Holland v. Jackson

HOLLAND, WARDEN v. JACKSON

ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

Tennessee's principal evidence at respondent's murder trial was Jonathan Hughes' eyewitness testimony that he was at the scene with Melissa Gooch, who did not testify. Respondent was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. After unsuccessfully moving for a new trial, he sought state postconviction relief, alleging, inter alia, that his trial counsel had been ineffective in failing to conduct an adequate investigation. See Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668. The trial court denied relief after an evidentiary hearing, finding that counsel's performance was not deficient and that, in any event, respondent suffered no prejudice. Respondent then moved for a new trial, claiming for the first time—after seven years—that Gooch would testify that she was not with Hughes on the night in question. The trial court denied the motion. In affirming that denial, the State Court of Criminal Appeals found that respondent had filed an earlier such motion and given no satisfactory reason for failing to locate Gooch in seven years, and that Gooch's testimony would only impeach Hughes' memory. In affirming the denial of postconviction relief, the court noted that there had been no showing on the record of favorable evidence that counsel could have elicited from Gooch and that respondent's pleading did not contradict what Hughes claimed to have seen. The Federal District Court granted the State summary judgment on respondent's subsequent federal habeas claim, finding the state court's application of Strickland erroneous but not unreasonable within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). The Sixth Circuit reversed, concluding that the state court had unreasonably applied Strickland, given that Gooch's statement undermined Hughes' credibility, and finding that the state court's opinion was contrary to Strickland because it assessed prejudice under a preponderance of the evidence, rather than a reasonable-probability, standard.

Held: The Sixth Circuit erred in granting relief under § 2254(d)(1). First, it found the state court's application of Strickland unreasonable on the basis of evidence not properly before the state court. Although the state court ventured that it would deny relief on the merits taking Gooch's statement into account, its judgment also rested on the holding that her statement was not properly before it. Granting relief in disregard of this independent basis for decision was error, for the question whether a state court's decision was unreasonable must be assessed in light of the record before that court, see, e. g., Yarborough v. Gentry, 540 U.S. 1, 6. Second, the Sixth Circuit erred in holding that the state court required proof by a preponderance of the evidence. The state court recited the correct reasonable probability standard, but the Sixth Circuit inferred from three subsequent passages in the state court's opinion that the state court had actually applied a preponderance standard. In doing so, the Sixth Circuit ignored § 2254(d)'s requirements that "state court decisions be given the benefit of the doubt," Woodford v. Visciotti, 537 U.S. 19, 24, and that "readiness to attribute error is inconsistent with the presumption that state courts know and follow the law," ibid.

Certiorari granted; 80 Fed. Appx. 392, reversed and remanded.