten, the White House said.

Roberts is the father of two young children.

In the early 1990s, Roberts couldn't drive for several months after he had a sudden fainting episode, said Larry Robbins, a Washington attorney who worked with Roberts at the Justice Department. Robbins said he drove Roberts to work during that time. He said Roberts never mentioned what the problem was and he never heard of it happening again.

Roberts became chief justice after the death of William Rehnquist in September 2005, although Bush had first chosen him to take Sandra Day O'Connor's seat when she announced her retirement earlier that year.

He had served as an appellate judge in Washington and spent more than a decade before that as a lawyer at the Hogan and Hartson law firm, where he specialized in arguing cases before the Supreme Court.

Roberts also served in the Reagan and Bush administrations in the 1980s and '90s. He was a clerk for Rehnquist after graduating from Harvard Law School.

Roberts spent a couple of weeks in Europe in July, teaching a course in Vienna and attending a conference in Paris. He was at the court in Washington late last week.

___

Associated Press writer David Sharp in Portland, Maine, contributed to this story.

___

On the Net:

Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov