Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-09-00002/USCOURTS-ca4-09-00002-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Loretta K. Kelly
Appellee
Leon J. Winston
Appellant

Document Text:

Volume 1 of 2

PUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

LEON J. WINSTON, 

Petitioner-Appellant,

v.  No. 09-2

LORETTA K. KELLY, Warden,

Sussex I State Prison,

Respondent-Appellee. 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Virginia, at Roanoke.

Samuel G. Wilson, District Judge.

(7:07-cv-00364-sgw-mfu)

Argued: September 23, 2009

Decided: January 27, 2010

Before MICHAEL, GREGORY, and DUNCAN,

Circuit Judges.

Affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded by published

opinion. Judge Michael wrote the opinion, in which Judge

Duncan joined. Judge Gregory wrote a separate opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.

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COUNSEL

ARGUED: Jennifer Leigh Givens, FEDERAL COMMUNITY DEFENDER’S OFFICE, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,

for Appellant. Steven Andrew Witmer, OFFICE OF THE

ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: James H. Moreno, FEDERAL COMMUNITY DEFENDER’S OFFICE, Philadelphia,

Pennsylvania, for Appellant. William C. Mims, Attorney

General, Jerry P. Slonaker, Senior Assistant Attorney General, OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee. 

OPINION

MICHAEL, Circuit Judge:

Leon J. Winston was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death by the Circuit Court for the City of Lynchburg, Virginia. After failing to obtain relief in state postconviction proceedings, he petitioned the district court for a

writ of habeas corpus. He now appeals the district court’s

denial of the writ. Winston presents the following issues, as

authorized by the certificate of appealability: (1) whether he

received ineffective assistance of counsel at the guilt phase of

his trial; (2) whether the state trial court unconstitutionally

denied his request for a lesser included homicide instruction;

(3) whether Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002), prohibits

his execution because he is mentally retarded; (4) whether he

received ineffective assistance when his counsel failed to

argue that Atkins prohibits his execution; and (5) whether he

otherwise received ineffective assistance at the sentencing

phase of his trial.

We affirm the district court’s denial of Winston’s ineffective assistance claims for both the guilt and sentencing phases

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of his trial; we also affirm the denial of his jury instruction

claim. On Winston’s Atkins and Atkins-related claims, however, we conclude that further proceedings in the district court

are required. As the district court recognized, because Winston presented material evidence in his federal habeas hearing

with respect to the Atkins-related claims that was not considered by the Supreme Court of Virginia, these claims present

complex questions concerning the application of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, Pub. L. No.

104-132, 110 Stat. 1214 (AEDPA). A district court may not

consider additional evidence in a federal habeas proceeding

unless the petitioner has satisfied AEDPA’s dual requirements

of exhausting state remedies and developing the factual record

in the state courts. While these requirements present a high

bar for the petitioner, we conclude in this case that Winston

cleared the bar. Winston’s counsel for both his state and federal habeas applications did not find records of a test score

relevant to proving his retardation until two weeks before the

evidentiary hearing held by the district court. We hold that it

was error for the district court to refuse to consider this evidence because the score does not fundamentally alter Winston’s claims and because habeas counsel was diligent in

searching for it. We therefore vacate the district court’s judgment insofar as it denies Winston’s Atkins and Atkins-related

claims, and we remand for further proceedings on these

claims.

I.

A.

On the morning of Friday, April 19, 2002, two men broke

into Rhonda and Anthony Robinson’s house. After confronting the Robinsons near their daughters’ second-floor bedroom, one of the men followed Anthony Robinson

downstairs. There, the man shot Anthony several times. He

then returned upstairs and shot Rhonda in front of her daughters, Niesha and Tiesha Whitehead. After the shootings the

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men left, leaving Rhonda and Anthony to die from their

wounds. Leon Winston was later arrested and tried for the

murders.

At trial two witnesses gave essentially uncontradicted testimony that Winston was present at the Robinsons’ when the

murders occurred. Michelle Lipford, who had been sexually

intimate with Winston, testified that she drove him and a man

named Kevin Brown to the Robinson house at about 5:00 a.m.

on the morning of the murders. After waiting nearby in the car

for an indeterminate time, Lipford heard gun shots and then

drove off. Tranika Turner, Winston’s girlfriend, testified that

in response to a telephone request from Winston at 6:00 a.m.

that same morning, she picked him up at a carwash near the

Robinson house. Turner noted that when she picked him up,

Winston was wearing a black hoodie with gray stripes. 

To establish that Winston actually shot the Robinsons, the

prosecution offered physical evidence, eyewitness testimony,

and a confession. For physical evidence, the prosecution

introduced a gun that forensic experts had identified as the

murder weapon and on which Winston’s DNA — and only

Winston’s DNA — was found. Robin Wilson testified that

shortly after the murders Winston had given him the gun to

keep. 

For eyewitness testimony, the prosecution relied on nineyear-old Niesha Whitehead. While Niesha witnessed many of

the events that transpired the morning of the murders, her testimony was somewhat inconsistent, and she could not directly

identify Winston. She did, however, testify that her mother’s

voice woke her on the morning of the murders and that upon

waking, she saw two black-skinned men outside her second

floor bedroom. She saw one of the men, whom she called

"Mr. No Name," follow Anthony Robinson downstairs. She

then heard gunshots and saw Mr. No Name return to shoot her

mother, Rhonda Robinson. On direct examination Niesha testified that Mr. No Name had a tattoo that looked like a "big

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dog," J.A. 39, and wore all black. It is undisputed that Winston has a tattoo on his arm matching the one described by

Niesha, but Niesha could not remember whether Mr. No

Name’s clothing had any stripes on it. On cross examination

she answered "Yes" twice when asked whether one man wore

all black and one wore black with white stripes. She also

answered "Yes" when asked whether the man in white stripes

tried to stop Mr. No Name from shooting her mother. Finally,

Niesha contradicted her testimony on direct by identifying the

man with white stripes as the one with the tattoo. 

For evidence of a confession, the prosecution called Nathan

Rorls, a long-time friend of Winston’s, as a witness. Rorls testified that Winston called him in April of 2002 and told him

that he had "slumped two people" in Lynchburg — meaning

he had "murdered somebody, killed somebody." Id. at 94.

Rorls further testified that the day after he received the call,

he saw Winston and Winston’s cousin Pego (Peyton Carter)

at a friend’s house. There, Rorls said that Winston told him

he had "killed two people and robbed them and stuff." Id. at

98. Rorls recounted that Winston proceeded to describe the

crime in detail, noting that he (Winston) and "his codefendant" had taken two thousand dollars and two ounces of

cocaine from the Robinsons. Id. at 101. 

Winston did not take the stand. His counsel thus focused on

undermining the credibility of the prosecution’s witnesses and

highlighting inconsistencies in the physical evidence. Pointing

to Niesha Whitehead’s testimony concerning the shooter’s

appearance, defense counsel contended that another man,

Tywan Turner, was the likely shooter, and that Winston had

tried to prevent the shooting. Counsel also challenged Rorls’s

testimony as fabricated and given to avoid the long prison

term he was facing on drug charges. Finally, counsel challenged the testimony of Lipford and Wilson as unreliable and

implausible. 

The jury returned a verdict of guilty, convicting Winston of

capital murder, robbery, and several lesser crimes. In the senWINSTON v. KELLY 5

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tencing phase defense counsel presented testimony from Winston’s family describing his troubled childhood. Winston’s

mother testified that he had never known his father, that she

had been in and out of prison for much of his childhood, and

that she regularly used PCP, marijuana, cocaine, and alcohol

both before and after Winston was born. Winston’s grandmother testified that she had frequently taken a very young

Winston with her when she committed various larcenies.

Finally, defense counsel introduced three psychological evaluations of Winston along with some related records, all from

Winston’s childhood. 

The psychological evaluations, however, were not introduced to prove that Winston was mentally retarded under Virginia law. Rather, they were admitted as ordinary mitigating

evidence, describing Winston’s sub-average intellectual functioning and troubled childhood. Defense counsel took this

approach despite the bounty of evidence in those evaluations

and related records relevant to a determination of retardation

under the applicable Virginia statute. The evaluations were

accompanied by I.Q. scores of 77, 73, and 76, respectively. In

one of the evaluations the psychologist commented that Winston was functioning in the "[b]orderline range of abilities"

and that his "ability to recall specific verbal facts which are

typically acquired through education and experience is

extremely deficient and falls within the Mentally Retarded

range (1st percentile)." J.A. 2133. In another the psychologist

found that Winston had "borderline intellect and severe verbal

processing problems." Id. The psychologist also noted that

Winston’s immaturity and passiveness "place him at a risk to

be easily manipulated by others. He is likely to always follow

the easiest path, the strongest leader." Id.

Also in defense counsel’s possession, but not submitted to

the jury, were additional records from the Fairfax County

Department of Student Services and Special Education (Fairfax County). These records showed that Winston was eligible

for special education due to "mild retardation," that he "de6 WINSTON v. KELLY

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monstrate[d] a reduced rate of intellectual development and a

level of academic achievement below that of age peers," and

that he "concurrently demonstrate[d] deficits in adaptive

behavior." Id. at 2133-34. Unlike the psychological evaluations presented to the jury, these records did not include an

I.Q. score. An affidavit from a Fairfax County special education professional — obtained long after Winston’s trial —

indicated that while an additional psychological evaluation

and I.Q. test would necessarily have accompanied the County’s conclusions about Winston, these additional items had

likely been destroyed.

In determining not to pursue a sentencing strategy based on

mental retardation, defense counsel apparently relied primarily, if not solely, on the advice of Dr. Evan Nelson, the clinical psychologist appointed to assist Winston during the

sentencing phase. Dr. Nelson did an assessment of Winston

for use at his sentencing. He reviewed the psychological evaluations and records forwarded to him by counsel and interviewed Winston and members of his family. Dr. Nelson did

not interview Winston’s teachers and social workers, and he

cannot recall whether he saw the Fairfax County record

changing Winston’s disability classification to mild retardation. Based on the materials before him at the time, Dr. Nelson told defense counsel that "he did not think [they] could

prove [that Winston] was mentally retarded as defined by the

Virginia statute." J.A. 2135.

Defense counsel were almost completely dependent on Dr.

Nelson’s analysis. They did not read Winston’s psychological

records in their entirety before forwarding them to Dr. Nelson, nor is there any evidence that they reviewed them after

receiving Dr. Nelson’s opinion. The lawyer tasked with gathering mitigation evidence admitted that he had been unable to

review all the records and had "relied on Dr. Nelson to thoroughly review the records and tell [him] what [he] needed to

know." J.A. at 2134. Neither of Winston’s lawyers read the

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records containing Fairfax County’s change of Winston’s disability classification to mild retardation.

After considering the evidence relevant to sentencing, the

jury recommended a sentence of death for each of the murders, 73 years for the robbery and related crimes, and

$400,000 in fines. The trial court sentenced Winston according to the jury’s recommendations, except for suspending the

fines. The Supreme Court of Virginia affirmed Winston’s

convictions and sentence, Winston v. Commonwealth, 604

S.E.2d 21 (Va. 2004), and the United States Supreme Court

denied certiorari, Winston v. Virginia, 546 U.S. 850 (2005).

B.

Winston later petitioned for habeas relief in the Supreme

Court of Virginia. Winston v. Warden of the Sussex I State

Prison, No. 52501, 2007 WL 678266 (Va. Mar. 7, 2007). In

his petition Winston requested an evidentiary hearing and

raised multiple claims centering on actual innocence, Atkins,

and ineffective assistance of counsel. The Virginia Supreme

Court denied all relief without allowing an evidentiary hearing. Id. at *18. It concluded that Winston’s actual innocence

claim was not cognizable in habeas, that his Atkins claim had

not been raised on direct appeal and therefore was procedurally defaulted, and that his ineffective assistance of counsel

claims failed on the merits. Id. at *1, 3, 6-17. The Virginia

Supreme Court did not then have before it Winston’s claim

that the trial court erred in denying his requested jury instruction on lesser included homicide charges.

Following the denial of his state habeas petition, Winston

filed the pending petition in federal district court. In its first

opinion, dated May 30, 2008, the district court rejected on the

merits Winston’s claims of actual innocence, ineffective assistance of counsel at the guilt phase, failure to instruct the jury

on lesser offenses, and ineffective assistance of counsel in

presenting mitigation evidence at the sentencing phase. How8 WINSTON v. KELLY

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ever, with respect to Winston’s Atkins and Atkins-related ineffective assistance of counsel claims, the court reserved

decision and ordered an evidentiary hearing. The district court

"d[id] not decide that Winston [wa]s entitled to an evidentiary

hearing, but rather exercise[d] its discretion" to order one.

J.A. 617.

At the hearing the district court heard from nine witnesses

over two days and received documentary evidence not presented to the state courts. Of particular importance was the

introduction of Winston’s missing 1997 psychological evaluation and I.Q. test score from Fairfax County. Just two weeks

before the hearing, Winston’s habeas counsel found Marilynn

Schneider Lageman, the psychologist who administered the

test. Lageman testified that she had kept personal copies of

Winston’s records, and she produced documentation reflecting Winston’s I.Q. score of 66. Dr. Daniel Reschly, a mental

retardation expert, testified for Winston, opining that "to a

reasonable degree of psychological certainty," Winston was

mentally retarded under Virginia law before he reached the

age of 18. J.A. 2141. After Reschly made what he concluded

were proper adjustments for both the Standard Error of Measurement (SEM) and the Flynn effect, the low ranges for Winston’s other I.Q. scores were more than two standard

deviations below the mean. Reschly further opined that Winston had conceptual, social, and practical adaptive deficits

before age 18. In response to Dr. Reschly, the Commonwealth

offered an expert, Dr. Leigh Hagan. Dr. Hagan opined that

Winston was not mentally retarded before age 18, that there

was no basis for adjusting Winston’s I.Q. scores due to SEM

or the Flynn effect, and that limitations in Winston’s adaptive

behavior did not significantly impair his functioning.

Winston’s trial counsel and mitigation expert also testified

at the district court hearing. Counsel admitted that if they had

seen the additional I.Q. score of 66, they would have argued

that Winston was retarded and therefore ineligible for the

death penalty under Atkins. Dr. Nelson testified that, in addiWINSTON v. KELLY 9

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tion to not having access to the Fairfax County records and

I.Q. score, counsel had not provided him with information

from certain teachers, social workers, and family members

that was relevant to Winston’s adaptive functioning. Nelson

acknowledged that his prior opinion — that a mental retardation defense was not sustainable — might have been different

had he possessed this information.

Following the hearing the district court issued a second

opinion, dated March 6, 2009, denying Winston’s remaining

claims. While the district court reaffirmed its decision to grant

an evidentiary hearing, it refused to consider the additional

records from Fairfax County, including the I.Q. score of 66,

because Winston had failed to exhaust that aspect of his ineffectiveness claim in the state courts. The district court further

noted that while Winston had diligently pursued his ineffectiveness claim in the state courts, he had failed to subpoena

Lageman or the records of Winston’s fourth I.Q. test. After

rejecting the additional records from Fairfax County, the district court concluded that nothing excused Winston’s procedural default of his Atkins claim and that his ineffective

assistance claim failed on the merits. This appeal followed.

II.

We first consider Winston’s claims that his conviction

should be vacated because he received ineffective assistance

of counsel at the guilt phase of his trial or because the trial

court erroneously refused to give a lesser-included homicide

instruction. We affirm the district court’s decision to reject

these claims.

A.

Winston claims that his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment

right to effective assistance of counsel was violated during the

guilt phase of his trial. He argues that his trial counsel failed

(1) "to prove, as they easily could have, that Rorls’ testimony

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was a lie" and (2) to pursue effectively their strategy of "t[ying] [Tywan] Turner to this crime any and every way [they]

could." Appellant’s Br. at 11, 13. We agree with the district

court that the state court did not unreasonably apply federal

law in denying this ineffective assistance claim.

When a state court has adjudicated a claim on the merits,

a federal court may grant a writ of habeas corpus only if the

state court decision "was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law" or

"was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in

light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding."

28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). We "review[ ] de novo the district

court’s application of the standards of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) to

the findings and conclusions of the [state] court." McNeill v.

Polk, 476 F.3d 206, 210 (4th Cir. 2007). To prevail on an

ineffective assistance claim, a petitioner must establish (1)

that counsel’s performance was deficient and (2) that the deficiency prejudiced the defense. Strickland v. Washington, 466

U.S. 668, 687 (1984). To establish deficient performance, a

petitioner "must show that counsel’s representation fell below

an objective standard of reasonableness." Id. at 688. Courts

"indulge a strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls

within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance"

to "avoid the distorting effects of hindsight." Yarbrough v.

Johnson, 520 F.3d 329, 337 (4th Cir. 2008) (quoting Strickland 466 U.S. at 689). To establish prejudice under Strickland, the petitioner "must show that there is a reasonable

probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the

result of the proceeding would have been different." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694. 

Rorls, in a recent affidavit, said that his testimony at Winston’s trial was "made up" to get a "bigger sentence cut" in his

own drug case. J.A. at 325. Winston argues that Rorls’s fabrication would have been apparent to the jury if his counsel had

presented testimony from Winston’s cousins, Peyton Carter

and Joe Lewis. Carter and Lewis attest in affidavits that they

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were present at the small gathering at which, according to

Rorls’s trial testimony, Winston confessed his role in the murders to Rorls for the second time. Both Carter and Lewis

swear that they were with or within earshot of Winston the

entire time at the gathering, and they did not witness a confession or overhear any private conversation between Winston

and Rorls in which Winston confessed. Counsel’s failure to

interview Carter and Lewis and call them as witnesses, Winston argues, constituted deficient performance that prejudiced

his defense.

As the district court observed, Winston’s claim that defense

counsel should have called Carter and Lewis boils down to

the argument that counsel "should have further emphasized

that Rorls lied about Winston’s admissions in order to reduce

Rorls’ own prison time." J.A. 594. Defense counsel devoted

considerable effort to attacking Rorls’s credibility. The very

first questions to Rorls on cross-examination were successful

in getting him to admit that he was facing a potential life sentence on cocaine conspiracy charges and that he had

"dangle[d] out" information to the authorities about the Robinson murders in an effort to shorten his sentence. J.A. 110.

Rorls, who had been released from custody, admitted to the

jury that he had "bought [his] freedom" with his cooperation.

J.A. 109-10. Defense counsel "clearly and repeatedly" used

Rorls’s admissions to press to the jury the theme that Rorls

was lying to reduce his prison time. J.A. 594.

It is easy for Winston to argue now that the testimony of

Carter and Lewis should have been offered as part of the

attack on Rorls’s credibility. But trial strategy decisions are

not evaluated "through the distorting effects of hindsight."

Yarbrough, 520 F.3d at 337. Defense counsel’s strategy of

attacking Rorls’s credibility in the manner chosen, which was

undeniably focused and aggressive, "falls within the wide

range of reasonable professional assistance." Id.

Winston challenges another strategy decision of defense

counsel in arguing that they did not sufficiently develop the

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theory that Tywan Turner committed the murders. Specifically, Winston argues that counsel should have called Patti

Whitehead, the sister of one of the victims and the mother of

Turner’s children, because she had made a statement to police

that Turner was in Lynchburg at the time of the murders.

However, one of Winston’s defense counsel explained by

affidavit that while he and his co-counsel had subpoenaed

Whitehead, they did not call her as a witness because they

"were unable to talk to her beforehand" and "were unsure

what she would say." J.A. 1881. "On habeas review, a federal

court generally credits plausible strategic judgments in the

trial of a state case." Vinson v. True, 436 F.3d 412, 419 (4th

Cir. 2006). Here, because defense counsel could not determine beforehand what Whitehead’s testimony would be, their

decision not to call her was a plausible strategic judgment. 

We conclude that defense counsel’s representation was not

deficient at the guilt phase of Winston’s trial. We likewise

conclude that the state court did not unreasonably apply

Strickland in denying Winston’s ineffective assistance claim

with respect to the guilt phase. 

B.

Winston next argues that his due process rights were violated when the state trial judge refused to instruct the jury on

lesser included homicide charges. Although Winston did raise

this claim on direct appeal, he did not raise it with the

Supreme Court of Virginia in his state habeas petition. The

state did not argue in the district court, however, that the

claim was unexhausted. Because we conclude that the claim

should be denied on the merits, we need not reach exhaustion.

See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(2). 

"In capital cases, due process requires the court to give an

instruction on any lesser included offense when the evidence

warrants such an instruction." Bates v. Lee, 308 F.3d 411, 418

(4th Cir. 2002) (citing Beck v. Alabama, 447 U.S. 625, 637-38

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(1980)). "Beck requires a lesser-included offense instruction

when the evidence at trial . . . casts ‘some doubt’ on a necessary element of the capital charge." Hyatt v. Branker, 569

F.3d 162, 174 (4th Cir. 2009). Because each state inevitably

has its own rule for when its courts should instruct a jury on

lesser included offenses, a federal court first determines

whether the state rule offends the federal rule. See Hopper v.

Evans, 456 U.S. 605, 611-12 (1982); see also Beck, 447 U.S.

at 628-29. Here, there is no material distinction between the

Virginia rule and the federal one. See Remington v. Commonwealth, 551 S.E.2d 620, 632-33 (Va. 2001) ("[a] second

degree murder instruction is only appropriate where it is supported by the evidence"); Briley v. Commonwealth, 273

S.E.2d 48, 54 (Va. 1980) (noting that Beck left the Virginia

rule unchanged). The Virginia rule therefore poses no constitutional problem on its face; indeed, its application is equivalent to application of the federal rule for the purposes of

AEDPA. Accordingly, we consider only whether the state

courts’ application of the Virginia rule was reasonable. 

Winston argues that the evidence permitted the inference

that he was not the triggerman and therefore supported an

instruction on non-capital murder. Except in the case of murder for hire, Virginia law bars conviction of a capital crime

when the accused was not the actual perpetrator. Frye v. Commonwealth, 345 S.E.2d 267, 280 (Va. 1986). Given Tranika

Turner’s unrebutted description of Winston’s clothing that

evening as being black with grey stripes, Winston contends

that a reasonable jury could have concluded from Niesha

Whitehead’s testimony that his accomplice fired the fatal

shots. Winston points specifically to Niesha’s testimony that

the shooter wore all black and the other man present wore

black with white stripes. The jury could therefore have credited Niesha’s testimony and disqualified Winston as the triggerman.

Winston ignores the fact that the state court considered this

slice of testimony in the context of a wealth of evidence indi14 WINSTON v. KELLY

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cating that he was the shooter. As the Virginia Supreme Court

held on direct appeal, "[i]n light of the overwhelming evidence indicating that Winston was the triggerman responsible

for Rhonda’s death, we cannot say that a short passage

excerpted from Niesha’s testimony was sufficient to merit

jury instructions on first or second degree murder, or accessory after the fact." Winston, 604 S.E.2d at 44. The evidence

at trial pointing to Winston included: Rorls’s testimony that

Winston confessed to being the shooter; testimony that the

gun used in the killings was in Winston’s possession and had

his DNA on it; Niesha’s testimony that a man with a tattoo

matching Winston’s was the shooter; and Winston’s own

admission that he was present when the shootings occurred.

When the several pieces of evidence pointing to Winston’s

guilt are measured against the small portion of Niesha’s testimony concerning the shooter’s clothing — which is itself

inconsistent — we cannot conclude that the trial court unreasonably applied controlling law by failing to give the lesserincluded offense instruction.

The dissent reaches the opposite conclusion by minimizing

the significance of relevant evidence and failing to exercise

sufficient deference under AEDPA. The dissent argues that

Niesha Whitehead’s testimony was consistent with Winston

not being the triggerman. However, there is little doubt that

Niesha’s testimony was inconsistent, with even the dissent

noting that Niesha identified both the man in black and the

man with stripes as having the "big dog" tattoo. This inconsistency tends to undermine Niesha’s testimony as a whole

rather than provide reliable evidence supporting the inference

that Winston was not the triggerman. Similarly, Niesha’s initial failure to remember whether the shooter wore white

stripes undermines the black and white distinction defense

counsel tried to draw between the two perpetrators. 

The dissent appears not to be troubled by the weaknesses

in Niesha’s testimony because it concludes that "[o]ther than

the testimony of Rorls, whose credibility was questioned at

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trial, no evidence relied on by the majority can be characterized as ‘overwhelming’ evidence that Winston was the triggerman." Infra at 48. While the dissent is quick to minimize

Rorls’s testimony, it was properly admitted into evidence and

clearly implicates Winston as the shooter. The fact that Rorls

later recanted is irrelevant to our analysis under AEDPA. See

Holland v. Jackson, 542 U.S. 649, 652 (2004) ("[W]hether a

state court’s decision was unreasonable must be assessed in

light of the record the court had before it."). Similarly, the

presence of Winston’s DNA on the murder weapon, which

was itself entrusted to another by Winston after the murders,

permits an inference that Winston was the triggerman. In light

of this additional evidence, it was not unreasonable for the

Virginia Supreme Court to characterize as "overwhelming"

the evidence that Winston was the triggerman. 

We cannot see how the dissent can conclude otherwise

under AEPDA’s deferential standard. The dissent states that

"the state court made an unreasonable determination of the

facts" when it found that there was overwhelming evidence

that Winston was the triggerman. Infra at 48-49. The "finding" that the dissent points to is a legal determination that the

evidence did not support giving a lesser included homicide

instruction. Proper consideration of this determination is

under § 2254(d)(1) rather than § 2254(d)(2). But even if the

dissent has identified the correct standard, it has not demonstrated why the state court’s determination was not only

incorrect but also unreasonable. The Virginia Supreme Court

concluded that no rational juror could have discounted Rorls’s

testimony, the evidence concerning the murder weapon, and

Winston’s presence at the scene and still credited Niesha’s

testimony that a man with white-striped clothing and a tattoo

tried to stop the shooting. Assuming this conclusion was error

because it crossed the line between making the legal determination of whether an inference is rational and weighing the

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evidence, it was not an unreasonable conclusion at variance

with AEDPA.1

Finally, we disagree with Winston that we should grant him

relief because the facts here closely resemble the facts of

Beck. In Beck the evidence was sufficient to establish that the

defendant was guilty of a serious, violent offense but left

some doubt as to whether he had committed a capital offense.

The jury, however, was instructed only on the capital charge.

Thus, the jury potentially faced the choice of either convicting

the defendant of capital murder because it believed that he

was "guilty of some serious crime and should be punished" —

an impermissible reason — or acquitting because "whatever

his crime, the defendant does not deserve death" — an equally

impermissible reason. Beck, 447 U.S. at 642. The Supreme

Court held that an instruction on the lesser included offense

was necessary in these circumstances. Winston’s jury, however, did not face the choice of death or acquittal because it

was also instructed on robbery and related charges. More

important, unlike the state court in Beck, the Supreme Court

of Virginia concluded that the evidence against Winston on

the capital charge was overwhelming. This reasonable conclusion did not leave room for the quantum of doubt required by

Beck. Accordingly, Beck did not mandate a lesser-included

offense instruction.

III.

We next consider Winston’s claims that his sentence should

be vacated because: (1) Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304

(2002), bars his execution; (2) he received ineffective assistance when his counsel failed to argue that Atkins barred his

1The dissent stresses that Beck does not present a sufficiency of the evidence issue. We agree. The fact that the evidence supported the jury’s verdict is not dispositive. However, we disagree with the dissent to the extent

it assumes that evidence besides Niesha’s testimony is irrelevant to

answering the Beck inquiry. 

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execution; and (3) he received ineffective assistance when his

counsel failed to adequately present mitigating evidence during the sentencing phase. Our treatment of Winston’s Atkinsrelated ineffective assistance claim renders analysis of Winston’s Atkins claim unnecessary. Winston concedes that his

Atkins claim is procedurally barred absent a valid excuse, and

ineffective assistance is one such excuse. Because we vacate

the district court’s decision and remand on Winston’s Atkinsrelated ineffective assistance of counsel claim, we need not

decide on this appeal whether any other excuse applies. 

A.

Winston claims that he received ineffective assistance

when his counsel failed to mount a defense under Atkins v.

Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002). In Atkins the Supreme Court

held that the Eighth Amendment prohibits the execution of

the mentally retarded, but it left to the states the task of

enforcing the constitutional restriction. Id. at 306, 317. The

Virginia legislature enacted a statute defining mental retardation shortly after Atkins was decided. To prove mental retardation under the statute, the accused must establish a

disability, "originating before the age of 18 years," characterized by both

(i) significantly subaverage intellectual functioning

as demonstrated by performance on a standardized

measure of intellectual functioning administered in

conformity with accepted professional practice, that

is at least two standard deviations below the mean

and (ii) significant limitations in adaptive behavior

as expressed in conceptual, social and practical adaptive skills.

Va. Code. Ann. § 19.2-264.3:1.1(A). The Supreme Court of

Virginia later held that "[w]hether [a defendant] is mentally

retarded [is] a factual issue for the jury to determine." Atkins

v. Commonwealth, 631 S.E.2d 93, 98 (Va. 2006).

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The district court rejected Winston’s Atkins-related ineffective assistance claim, concluding that Strickland’s prejudice

requirement had not been satisfied. Proving prejudice required

Winston to demonstrate a reasonable probability that a factfinder would have determined he was mentally retarded under

Virginia law. In rejecting Winston’s claim in his state habeas

proceeding, the Virginia Supreme Court focused on whether

Winston had demonstrated "significantly subaverage intellectual functioning." To this end, Winston had presented the state

court with I.Q. scores of 77, 73, and 76 as well as evidence

that Fairfax County had diagnosed him with mild retardation

in 1997. The Virginia Supreme Court rejected the three I.Q.

scores as evidence of retardation because it had previous held

"that the maximum score for a classification of mental retardation [was] an I.Q. score of 70." J.A. 305. The court rejected

the Fairfax County diagnosis because it had been made for the

purpose of establishing special education eligibility, and the

definition of mental retardation used by the county did not

require an I.Q. score below 70. The district court concluded

that the Virginia Supreme Court’s determination was not

objectively unreasonable.

In reaching its decision, however, the district court refused

to consider new evidence that Fairfax County did indeed give

Winston an I.Q. test and that the score was 66 — clearly

below 70. In Winston’s state habeas proceedings, the Virginia

Supreme Court had denied, without explanation, his motion

for discovery and an evidentiary hearing to further develop

the factual basis of his claims. Consequently, it was not until

two weeks before the evidentiary hearing scheduled by the

district court that Winston, through the efforts of his counsel,

was able to obtain the additional test score. The district court

noted that the new evidence "rais[ed] interrelated questions of

whether Winston failed to develop in state court proceedings

the factual basis he now relies on to support his ineffective

assistance claim and whether Winston has failed to exhaust

that claim." J.A. 2148. After the evidentiary hearing, however, the district court concluded that both questions were

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"perhaps best viewed analytically as exhaustion questions."

Id. It determined that the potentially dispositive new evidence

should not be considered on the merits because it rendered

Winston’s claim unexhausted.

The application of AEDPA is, of course, implicated in the

question of whether the district court should have considered

Winston’s new evidence. We agree with the district court’s

original observation that the question raises both an exhaustion issue and a failure-to-develop issue. We disagree that the

two issues should be collapsed into an exhaustion issue post

hearing, and we therefore consider each in turn. See Boyko v.

Parke, 259 F.3d 781, 788-92 (7th Cir. 2001). Finally, we note

that because mental retardation is at bottom a factual issue,

review of Winston’s new evidence implicates § 2254(d)(2)

and § 2254(e)(1), both provisions of AEDPA governing federal habeas review of state court factual findings. Because we

conclude that the district court should have considered the

evidence, we will discuss the appropriate application of these

provisions on remand.

1.

"An application for a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of a

person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court

shall not be granted unless it appears that . . . the applicant has

exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State."

28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1). The exhaustion requirement applies

as much to the development of facts material to a petitioner’s

claims as it does to the legal principles underlying those

claims. See Breard v. Pruett, 134 F.3d 615, 619 (4th Cir.

1998). For a claim to be exhausted, "both the operative facts

and the controlling legal principles must be presented to the

state court." Matthews v. Evatt, 105 F.3d 907, 911 (4th Cir.

1997) (quotation marks and citations omitted). If the rule was

otherwise, petitioners could "expedite federal review by deliberately withholding essential facts from the state courts," thus

upsetting the careful balance struck by Congress between

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respecting the finality of state court judgments and enforcing

federal rights. Vasquez v. Hillery, 474 U.S. 254, 260 (1986).

The exhaustion requirement does not, however, prohibit a district court from considering evidence not presented to the

state courts. "[S]upplemental evidence" that does not "fundamentally alter the legal claim already considered by the state

courts" can properly be considered by a district court. Id. The

question of when new evidence "fundamentally alters" an otherwise exhausted claim "is necessarily case and fact specific."

Morris v. Dretke, 413 F.3d 484, 491 (5th Cir. 2005). 

In Vasquez v. Hillery the Supreme Court addressed the tension between the exhaustion requirement and consideration of

new evidence. In that case the petitioner alleged that AfricanAmericans had been systematically excluded from the grand

jury that indicted him. In the federal habeas proceeding, the

petitioner introduced two categories of evidence that had not

been presented to the state courts: (1) affidavits stating that

qualified African-Americans had been available but had not

been called; and (2) statistical evidence — based on census

data that had been available to the state courts — assessing

the mathematical probability that chance could have

accounted for the exclusion of African-Americans from grand

jury panels. The Court held that the affidavits supported a

proposition already well-substantiated by the record before

the state courts and that the statistical analysis "added nothing

to the case that th[e] Court had not considered intrinsic to the

consideration of any grand jury discrimination claim." 474

U.S. at 259. Without further explanation, the Court concluded

that this evidence could be considered because it did not fundamentally alter the petitioner’s equal protection claim.

We read Vasquez to permit a district court to consider new

evidence if it supports factual allegations for which there is

already at least some support in the state record. The evidence

in Vasquez was supplemental insofar as there was already evidence in the state record from which a fact-finder could reasonably determine the existence of facts essential to the

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petitioner’s claim. This reading is consistent with circuit precedent requiring petitioners to present the operative facts of

their claims to the state courts. Matthews, 105 F.3d at 911.

We note that the strength of the evidence in the state court

record is irrelevant to our interpretation. Suppose, for example, that a petitioner on federal habeas introduces new evidence to establish the existence of fact X, a fact required to

prove his claim. The claim will inevitably be stronger, regardless of the evidence the petitioner presented to the state

courts. However, if the petitioner presented no evidence to the

state courts to establish the existence of fact X, the claim will

be fundamentally altered by the new evidence presented to the

district court.

The district court concluded that the addition of Winston’s

1997 I.Q. score of 66 fundamentally altered his ineffective

assistance of counsel claim under Vasquez. It relied primarily

on two rationales, the first centering on the potentially dispositive nature of the evidence:

Had the Supreme Court of Virginia confronted a

full-scale I.Q. score of 66, it might have viewed the

Strickland prejudice prong differently. Instead, Winston presented three scores over 70 and evidence that

a likely non-retrievable fourth score might have been

under 70. Therefore, there is a substantial difference

between the operative facts that the Supreme Court

of Virginia confronted and the operative facts here.

J.A. 2150. As an alternative rationale, the district court cited

counsel’s failure to ask the Virginia Supreme Court for subpoena power. With that power, counsel could have subpoenaed Lageman and discovered the score during state habeas

proceedings. Because counsel could have obtained and presented the score to the state court, the district court reasoned

that they cannot now present it to the federal courts.

We conclude that the district court erred in its analysis.

First, it is irrelevant to the "fundamentally alters" inquiry

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whether the Virginia Supreme Court would have decided the

claim differently had it seen the new evidence presented by

Winston. As noted above, whether new evidence fundamentally alters a claim does not depend on whether it makes the

claim stronger. The key is whether Winston offered some evidence in state court to support the factual claim that he possesses significantly sub-average intellectual functioning as

measured by a standardized test. Winston presented evidence

to the Virginia Supreme Court that Fairfax County had diagnosed him as mentally retarded based on standardized testing,

that one I.Q. score should be considered below 70 due to the

Flynn effect, and that he possessed substantial deficits in

adaptive behavior. While the Virginia Supreme Court was

unpersuaded in the absence of an actual score below 70, the

court’s determination was based on the weight of the evidence

rather than the lack of any evidence to support Winston’s

claim.

Wise v. Warden, Maryland Penitentiary, 839 F.2d 1030

(4th Cir. 1988), a case cited by the district court, does not preclude our analysis. In Wise the petitioner claimed that the

prosecution had violated Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150

(1972), by withholding a cooperation agreement with a key

witness. In the state courts the petitioner had offered little

more than "bald assertions" and the affidavit of a fellow

inmate attesting to the existence of the agreement. Wise, 839

F.2d at 1032, 1034. In the district court, however, the petitioner presented the agreement itself as well as statements by

the inmate-witness to the police. Wise held that the claim had

not been exhausted, noting that there was "a world of difference between conjecture and proof" and that mere conjecture

was all that supported the petitioner’s claim when it was presented to the state courts. Id. at 1034. While Wise did refer to

the "significantly different and stronger evidentiary posture"

of the petitioner’s claim in the district court, id. at 1033 (quoting Brown v. Estelle, 701 F.2d 494, 495 (5th Cir. 1983)), it

used the words "significantly different and stronger" to distinguish a claim without evidentiary support from one with eviWINSTON v. KELLY 23

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dentiary support. Unlike the case before us today, no

reasonable fact-finder in Wise could have found the facts necessary to support the petitioner’s claim from the evidence

presented to the state courts.

The district court’s alternative rationale fares no better.

Winston’s failure to request a subpoena from the Virginia

Supreme Court is simply not relevant to the "fundamentally

alters" inquiry. Indeed, considering this "failure" conflates the

exhaustion inquiry with the standard for obtaining an evidentiary hearing under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2), which we discuss

below. We note, however, that even if Winston’s efforts in the

state proceedings were relevant, the district court would have

been wrong to hold Winston responsible for failing to seek a

subpoena. Death penalty habeas petitioners seeking discovery

in Virginia are required by statute to request an evidentiary

hearing from the Virginia Supreme Court. See Va. Code.

§ 8.01-654(c)(1); see also Hedrick v. Warden of the Sussex I

State Prison, 570 S.E.2d 840, 862 (Va. 2002). Only if that

court grants the hearing request and refers the petitioner to a

circuit court for discovery would a subpoena request be

appropriate. Here, Winston did request an evidentiary hearing

from the Virginia Supreme Court, and that hearing was

denied. Requesting a subpoena directly would have been procedurally improper, and Winston cannot be faulted for failing

to take that step. 

2.

In district court the state did not argue that the introduction

of the 1997 I.Q. score fundamentally altered Winston’s ineffective assistance claim. Instead, it argued that the court could

not consider the score because Winston had failed to develop

the factual basis of his claim in the state courts. At oral argument before us, the state continued to advance this failure-todevelop argument despite tacit acknowledgment that the district court had correctly applied the "fundamentally alters"

test. We agree that the question of whether Winston failed to

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develop the factual basis of his claim in the state courts is

independent of the exhaustion question. We conclude, however, that Winston did not fail to develop the factual record

in state court.

The requirement that petitioners develop the factual basis

of their claims in the state courts has its source in 28 U.S.C.

§ 2254(e)(2):

(2) If the applicant has failed to develop the factual

basis of a claim in State court proceedings, the court

shall not hold an evidentiary hearing on the claim

unless the applicant shows that —

(A) the claim relies on — 

(1) a new rule of constitutional law,

made retroactive to cases on collateral

review by the Supreme Court, that was previously unavailable; or 

(ii) a factual predicate that could not

have been previously discovered through

the exercise of due diligence; and 

(B) the facts underlying the claim would

be sufficient to establish by clear and convincing evidence that but for constitutional

error, no reasonable factfinder would have

found the applicant guilty of the underlying

offense. 

The Supreme Court has held that the word "failed" in the

opening line of this section connotes fault. Michael Williams

v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 420, 431-32 (2000). Specifically, it held

that "a failure to develop the factual basis of a claim is not

established unless there is a lack of diligence, or some greater

fault, attributable to the prisoner or the prisoner’s counsel."

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Id. at 432. If a district court concludes that the petitioner was

diligent in developing the factual basis of his claim, it may

grant an evidentiary hearing as an exercise of discretion.

Schriro v. Landrian, 550 U.S. 465, 473 (2007) ("Prior to

[AEDPA], the decision to grant an evidentiary hearing was

generally left to the sound discretion of district courts. That

basic rule has not changed."). This discretion should, however, be exercised with restraint. "[F]ederal evidentiary hearings ought to be the exception, not the rule." Pike v. Guarino,

492 F.3d 61, 70 (1st Cir. 2007). They are not "intended to

provide a forum in which to retry state cases," but rather their

"prototypical purpose [is] to fill a gap in the record or to supplement the record on a specific point." Id. As the Supreme

Court has said: "Because the deferential standards prescribed

by [AEDPA] control whether to grant habeas relief, a federal

court must take into account those standards in deciding

whether an evidentiary hearing is appropriate." Schriro, 550

U.S. at 474.

In its first opinion the district court concluded that it had

discretion to grant Winston a hearing on his Atkins and

Atkins-related ineffective assistance claims, and it exercised

that discretion. After citing to the requirements of

§ 2254(e)(2), the district court held that: "(1) Winston diligently pursued his habeas corpus claims that Atkins bars his

execution and that he received ineffective assistance of counsel through the failure to investigate this claim; and (2) it is

not wholly implausible that he could establish his claims even

in light of AEDPA’s deferential standards." J.A. 617. In its

post-hearing second opinion the district court declined to

reconsider its finding of diligence. It is therefore somewhat

puzzling that the state goes so far as to declare in its brief that

"[t]he district court’s finding with respect to Winston’s failure

to develop this claim is exceptionally clear: Winston did not

exercise due diligence." Appellee’s Br. at 37. The state is

wrong.

Perhaps the district court confused the state by considering

Winston’s failure to seek a subpoena in its analysis of the

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exhaustion question. Whether Winston could have or should

have sought a subpoena is relevant to the issue of Winston’s

diligence, not the issue of exhaustion. In any event, we do not

read the district court’s discussion of the subpoena matter as

a retreat from its otherwise clear finding of diligence. Moreover, as we have noted, whatever fault the district court

assigned to Winston for failing to seek a subpoena was simply

misplaced. 

Finally, we cannot say that the district court abused its discretion in holding an evidentiary hearing. The district court

specifically considered whether to hold a hearing in light of

AEDPA’s deferential standards, and the court concluded that

it was not implausible that Winston would succeed if he

proved the facts alleged in his petition. Winston had never

had a hearing on his Atkins and Atkins-related ineffective

assistance claims because the Virginia Supreme Court denied

him one, and the district court acted properly to provide him

such an opportunity on a colorable claim. The district court

narrowly tailored the hearing to supplement the record on a

particular issue, and there was no attempt to retry the entire

case against Winston.

Because we can find no legitimate justification for the district court’s exclusion of Winston’s 1997 I.Q. score, we conclude that remand is appropriate so that the court can

reconsider Winston’s Atkins-related ineffective assistance

claim with the score in evidence. The district court was wrong

to exclude the score on the ground that it rendered Winston’s

claim unexhausted, and the state is wrong that the score

should have been excluded because the hearing in which the

score was introduced was improperly granted. Winston is

entitled to a decision on his claim based on all of the admissible evidence in the record. We remand for the district court

to make this decision in the first instance.

3.

The issue remains as to what standard of review the district

court should apply on remand. Winston insists that the district

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court should apply § 2254(e)(1) because that provision applies

exclusively when an evidentiary hearing is appropriate in federal court. The state counters that the district court was right

to apply § 2254(d)(2). While we reject Winston’s argument

that § 2254(d)(2) will never apply once the district court has

granted an evidentiary hearing, we conclude that it does not

apply in this particular case. The district court should still

apply § 2254(e)(1) to any factual findings made by the state

court and make any additional findings necessary to resolve

Winston’s claims. Once the facts are determined, the district

court should apply Strickland’s standards without any deference to the decision of the Supreme Court of Virginia. The

Virginia court had its opportunity to consider a more complete record, but chose to deny Winston’s request for an evidentiary hearing. Accordingly, comity and finality do not

require deference when material evidence later surfaces in a

federal habeas hearing.

i.

Section 2254(d) provides AEDPA’s framework for reviewing habeas petitions: 

(d) An application for a writ of habeas corpus on

behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted with

respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings unless the adjudication

of the claim —

(1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law,

as determined by the Supreme Court of the

United States; or 

(2) resulted in a decision that was based

on an unreasonable determination of the

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facts in light of the evidence presented in

the State court proceeding. 

Section 2254(d)(1) describes the standard of review to be

applied to claims challenging how the state courts applied

federal law, while § 2254(d)(2) describes the standard to be

applied to claims challenging how the state courts determined

the facts. Both provisions direct federal courts to assess the

reasonableness of the state court determinations, and both

assessments must be made in light of the evidence the state

courts had before them. Holland, 542 U.S. at 652. The only

limitation on § 2254(d)’s application is that the claims submitted must have been "adjudicated on the merits" in state

court. When a claim has not been adjudicated on the merits

by the state court, a federal court reviews the claim de novo.

Cone v. Bell, 129 S. Ct. 1769, 1784 (2009); Monroe v. Angelone, 323 F.3d 286, 297 (4th Cir. 2003); Wilson v. Workman,

577 F.3d 1284, 1290 (10th Cir. 2009); Pike, 492 F.3d at 67;

Drake v. Portuondo, 321 F.3d 338, 345 (2d Cir. 2003).

A state court’s judgment is unreasonable under

§ 2254(d)(1) "if the state court correctly identifies the governing legal principle from [Supreme Court] decisions but unreasonably applies it to the facts of the particular case." McNeill

v. Polk, 476 F.3d 206, 211 (4th Cir. 2007) (quotation marks

and citations omitted). The state court’s application, however,

"must have been more than incorrect or erroneous. . . . [It]

must have been ‘objectively unreasonable.’" Wiggins v.

Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 520 (2003) (quotation marks and citations omitted); accord Terry Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S.

362, 410-12 (2000). A similar analysis naturally applies to the

analogous and adjacent language in § 2254(d)(2). For a state

court’s factual determination to be unreasonable under

§ 2254(d)(2), it must be more than merely incorrect or erroneous. Schriro, 550 U.S. at 474. It must be sufficiently against

the weight of the evidence that it is objectively unreasonable.

An apparent tension between § 2254(d)(2) and § 2254(e)(1)

arises because the latter section provides an alternate and

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seemingly inconsistent standard for review of state court factual determinations:

(e)(1) In a proceeding instituted by an application

for a writ of habeas corpus by a person in custody

pursuant to the judgment of a State court, a determination of a factual issue made by a State court shall

be presumed to be correct. The applicant shall have

the burden of rebutting the presumption of correctness by clear and convincing evidence.

This section does not concern itself with the reasonableness

of factual determinations by the state courts but with the correctness or incorrectness of those determinations. It further

assigns a burden of proof to the petitioner — clear and convincing evidence — for negating them. Finally, unlike

§ 2254(d), there are no limitations on the application of

§ 2254(e). The precise interplay between these provisions has

split the courts of appeals. See Lambert v. Blackwell, 387 F.3d

210, 234 (3d Cir. 2004) ("a comprehensive interpretation of

AEDPA’s factual review scheme has yet to emerge from the

federal courts"); Wood v. Allen, 542 F.3d 1281, 1303-05 &

n.23 (11th Cir. 2008);2 Teti v. Bender, 507 F.3d 50, 57-58 (1st

Cir. 2007); Guidry v. Dretke, 397 F.3d 306, 324-27 (5th Cir.

2005); Taylor v. Maddox, 366 F.3d 992, 999-1001 (9th Cir.

2004). 

The Supreme Court has held that § 2254(d)(2) and

2The Supreme Court granted certiorari in Wood v. Allen and issued its

decision on January 20, 2010, without addressing the question we consider

above. The Court acknowledged that "[a]lthough we granted certiorari to

resolve the question of how §§ 2254(d)(2) and (e)(1) fit together, we find

once more that we need not reach this question, because our view of the

reasonableness of the state court’s factual determination in this case does

not turn on any interpretive difference regarding the relationship between

these provisions." Wood v. Allen, No. 08-9156, 558 U.S. __, slip op. at 9

(Jan. 20, 2010). Nothing in our opinion today is inconsistent with the

Court’s decision. 

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§ 2254(e)(1) provide "independent requirements" for review

by the federal courts. Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 341

(2003). The sections should not, for instance, be merged to

"require [the] petitioner to prove that a decision is objectively

unreasonable by clear and convincing evidence." Id. Both

provisions apply independently to all habeas petitions. "To

secure habeas relief, petitioner must demonstrate that a state

court’s [factual] finding . . . was incorrect by clear and convincing evidence, 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1), and that [it] was

‘objectively unreasonable’ in light of the record before the

court." Id. at 348 (emphasis added); accord Miller-El v.

Dretke, 545 U.S. 231, 266 (2005). The Supreme Court has

nevertheless left open the precise question of when and how

§ 2254(e)(1)’s presumption of correctness applies. See Rice v.

Collins, 546 U.S. 333, 339 (2006). 

Given these principles, we conclude that § 2254(d)(2) and

§ 2254(e)(1) will both ordinarily apply even after a district

court has properly held an evidentiary hearing. First, we can

discern nothing inconsistent with the concurrent application

of § 2254(d)(2) and § 2254(e)(1) after a district court has held

an evidentiary hearing. If a petitioner succeeds under

§ 2254(e)(1), he has merely proven that the state court finding

was incorrect. To satisfy § 2254(d)(2), the petitioner must

prove that the state court was not only incorrect, but also

objectively unreasonable. Second, § 2254(e)(1) should apply

because there is no limitation in the section’s text. While there

might a situation when it would be improper to apply a presumption of correctness to state court factual findings, for

example, when the state proceedings violated due process,

this would be the exception rather than the rule. See Taylor,

366 F.3d at 1000; see also 1 Randy Hertz & James S. Liebman, Federal Habeas Corpus Practice and Procedure § 20.2c.

Third, the only limitation on § 2254(d)(2) — that the claim

have been adjudicated on the merits — will not automatically

apply simply because the district court held an evidentiary

hearing. If the record evidence after the hearing is substantially the same as the evidence presented to the state court,

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there is no reason why the district court cannot assess whether

the state court made an "unreasonable determination of the

facts in light of the evidence" presented to it.

When, however, the petitioner offers, for the first time in

federal habeas proceedings, new, material evidence that the

state court could have considered had it permitted further

development of the facts, an assessment under § 2254(d) may

be inappropriate. The requirement that § 2254(d) be applied

only to claims "adjudicated on the merits" exists because

comity, finality, and federalism counsel deference to the judgments of state courts when they are made on a complete

record. Cf. Michael Williams, 529 U.S. at 436. "In this

respect, the ‘exhaustion’ and ‘adjudicated on the merits’ elements of federal habeas practice are mirror images." Wilson,

577 F.3d at 1292. Exhaustion requires that the state courts

have an opportunity to apply the law and consider all the evidence relevant to the petitioner’s claim. Baldwin v. Reese, 541

U.S. 27, 29 (2004); Vasquez, 474 U.S. at 257. When a state

court refuses to opine on the merits of a claim properly presented to it, exhaustion is satisfied. Cone, 129 S. Ct. at 1784;

Pike, 492 F.3d at 67. Similarly, when a state court forecloses

further development of the factual record, it passes up the

opportunity that exhaustion ensures. Wilson, 577 F.3d at

1292-93; Drake, 321 F.3d at 345; see also Monroe, 323 F.3d

at 297-98. If the record ultimately proves to be incomplete,

deference to the state court’s judgment would be inappropriate because judgment on a materially incomplete record is not

an adjudication on the merits for purposes of § 2254(d). Wilson, 577 F.3d at 1292; Drake, 321 F.3d at 345. New, material

evidence, introduced for the first time during federal habeas

proceedings, may therefore require a de novo review of petitioner’s claim.

Our conclusion is not new to this circuit. In Monroe v.

Angelone, 323 F.3d 286 (2003), we held that "AEDPA’s deference requirement does not apply when a claim made on federal habeas review is premised on Brady material that has

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surfaced for the first time during federal habeas proceedings."

Id. at 297. In Monroe the petitioner had sought habeas relief

from the Supreme Court of Virginia for violations of Brady

v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), based on nine categories of

exculpatory evidence allegedly withheld by the prosecution.

The petitioner had also sought discovery to seek disclosure of

additional evidence that might have been withheld. The state

court denied his claims and "refused, without explanation, to

authorize . . . discovery." Monroe, 323 F.3d at 294. The federal district court, however, granted discovery and an evidentiary hearing, and the petitioner uncovered several additional

categories of withheld exculpatory evidence. On appeal we

held that de novo review was appropriate for those portions

of petitioner’s Brady claim that were based on the new evidence. Id. at 297. In addition, we held that it was necessary

to consider all the evidence in the record — not just the new

evidence — because the materiality element of a Brady claim

requires a collective assessment of whether introduction of the

exculpatory evidence might have affected the outcome of the

trial. As a result, we could not "accord AEDPA deference on

an item-by-item basis to the . . . items of exculpatory material

considered in state court." Id. at 298. 

Our conclusion in this case is also consistent with holdings

reached in similar cases in the Second and Tenth Circuits. In

Drake v. Portuondo, 321 F.3d 338 (2d Cir. 2003), the Second

Circuit concluded that de novo review of the petitioner’s due

process claim was appropriate when "the state courts did not

permit the development of the factual record" and therefore

relied on an incomplete record in denying the claim. Id. at

345. Indeed, the Second Circuit actually remanded the case

for discovery and an evidentiary hearing. In Wilson v. Workman, 577 F.3d 1284 (10th Cir. 2009), the Tenth Circuit, sitting en banc, concluded that de novo review of the

petitioner’s ineffective assistance claims was appropriate

because the Oklahoma state courts denied the claims based

"on a factual record that was, solely as a result of [a] state

procedural rule, incomplete." Id. at 1290-91. Like the Virginia

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Supreme Court in this case, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal

Appeals denied the petitioner an evidentiary hearing and

therefore passed up any opportunity to consider evidence

material to the petitioner’s ineffective assistance claim. 

The court in Wilson also addressed what might be an additional concern with our conclusion today: that habeas petitioners seeking de novo review of their claims need only produce

some small sliver of new evidence in federal court. Like the

Wilson court, we conclude that this concern is "greatly exaggerated." Id. at 1294. As we have emphasized above, the

requirements that petitioners exhaust their state remedies and

diligently develop the record in state court are exacting burdens. Even if the state courts deny a petitioner’s request for

an evidentiary hearing, new evidence surfacing in federal

court that fundamentally alters a claim will render the claim

unexhausted. Similarly, while requesting an evidentiary hearing from the state courts may be necessary to satisfy

§ 2254(e)(2)’s diligence requirement, it may not always be

sufficient. See Michael Williams, 529 U.S. at 437 ("Diligence

will require in the usual case that the prisoner, at a minimum,

seek an evidentiary hearing in state court in the manner prescribed by state law.") (emphasis added). "In light of these

safeguards, we see little risk that habeas petitioners will misapply [our] holding to obtain unwarranted de novo review in

the federal courts." Wilson, 577 F.3d at 1295.

ii.

Turning more specifically to this case, we hold that

§ 2254(d) does not apply to Winston’s Atkins-related ineffective assistance claim and that the district court should not

afford deference to the Supreme Court of Virginia’s application of Strickland. Winston’s additional I.Q. score is material

to whether he is retarded under Virginia law and therefore

material to whether he was prejudiced under Strickland by his

counsel’s conduct. Moreover, like the petitioner in our Monroe opinion, Winston requested discovery and an evidentiary

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hearing from the state court to further develop the factual

record. Like the state court in Monroe, the Virginia Supreme

Court denied Winston’s request and passed on the opportunity

to adjudicate Winston’s claim on a complete record. Finally,

as in Monroe, the state court adjudicated a claim that was

materially incomplete. The deficient performance and prejudice inquiries under Strickland present mixed questions of law

and fact, Smith v. Moore, 137 F.3d 808, 817 (4th Cir. 1998),

that require a collective evaluation of the evidence rather than

an analysis confined to a subset of the facts. See Kyles v.

Whitley, 514 U.S. 419, 436-37 (1995); see also Cargle v. Mullin, 317 F.3d 1196, 1206 (10th Cir. 2003). Consequently, the

Virginia Supreme Court’s legal conclusions are not neatly

separable into those based on a complete record and those

based on an incomplete record. Accordingly, on remand the

district court should not afford any deference under AEDPA

to the Virginia Supreme Court’s application of the Strickland

standards.

AEDPA deference under § 2254(e)(1), however, will be

appropriate to any relevant factual findings made by the Virginia Supreme Court. While that court does not appear to

have found that Winston was not mentally retarded — a factual matter — we note that it did make several factual findings concerning the tests Winston took and the Fairfax

County assessment procedures. On remand these findings are

entitled to a presumption of correctness, and should Winston

wish to overcome this presumption, he will have to do so by

clear and convincing evidence. Where the Virginia Supreme

Court did not make a factual finding, the district court must

make its own without regard to what the state court might

have done.

Finally, in making its factual determinations, the district

court should not only consider Winston’s 1997 I.Q. score, but

also decide whether to consider Winston’s proffered evidence

concerning the Flynn effect and SEM. The only time the Virginia Supreme Court has even mentioned the Flynn effect in

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a published opinion was in this case, and it has never considered the effect of SEM. The Virginia court did not discuss the

Flynn effect beyond stating that Winston had offered evidence

concerning it. The court concluded that:

This Court has previously held that the maximum

score for a classification of mental retardation is an

I.Q. score of 70. Petitioner provides no documentation that he was diagnosed as being mentally

retarded before the age of 18 in accordance with the

legal definition of mental retardation established by

the legislature. Thus, petitioner has failed [to satisfy

the requirements of Strickland].

J.A. 305-06 (citations omitted). The most that can be reasonably inferred from this holding is that the Virginia Supreme

Court was unconvinced by Winston’s evidence concerning

the Flynn effect and SEM. While a federal court sitting in

habeas could not conclude that such a holding violated

§ 2254(d), see Green v. Johnson, 515 F.3d 290, 300 n.2 (4th

Cir. 2008), the district court will not be applying Section

2254(d) on remand. Instead, it will be weighing Winston’s

expert evidence, documentary evidence, and proffered testimony — taking § 2254(e)(1) into account when necessary —

to determine the facts. Once determined, the district court will

consider de novo whether there is a reasonable probability

that, but for his counsel’s deficient performance, Winston

would have succeeded on his Atkins claim.

B.

Lastly, we affirm the district court’s denial of Winston’s

claim that he received ineffective assistance when his counsel

failed to present an adequate case in mitigation. The Supreme

Court of Virginia held that Winston had failed to demonstrate

deficient performance and prejudice, and the district court

held that this was not an unreasonable application of Strick36 WINSTON v. KELLY

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land. We affirm because it was not unreasonable to conclude

that there was no prejudice.

Because a verdict recommending death in Virginia must be

unanimous, Va. Code Ann. § 19.2-264.4(E), the prejudice

inquiry requires Winston to demonstrate that there was a reasonable probability that, but for his counsel’s failures, a single

juror would have voted against death. Each juror has discretion to vote for death provided that: (1) the prosecution proves

one of Virginia’s statutory aggravating factors beyond a reasonable doubt; and (2) the jury considers all the evidence in

mitigation. See Watkins v. Virginia, 331 S.E.2d 422, 437-38

(Va. 1985). Winston does not argue that either of these

requirements was not satisfied. Accordingly, we consider

whether the Supreme Court of Virginia unreasonably applied

federal law when it concluded that no juror would have exercised his or her discretion to vote against death.

Winston argues that the Virginia Supreme Court unreasonably applied federal law because at least one juror would have

exercised his or her discretion to vote against death if: (1) his

trial counsel had elicited facts concerning his sub-average

intellectual functioning through live witnesses rather than

through the written psychological reports that were submitted

to the jury; (2) the jury had seen Winston’s 1997 psychological records and I.Q. score of 66; and (3) his trial counsel had

presented a more detailed narrative of his traumatic childhood. In rejecting these arguments, the Virginia Supreme

Court emphasized that Winston "does not identify the substance of any additional evidence he contends counsel should

have presented and does not explain how such evidence

would not have been cumulative." J.A. 306; accord id. at 308.

In rejecting Winston’s first argument about the need for

live witnesses on the issue of low functioning intelligence, the

Virginia Supreme Court rested its determination primarily on

the rich content of the written psychological reports. The

reports contained many assessments easily understood by the

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lay juror, including findings that Winston was of "mentally

deficient to average intelligence" with "extreme problems

maintaining attention and effort" and "many emotional concerns resulting from his abandonment and rejection from various family members." Id. at 306. Hence, the core of

Winston’s mitigation case was before the jury. Also, Winston

had not shown that any particular testimony would have materially added to the reports.

Winston responds by arguing that the manner rather than

the substance of counsel’s mitigation case is the critical factor. He argues that the district court "treats manner of presentation as a complete irrelevancy." Appellant’s Br. at 77.

Winston does not, however, cite any case law in this circuit

to support his argument. Moreover, what case law Winston

does cite does not stand for the proposition that ineffective

assistance follows from a failure to present evidence through

live witnesses. See, e.g., Gray v. Branker, 529 F.3d 220, 234-

38 (4th Cir. 2008) (prejudice found when counsel offered no

medical explanation for defendant’s behavior); Williams v.

Allen, 542 F.3d 1326, 1342 (11th Cir. 2008) (prejudice found

when counsel failed to discover evidence that "paint[ed] a

vastly different picture" than that presented to the jury). While

we acknowledge that there might be a case when the manner

in which counsel presents evidence is so abysmal that it supports a finding of prejudice, the line would have to be drawn

carefully so as not to conflate deficient performance with

prejudice. We simply cannot conclude in this case that the

Virginia Supreme Court unreasonably applied federal law by

discounting the manner in which counsel presented mitigation

evidence.

Winston’s second argument — based on counsel’s failure

to introduce his 1997 psychological records and I.Q. score —

does not survive a careful comparison of the psychological

records the jury did see and the records it did not. Winston’s

1997 psychological evaluation reads very much like his previous evaluations. Both his 1995 and 1997 evaluations agree

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that Winston was "cooperative" but very "immature." J.A.

1917, 1979. Where Winston largely disclaims responsibility

for his own bad acts in the 1995 evaluation, he "reports that

he does not feel guilty after doing something wrong" in the

1997 evaluation. J.A. 1919, 1981. With regard to I.Q. scores,

his verbal I.Q. for both the 1995 and 1997 evaluations was

consistent at 60, which both evaluations describe as being

within the range of "mild mental retardation". J.A. 1918,

1980. His performance I.Q. scores on his 1987 and 1990 tests

were actually lower than his score on the 1997 test, and his

1990 and 1997 evaluations both describe his nonverbal skills

as "borderline." J.A. 1913, 1980. Finally, each of the evaluations describes his intellectual functioning at various points as

"limited", "borderline", or "mentally deficient." J.A. 1910,

1915, 1921, 1982. 

Despite these similarities between what was introduced and

what was not, Winston argues that "the information possessed

by the jury was tremendously incomplete." Appellant’s Br. at

77. The question, of course, is whether the information possessed by the jury was materially incomplete. Although the

jury did lack certain details, Winston cannot suggest prospects

for the material omission category except for the single onepage document in which Fairfax County changed his primary

disability classification to "mild retardation", J.A. 1876, and

the 1997 I.Q. score of 66. While Winston’s classification and

1997 I.Q. score are material to his Atkins claim, there is no

reason to believe that these items would have been persuasive

to the jury as ordinary mitigating evidence. With all of the

similarities between the submitted and unsubmitted evaluations described above, the question is whether the classification and the additional low score would have made a

difference. Because the reports before the jury had already

classified Winston’s verbal abilities as mildly retarded, we

cannot conclude that a more general classification of mild

retardation would have made a material difference. Similarly,

we cannot conclude that the difference between a score of 73

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tion under Atkins, would have made a material difference to

a lay juror considering a broader range of mitigation evidence

about intellectual functioning.

The dissent contends that the jury did not possess at least

ten items of material information. In most of the instances

cited, however, the jury either had the information or had

information that was essentially indistinguishable. Items 3

(deficient verbal skills) and 5 (twice failing kindergarten)

cited in the dissent were noted in Winston’s 1995 and 1987

evaluations. J.A. 1909, 1918. Items 4, and 6-10 all comment

on various specific deficiencies, some of which were discussed in the other evaluations, J.A. 1920-21 (items 7 and 9

— failure to understand social expectations or properly handle

money), while others such as item 4 (evenly delayed functioning in all areas) are merely syntheses of previous observations. This again leaves only Fairfax County’s retardation

classification and the 1997 I.Q. score, and, as explained

above, these omissions were not material. 

Winston’s third and final argument — that his trial counsel

did not adequately present the jury with evidence of his traumatic childhood — also fails. Defense counsel called four

witnesses to illustrate his traumatic childhood: a social worker

who testified as to his itinerant experience in foster care; and

his mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother, who testified as to his poor upbringing and his exposure to drugs and

crime at a very young age. While we have no doubt that Winston’s counsel could have painted a more detailed picture of

his childhood, we cannot conclude that the picture they did

paint was somehow materially incomplete. Winston’s argument appears to be that further embellishments, greater detail,

and more forceful advocacy would have changed at least one

juror’s mind. He does not argue, however, that the mitigation

case or traumatic childhood his counsel did present to the jury

was misleading or that it left out critical facts. Cf. Williams,

542 F.3d at 1342-43 (finding prejudice when counsel put on

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nary parental discipline" that occurred occasionally, rather

than testimony describing the beatings as "serious assaults"

involving "deadly weapons" that occurred "on a near constant

basis"). The jury heard testimony concerning Winston’s abandonment by a drug-abusing mother and his exposure to criminal life by his grandmother. It also saw documentary evidence

describing his many difficulties coping with his sub-average

intellectual functioning. Because the jury still recommended

death in light of this evidence, we cannot conclude that the

Supreme Court of Virginia unreasonably applied Strickland

when it held that a more detailed mitigation case would not

have changed even a single juror’s mind.

In reaching a contrary conclusion, the dissent gives inadequate consideration to AEDPA’s standard of review. The dissent does argue that it "can find no reasonable theory under

which the evidence disregarded could be considered cumulative," infra at 61, because Winston’s counsel left out "even

the most basic details of Winston’s childhood," infra at 63. As

we explained above, however, we do think that such a reasonable theory existed and that counsel did present the basic

details of Winston’s admittedly troubled childhood to the

jury. Again, the Virginia Supreme Court may have been

wrong to adopt such a theory, but we cannot conclude that it

acted unreasonably.

In summary, even if we assume deficient performance by

Winston’s counsel, we conclude that the Supreme Court of

Virginia did not unreasonably apply federal law when it held

that counsel’s performance did not prejudice Winston’s case

in mitigation. 

IV.

For the foregoing reasons we affirm the district court’s

denial of Winston’s claims except with respect to his Atkins

and Atkins-related ineffective assistance claims. With respect

to the Atkins and Atkins-related claims, we vacate the district

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court’s decision and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

AFFIRMED IN PART,

VACATED IN PART,

AND REMANDED

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Volume 2 of 2

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GREGORY, Circuit Judge, concurring in part and dissenting

in part:

Today’s decision overlooks the prejudice that Leon Jermain

Winston suffered from the utter failure of counsel to investigate and present mitigating evidence at the penalty phase

where he received a capital sentence. If we are to safeguard

the Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel

in criminal cases, then we must conduct a meaningful review

of the record when, as here, there is a vast quantity of unquestionably mitigating evidence that was never presented to the

jury. Moreover, while it appears that Winston failed to raise

the issue in his state habeas petition, I disagree with the

majority’s merits-inquiry denying Winston’s claim that his

due process rights were violated by the state court’s refusal to

instruct the jury on lesser included homicide charges. The

majority misinterprets the evidence at trial by equating evidence placing Winston at the scene with evidence that Winston was the triggerman. Only the latter satisfies Virginia’s

requirement for a capital conviction. Therefore, I respectfully

dissent from the portions of this opinion denying those two

claims, but I concur in the majority’s judgment as to the

remaining issues.

I.

In section II.B, the majority concludes that Winston’s due

process rights were not violated when the state court denied

his request for instructions on lesser included homicide

charges. I agree that Winston did not raise this issue in his

state habeas petition. Because the majority proceeds to reach

the merits and because the Commonwealth did not raise the

issue of exhaustion in the district court or before this Court,

I note my disagreement with the majority’s assessment.

The merits inquiry is guided by the Supreme Court’s decision in Beck v. Alabama, 447 U.S. 625 (1980). In Beck, the

Court announced the principle that

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capital defendants have a constitutional right to

receive a jury instruction on a lesser-included

offense "when the evidence unquestionably establishes that the defendant is guilty of a serious, violent

offense-but leaves some doubt with respect to an element that would justify conviction of a capital

offense."

Hyatt v. Branker, 569 F.3d 162, 174 (4th Cir. 2009) (quoting

Beck, 447 U.S. at 637); Bates v. Lee, 308 F.3d 411, 420 (4th

Cir. 2002). The Court concluded that finding otherwise would

"enhance the risk of an unwarranted conviction." Beck, 447

U.S. at 637. 

The Supreme Court subsequently explained that "due process requires that a lesser included offense instruction be

given only when the evidence warrants" it. Hopper v. Evans,

456 U.S. 605, 611 (1982). I agree with the majority that Virginia’s rule poses no constitutional problem because it is consistent with the federal rule and that the application of the two

rules is identical. What the majority fails to appreciate is that

this Court has found that whether the evidence warrants the

instruction is not a sufficiency of the evidence question. See

Hyatt, 569 F.3d at 174. Instead, "Beck requires a lesserincluded offense instruction when the evidence at trial merely

casts ‘some doubt’ on a necessary element of the capital

charge." Id.; cf. Taylor v. Workman, 554 F.3d 879, 887 (10th

Cir. 2009) (finding that Beck clearly holds that courts are not

to determine which instruction they feel is most warranted but

instead must give the lesser included offense instruction in

every case where the evidence supports it).

Under Virginia law, the "element that would justify conviction of a capital offense," Beck, 447 U.S. at 637, in this case

is that Winston is a principal in the first degree. Frye v. Commonwealth, 345 S.E.2d 267, 280 (Va. 1986). Winston argues

that because there was evidence that he was not the triggerman, and therefore not a principal in the first degree, he was

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constitutionally entitled to lesser included offense instructions

on non-capital murder. The majority today agrees with the

Supreme Court of Virginia that there was "overwhelming evidence . . . that Winston was the triggerman responsible for

Rhonda’s death." Winston v. Commonwealth, 604 S.E.2d 21,

44 (Va. 2004). When a state court has decided whether a

lesser included offense instruction is necessary, this Court has

unmistakably affirmed that federal court review in the habeas

context is limited by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death

Penalty Act of 1996. See Hyatt, 569 F.3d at 166. Even given

this deferential standard, I find the state court’s determination

of the facts to be unreasonable.1

Evidence at trial supported Winston’s requested instructions for lesser included homicide charges and his theory that

he was present at the scene but was not the triggerman, casting "some doubt" on one element necessary for his capital

conviction. Niesha Whitehead, the only eye witness, testified

on direct and cross to facts showing Winston was not the triggerman. In fact, Niesha, the government’s witness, did not

identify Winston. On the stand, Niesha testified that it was the

1Contrary to the majority’s assertion, the state court’s determination that

there was "overwhelming evidence" pointing to Winston as the triggerman

is not exclusively a legal determination. Supra at 16. The state court correctly identified the applicable law to resolve this issue. However, the

court’s reading of the facts is what I find not only incorrect but also unreasonable. 

If the majority does read the court’s statement as a legal determination,

then the state court engaged in an unreasonable application of clearly

established federal law. "Under Beck, courts are not directed to evaluate

the evidence to determine whether it would support a first degree murder

conviction, or even whether a conviction for first degree murder or a

lesser-included offense is better supported." Taylor, 554 F.3d at 887.

Rather, "[t]he proper inquiry is whether the defendant presented sufficient

evidence to ‘allow a jury to rationally conclude’ that the defendant was

guilty of the lesser-included offense." Id. at 888 (citation omitted). Thus,

if, as the majority suggests, the state court determined that the lesser

included offense instruction was not warranted "in light of" the evidence

supporting the capital murder charge, it unreasonably applied Beck. 

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man wearing all black that shot her mother. J.A. 37, 45-46.

She also testified that the other man was wearing stripes and

tried to stop the shooter. J.A. 45. Unrebutted evidence existed

that Winston was wearing stripes. Winston, 604 S.E.2d at 44.

Contrary to the majority’s contention, Niesha’s testimony was

not inconsistent concerning the clothing of the two men.

When first asked what the shooter was wearing, Niesha

responded, "All black." J.A. 36. At that time, on direct, she

stated that she could not recall whether the clothing had

stripes in it. J.A. 37. Throughout the rest of her testimony,

Niesha stated that there was one man in "all black" and one

wearing stripes. J.A. 42, 44, 46-48. She testified that it was

the man in "all black" that pulled the trigger. J.A. 44-46.

Niesha also testified that the shooter was taller than her

father, Anthony Robinson. J.A. 48-49. Winston was shorter

than Robinson. J.A. 216, 222. The majority relies on Niesha’s

testimony that a man with a tattoo was the shooter. However,

Niesha was shaky on which man in the house had a tattoo,

testifying both that it was the shooter and the non-shooter.

J.A. 38-39, 47-48. Thus, that Winston had a tattoo is not

determinative of which person was the triggerman.2

The majority finds that I am not "troubled" by the weaknesses in Niesha’s testimony. Supra at 15. However, the fact

that Niesha’s testimony is inconsistent on which man had a

tattoo does not signify that it lends no support to Winston’s

requested instructions. In fact, the main inconsistency in

Niesha’s testimony, which person had the tattoo, undermines

the majority’s position, not Winston’s. If Niesha’s testimony

were truly undermined as a whole, as the majority suggests,

supra at 15-16, it seems unusual that the majority cites to her

testimony in support of its position. Thus, given the dearth of

evidence directly proving that Winston was the triggerman,

2Other than which person at the scene had a tattoo, Niesha’s testimony

was consistent with the fact that Winston was not the triggerman. 

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Niesha’s testimony cast some doubt on an element necessary

for Winston’s capital conviction.3

Other than the testimony of Rorls, whose credibility was

questioned at trial, no evidence relied on by the majority can

be characterized as "overwhelming" evidence that Winston

was the triggerman on April 19, 2002.4 The majority cites to

evidence that only places Winston at the scene, which is

insufficient for a capital conviction under Virginia law. While

there was testimony that Winston’s DNA was on the gun

used, this does not prove that Winston pulled the trigger on

the date in question.5 For example, Winston could have supplied the gun or he could have simply hidden the gun after the

shootings to cover up his complicity. Neither of these scenarios would have made Winston death-eligible. Additionally,

Niesha testified that both men were wearing gloves. J.A. 42.

Because the evidence in this case casts some doubt that

Winston was the triggerman, an element necessary for conviction of the capital offense in Virginia, Winston was entitled

to an instruction on the lesser included homicide charges.

Some doubt is all that is required. In finding that there was

"overwhelming evidence . . . that Winston was the triggerman

responsible for Rhonda’s death," Winston, 604 S.E.2d at 44,

3Niesha’s testimony was not the type of self-serving testimony of a

criminal defendant or of an incredible witness with a bias towards the

defendant. Her testimony in favor of Winston was first elicited by the

Commonwealth. 

4Contrary to the majority’s assertion, I do not minimize the significance

of relevant evidence. In fact, it is not our job to weigh the evidence or

search for evidence to support the instruction given. While I recognize that

there is evidence in support of the jury’s verdict, this is not a sufficiency

of the evidence issue. The question is whether the evidence at trial cast

some doubt that Winston was the triggerman—whether the state court

made an unreasonable determination of the facts in finding that the evidence that Winston was the triggerman was "overwhelming." 

5The majority cannot simply draw "inferences" in only one direction.

Supra at 16. Again, this is not a sufficiency of the evidence issue. 

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the state court made an unreasonable determination of the

facts.

II.

In section III.B, the majority inadequately considers Winston’s claim that his counsel was constitutionally ineffective

by not reading relevant records in his possession, passing

along four incomplete psychological reports to jurors without

explanation, failing to mention Winston’s classification as

mentally retarded, failing to present evidence of Winston’s

adaptive deficits and cognitive difficulties, and presenting

extraordinarily minimal mitigating evidence about Winston’s

childhood in a generalized and unpersuasive manner given the

reasonably accessible material available. Rather, the majority

puts forth alleged arguments made by Winston that fail to represent his entire claim. Looking at the whole record and Winston’s complete argument, I must depart from the majority

and find that the state court was unreasonable in dismissing

Winston’s claim that he received ineffective assistance of

counsel at the sentencing phase of his trial.

A.

In this case, the performance prong of Strickland entails

assessing whether counsel satisfied his duty to consider and

investigate mitigating evidence for sentencing in a capital

case. It is a "well-defined norm[ ]" that "investigations into

mitigating evidence ‘should comprise efforts to discover all

reasonably available mitigating evidence.’" Wiggins v. Smith,

539 U.S. 510, 524 (2003) (quoting American Bar Association

("ABA"), Guidelines for the Appointment and Performance of

Counsel in Death Penalty Cases 11.4.1(C) 93 (1989) (hereinafter Guidelines)). According to the ABA Guidelines in effect

at the time, counsel had a duty to consider presenting medical

evidence, educational history, and family and social history,

especially in a capital case. Guidelines 11.8.6. Counsel plainly

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cannot perform this duty when not reasonably informed about

the case.

Although courts cannot second-guess the strategic choices

of counsel, counsel must be informed to act strategically. See,

e.g., Rompilla v. Beard, 545 U.S. 374, 389-90 (2005) (concluding a decision not to pursue certain mitigating evidence

cannot be strategic if it is based on inadequate investigation);

Wiggins, 539 U.S. at 527-28 (finding a cursory investigation

insufficient to support any tactical decision). Here, counsel

was in no way informed. Counsel testified he had no strategic

reason for not pursuing further mitigating evidence. J.A. 656,

674-75, 677, 681. Furthermore, counsel failed to read records

in counsel’s possession and made no reasonable effort to discover mitigating evidence that was unmistakably available.

While Winston’s counsel had the assistance of an investigator, no mitigation investigation occurred nor was a mitigation

specialist provided. Instead of reviewing the records regarding

Winston’s case in his very possession, counsel abdicated his

constitutional duty by relying on Dr. Nelson, who had been

appointed to evaluate Winston, to review them.

When analyzing whether counsel’s deficient performance

was cause for the procedural default of Winston’s Atkins

claim, the district court correctly recognized that "capital trial

counsel cannot outsource their fundamental responsibilities."

Winston v. Kelly, 600 F. Supp. 2d 717, 732 n.14 (W.D. Va.

2009). The court added that "[a]lthough counsel’s ‘strategic

choices made after thorough investigation . . . are virtually

unchallengeable,’ [Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668,

690 (1984)], contextually, simply not reading essential documents that are facially significant to competent capital defense

counsel did not seem to this court to be any choice at all." Id.

at 732. The court inexplicably and inappropriately failed to

apply this logic when deciding whether the same counsel was

ineffective in failing to investigate and present mitigating evidence. See Winston v. Kelly, 624 F. Supp. 2d 478, 512 (W.D.

Va. 2008).

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While the Supreme Court has recognized that "the duty to

investigate does not force defense lawyers to scour the globe

on the off chance something will turn up," the Court has also

found failure to review relevant files that are easily accessible

can be objectively unreasonable and that reasonable counsel

would investigate further in the absence of "good reason to

think further investigation would be a waste." Rompilla, 545

U.S. at 382-83, 389-90. Without reading the records, counsel

had no strategic reason to think further investigation was

unnecessary. Additionally, unreasonableness can be heightened by the easy availability of the mitigating evidence. See

id. at 389-90. Here, counsel had the documents in his possession containing mitigating evidence and leads to easilylocated evidence. Even a cursory review of this record shows

that the district court erred when it held that the state court

was reasonable in finding that counsel’s limited efforts at sentencing were not deficient.

B.

On the second prong of Strickland, the state court unreasonably determined that Winston was not prejudiced by counsel’s deficient performance. A thorough review of the record

demonstrates that but for counsel’s deficient conduct, a reasonable probability exists that at least one juror would have

voted against the death penalty. At sentencing, counsel presented a few witnesses, asked them yes or no questions spanning less than thirteen transcript pages, threw several incomplete psychological evaluations at the jury without

explanation or context, and hoped for the best. The minimal

evidence counsel did present is at stark contrast with the

mountain of mitigating evidence that was readily available,

including evidence of mental deficiencies and evidence of

Winston’s emotional distress, neglect, and abandonment

throughout childhood.

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tion of mental retardation,6

 evidence of mental deficiencies is

certainly mitigating. Counsel here undisputably failed to present to the jury a classification of Winston as mentally

retarded that was in counsel’s possession. The majority apparently finds this harmless, reasoning that "there is no reason to

believe that these items [the classification of mental retardation and 1997 I.Q. score of sixty-six] would have been persuasive to the jury as ordinary mitigating evidence." Supra at 39.

This assertion misses the mark, and despite the majority labeling the classification a "single one-page document," supra at

39, it is the only classification of Winston as mentally

retarded that existed and was thus supremely relevant to

assessing mitigating evidence. While a specific score may or

may not be influential to a lay juror,7 a classification as mentally retarded certainly would have been materially significant

to the jury when considering evidence about Winston’s subaverage intellectual functioning. The majority finds the classification immaterial by characterizing it as "more general" than

the classifications of Winston’s verbal abilities that the majority assumes the jury read and could correctly interpret. Supra

at 39-40. However, the 1997 evaluation in pertinent part states

that

Leon earned a Verbal IQ score of 60 and a perfor6Based on the evidence before this Court, Winston has a strong claim

that he is mentally retarded under Virginia law and that the default of that

claim should be excused based on cause and prejudice resulting from ineffective assistance of counsel. I therefore fully concur with our decision

today to remand this case to the district court so that it may properly consider evidence that came to light at the evidentiary hearing. 

7The majority cites to several of Winston’s verbal I.Q. scores as evidence before the jury of Winston’s deficient verbal abilities. If these

scores are material to the jury’s evaluation, then surely the same must be

said of an overall I.Q. score of sixty-six, lower than all the overall I.Q.

scores contained in the reports handed over to the jury. And if the majority

assumes the jury could interpret the verbal I.Q. scores and classifications,

by the same token we should assume the jury understands that a full scale

I.Q. score is the score used to classify a person as mentally retarded. 

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mance IQ score of 77, resulting in a Full Scale IQ

score of 66. Based on his Full Scale score, Leon is

currently functioning in the Mentally Deficient range

of intelligence, and might be expected to achieve

better than one percent of his age group in academic

areas.

J.A. 1980. Thus, it is clear that a juror reading such evaluation

would place more importance on a full scale classification and

score than that of a sub-part. It is the full scale score that is

used to classify a person as mentally retarded.

Beyond the failure to present the classification, counsel did

not provide the jury with information from certain teachers,

social workers, and family members whose input would have

been essential to evaluate Winston’s mental state and adaptive

functioning. The majority concludes that Winston is asserting

that his counsel was constitutionally inadequate purely

because live witnesses did not present the information. Supra

at 37-38. This conclusion is incorrect. Winston’s argument is

that the information was not presented at all because (1)

counsel’s investigation was unreasonably wanting, Petr.’s Br.

78, and (2) "the information possessed by the jury was tremendously incomplete," id. at 77. It is undisputed that, as discussed above, counsel did not read records in his possession

nor conduct a full investigation.

As for information regarding Winston’s low intellectual

functioning, the majority relies heavily on the psychological

reports entered into evidence. The majority finds that the

reports contained "rich content" "describing [Winston’s]

many difficulties coping with his sub-average intellectual

functioning." Supra at 37, 41. However, to clarify, the evaluations constantly referenced external documents,8

 and there8Historical and detailed information about Winston was referenced in

the documents, but not provided. As an example, the 1995 evaluation

states that "[d]etails of Leon’s family life are available to the court, and

so will not be reported here in great detail." J.A. 2075. The "details"

referred to were never provided to the jury. 

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fore, the jurors received incomplete information even if we

assume that they read and understood the evaluations. Counsel presented Crystal Carper from the Fairfax County Department of Family Services to authenticate the evaluations. As

Carpenter had no personal knowledge of the evaluations, she

could not speak to their information, and the documents were

merely entered into evidence. Simply sending incomplete

records back with the jury without explanation or context

does not save counsel’s constitutionally deficient performance

in this case. See Johnson v. Bagley, 544 F.3d 592, 602 (6th

Cir. 2008) (finding that "an unreasonably truncated mitigation

investigation is not cured simply because some steps were

taken prior to the penalty-phase hearing and because some

evidence was placed before the jury").

The information before the jury concerning Winston’s subaverage intellectual and adaptive functioning was also materially incomplete because counsel failed to seek out those most

familiar with Winston in these areas. If the jury had this information, there is a reasonable probability that at least one juror

would have voted against the death penalty. That the state

court found otherwise is unreasonable. As an example, two of

the people that counsel did not speak with were Kirsten Jackson and Denise King. Jackson, Winston’s aunt, who was three

years his junior, was never contacted by counsel despite living

with Winston for almost ten years until Winston was age seventeen. Among Jackson’s testimony at the evidentiary hearing

is the following:

you could tell him to wash the dishes, and you would

come back and the dishes weren’t done, and he was

just standing there trying to figure out what he was

supposed to be doing. Anything, any chore he was

supposed to be doing, you had to constantly go back

and remind him. . . .

. . . .

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His hygiene was good when he lived with us because

my mom constantly made sure he took a bath. . . .

And afterwards, it was—when he moved out, it was

something totally different. He always looked dirty,

like just smelled nasty, just untouchable. You didn’t

want to touch him; that’s how dirty he looked.

. . . .

I think my mom bathed him until he was about 10,

11. He had to be watched until he was about that

age.

. . . .

. . . we had one incident where he fell asleep in the

tub and had a bowel movement in the tub. And we

were trying to figure out where he was at and what

was going on. We went upstairs, and he told us it

was just toys, and he started playing with it.

. . . . 

You couldn’t have a conversation with him. He

couldn’t comprehend what everyone was saying.

Talking to him was talking on a different level. It

was like you were talking to someone like—that was

five or six years old, that he constantly was—like he

would joke at the wrong times, or he could—if he

couldn’t comprehend, like, or have the conversation

that we were having, he would like sort of mimic

what everyone was saying and converse in that way,

and just—it was impossible.

. . . .

His idea of friendship was if he did something for

them, that that was his way of getting them to like

him[.]

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. . . .

He was never able to do his homework. Things that

his teacher would send him home with, he couldn’t

comprehend it, he didn’t understand it. Even if it was

told to him how to do it at school, he would still

come home and couldn’t figure it out, and I would

have to explain to him what the teacher meant and

what he was supposed to be doing. And he would

generally get frustrated, agitated, and get upset, want

to fight just because he didn’t know it. Just spelling

and all of that, he didn’t have a good subject in

school.

J.A. 725-31.

Denise King was Winston’s teacher for four years at the

Leary School, a school of last resort for students in Fairfax

County who were experiencing learning and behavior difficulties. King spent on average seven hours a day with Winston, then age eight, and yet she was never contacted. At the

evidentiary hearing, she testified that Winston had great difficulty reading and following directions. Among King’s testimony about Winston at the hearing is the following:

He posed a particular dilemma to me because I

thought I came equipped to help students with special needs, and I could not teach Leon to read; he

was a particularly difficult student to teach. . . .

. . . .

I always felt like Leon was not very well cared for.

He was interested in school, but I think he had a lot

of things going on at home. . . . I think even his

physical needs weren’t taken care of. His clothes

didn’t seem to be his own; they appeared too big for

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him. And we didn’t have a lunch program at the

school, and Leon didn’t come with food.

. . . .

I think he had auditory processing problems. He

didn’t understand a lot of what he heard. If it was

more than one or two directions, he had trouble following it. He misinterpreted social cues. He misinterpreted what people said. He took things very

literally. I think his abstract reasoning and long-term

memory were probably very limited as well.

. . . .

Leon was the lowest student for the whole four years

that I had him. . . .

. . . . 

I don’t think he knew what a reciprocal friendship

was like. A friend was somebody who was, if you

were hungry, would give you a cookie, or if you

were thirsty, would give you a soda. But other than

that, I don’t think that he even understood what

friendships and that kind of thing were all about.

. . . . 

He had no real sense of time. You know, it’s dark

outside or it’s light outside, but other than that, not

really.

. . . .

And Leon did not have any idea where the school

was in reference to where he lived. . . . And he

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wouldn’t leave early because he didn’t know how to

get home.

. . . .

I saw very small changes in his academics. . . . There

are students that, yes, would adapt to the situation,

and once they got into sort of the groove of how the

school goes, that’s when they catch on and they

really start to learn. That was not the case with Leon.

He never got it. He never understood how school

went and how—it was every day was a new day,

every day.

J.A. 741-54.

In addition to testimony from Kirsten Jackson and Denise

King, other evidence of mental deficiencies not presented due

to counsel’s failures includes the following:

1. Fairfax schools classified Winston as mentally

retarded in 1997, as mentioned above, J.A.

1876;

2. The 1997 classification, as well as other documents in counsel’s possession, identified Marilynn Schneider Lageman ("Lageman") as a

psychologist and a member of the Special Education committee that recommended the 1997

evaluation. Winston produced a 1997 evaluation

by Lageman conducted on Winston, which

included a verbal I.Q. score of sixty and a fullscale I.Q. score of sixty-six. This full-scale score

is more than two standard deviations below the

mean, compelling evidence of mental retardation under the Virginia definition. Lageman was

never contacted, J.A. 1232, 1876;

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3. By 1997, sixteen year-old Winston demonstrated "verbal cognitive skill development

within the mild range of mental retardation for

his age," J.A. 1980;

4. Winston’s 1997 "evaluation [showed] a fairly

evenly delayed profile of cognitive, social, and

emotional functioning, generally within the mild

range of mental retardation," J.A. 1982;

5. Winston failed kindergarten twice and had

severe academic struggles, J.A. 1909;

6. By age fourteen-and-a-half, Winston had not

developed age-appropriate ability to tell time or

learn the months of the year, J.A. 751-52;

7. Lageman noted "[i]t [was] particularly surprising how little Leon appear[ed] to understand

social expectations and the reasons behind social

practices." J.A. 1980;

8. After being placed in the custody of Fairfax

County, Winston "had extremely low intellectual functioning" and experienced severe emotional distress, J.A. 1359, 1799;

9. Winston’s handling of money was "inadequate

by almost any standard" and he "never had a

checking account, a savings account, a credit

card, an apartment/home lease or ownership in

his name," J.A. 1257;

10. Winston never had a job of any type other than

selling drugs on the street; even at this, other

persons gave him instructions and the drugs in

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pre-divided quantities with set prices, J.A. 896-

97, 1258.9

Additionally, because not reasonably informed, counsel

failed to present consequential evidence of Winston’s childhood of emotional distress, neglect, and abandonment, including the following:

1. Winston’s mother could not stand to be around

him and was violent with her children, J.A. 429;

2. The "void left by his mother’s absence was

never filled, and the negative influence(s) of her

criminal activity were never replaced with positive ones," J.A. 1358;

3. While the jury did hear that Winston’s grandmother ran a shoplifting operation, it did not

hear that it was Winston who blew the whistle

on the operation when he was picked up by Fairfax County Juvenile Detention after his family

left him behind and fled as the operation was

busted, J.A. 1352;

4. Because Winston had no real caretaker in his

life, he "was denied a real feeling of family and

belonging," J.A. 1358;

9Despite the majority’s herculean efforts to comb the record and find

some of the facts listed buried in the reports entered into evidence, supra

at 40, the jury found no mitigating factor. Thus, we cannot ascertain

whether the jury glanced at the reports, much less considered the reports

in depth as the majority has. The jury was given little reason to read the

reports. The reports were given no context or explanation. Not one witness

spoke personally to any of the information contained in the reports. Furthermore, as mentioned previously, the reports were materially incomplete. 

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5. At age fifteen, Winston was "struggling significantly with trust versus mistrust issues due to all

the abandonment and loss in his lifetime." J.A.

72;

6. At the Leary School, Winston was "struggling to

make sense out of the world" because of his

abandonment and upbringing, J.A. 1345;

7. A teacher at Leary noticed that "Leon’s concept

of right and wrong never stood a chance," J.A.

1347;

8. Winston was easily manipulated, had few or no

friends, and was never fully accepted by any

peer group, J.A. 1347, 1370;

9. Winston was consistently described by family,

counselors, and teachers as a child characterized

by gullibility, immaturity, passiveness, a lack of

self-esteem, and a desperate need for peer

acceptance, J.A. 1255-56;

10. Winston was diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, J.A. 1271.

In spite of all the above evidence not presented to the jury, the

state court found no prejudice on the ground that the evidence

was cumulative. I can find no reasonable theory under which

the evidence disregarded could be considered cumulative.

The negligible evidence of Winston’s childhood that was

before the jury gave an "incomplete and misleading understanding of [Winston’s] life history." Williams v. Allen, 542

F.3d 1326, 1331, 1340 (11th Cir. 2008). As I found previously, the evaluations were both unexplained and incomplete.

Also, counsel presented three witnesses to speak solely on

Winston’s social history: his mother, grandmother, and great

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grandmother. In totality, these witnesses represent less than

thirteen transcript pages and provided only vague generalities

about Winston’s upbringing, generally through yes or no

answers. Consider an excerpt from Winston’s mother’s testimony at sentencing:

Q. And how old was he when you went to the penitentiary?

A. Six and a half.

Q. Okay. And what are you in the penitentiary for?

A. Malicious wounding, firearm and robbery.

. . . . 

Q. Was Leon with you when that crime was committed?

A. Yes, sir.

. . . . 

Q. Has Leon’s father ever been involved in his

life?

A. No, sir.

. . . . 

Q. When you became pregnant with Leon, what

were some of your habits?

A. You mean as —

Q. Well, did you stick strictly to drinking tea and

milk and things like that or did you drink something else?

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A. Alcohol. I did drugs.

J.A. 240-41. When contrasting the one- or two-word answers

by three witnesses with the mitigating evidence available, the

state court unreasonably determined that but for counsel’s

deficient conduct, a reasonable probability did not exist that

at least one juror would have voted against the death penalty.

For example, Winston’s mother never described him as a

child, never told a story of him growing up, nor provided any

examples to humanize him. Astoundingly, she was never

asked to. This dearth of even the most basic details of Winston’s childhood10 stands in stark contrast to his mother’s affidavit, submitted two years later:

I was 15 years old when I got pregnant with Leon.

I was never in a relationship with his father, Leon

Johnson. I knew his father because he was a junkie

and I was doing a lot of drugs and drinking at the

time. When Leon Johnson found out that I was pregnant, he denied that it was his baby. I have never

seen him since then.

I remember that it took Leon a long time to learn

how to use the toilet by himself. After he stopped

using diapers, he used to wet the bed a lot as a child.

He also had problems talking—he stuttered a lot.

Leon had a really hard time understanding directions

I would give him. For instance, I remember that I

would often ask him to get me "the chair," and I

would point toward the chair that we kept next to the

refrigerator in the kitchen. He did not seem to understand what I was talking about; he would just look

10The majority finds that "counsel did present the basic details of Winston’s admittedly troubled childhood to the jury." Supra at 41. It is difficult to imagine a capital case in which less testimony at sentencing was

presented by defense counsel. The thirteen transcript pages relied on by

the majority is bereft of anything approaching the meaning of "details." 

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back at me and say, "which chair," even though it

was the only chair in the kitchen and the same chair

I always wanted him to get for me. . . .

. . . . 

I continued to drink and use drugs after Leon was

born and during and after I was pregnant with my

other two sons. During the times that I was living

with my children, I would drive them to school.

After I dropped them off at school, I would go to the

liquor store when it opened at 10:00 a.m. I would

buy a pint of Barcardi rum and go to my friends’

house and drink it during the day. Sometimes I

would finish it by the time I went to pick up the kids,

and sometimes I wouldn’t. I would usually go get

some food at Burger King or McDonalds to try to

bring down my high around the time I picked up my

kids. I was also using still using [sic] drugs when the

kids were in school. . . .

Leon started school before I went to prison. On some

days, I was sober enough in the afternoon to try and

help Leon with his homework. He had a really hard

time with it, and I always thought that he was going

to have problems learning. Leon had these ABC

blocks, but he could never manage to put them in the

right order. . . .

There were times when we lived with my family

members and times when we lived with my boyfriends. We moved around a lot. . . . I often left Leon

with my family so that I could go hang out with my

friends and get drunk and high.

. . . . 

When I was dating Raymond Jackson, Leon told me

once that Raymond beat him when I wasn’t around.

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. . . I saw marks and bruises on his back once. . . .

I just wasn’t much of a parent to my children. I did

not give them the love and attention they deserved to

have. Two of my three children are currently in

prison.

J.A. 1361-62. The dramatic detail contained in this affidavit

plainly was not presented to the jury. Rather, counsel’s presentation about Winston’s childhood was haphazard and woefully incomplete.

Given the evidence cited herein of Winston’s mental deficiencies and traumatic childhood, coupled with the absence of

evidence that Winston was the triggerman, there is a reasonable probability that at least one juror would have voted

against the death penalty.11 As the Supreme Court found in

Rompilla, 545 U.S. at 393 (citations omitted), the evidence

now before this Court

adds up to a mitigation case that bears no relation to

the few naked pleas for mercy actually put before the

jury, and although . . . it is possible that a jury could

have heard it all and still have decided on the death

penalty, that is not the test. It goes without saying

that the undiscovered "mitigating evidence, taken as

a whole, ‘might well have influenced the jury’s

appraisal’ of [Winston’s] culpability," and the likelihood of a different result if the evidence had gone in

11To exacerbate this prejudice, the nature of the information not presented is exactly the type that jurors find persuasive. Evidence of a diminished mental capacity, along with evidence of a traumatic childhood is

precisely the kind of evidence that reduces a defendant’s moral culpability

and provokes sympathy from the jury. This Court has found that evidence

of mental deficiencies "can be persuasive mitigating evidence for jurors

considering the death penalty, and this evidence can determine the outcome." Gray v. Branker, 529 F.3d 220, 235 (4th Cir. 2008); cf. Smith v.

Mullin, 379 F.3d 919, 942 (10th Cir. 2004) (finding that evidence of mental deficiencies "garners the most sympathy from jurors"). 

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is "sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome" actually reached at sentencing.

III.

In this capital case, the performance of counsel was abysmally deficient. Had the jury been able to place Winston’s

troubled childhood and background, along with the evidence

of his mental deficiencies, "on the mitigating side of the scale,

there is a reasonable probability that at least one juror would

have struck a different balance." Wiggins, 539 U.S. at 537.

Additionally, I would find that Winston was unconstitutionally denied lesser included homicide instructions. Accordingly, I would reverse the state court’s adjudication of

Winston’s ineffective assistance of counsel claim and due

process claim as unreasonable and remand for resentencing.

On this basis, I dissent.

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