[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 21-10006

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

ADALBERTO RAMOS, 

Petitioner-Appellant,

versus

ATTORNEY GENERAL, STATE OF FLORIDA, 

Respondent-Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Florida

D.C. Docket No. 0:19-cv-62456-PCH

____________________

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 1 of 8
2 Opinion of the Court 21-10006

Before ROSENBAUM, LUCK, and BRASHER, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Adalberto Ramos, proceeding pro se, appeals the district 

court’s denial of his petition for habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 

following his convictions for sexual battery against a minor. We 

granted a certificate of appealability on the issues of whether Ramos’s trial counsel provided ineffective assistance for failing to call 

the victim’s mother to testify and for failing to adequately impeach 

the victim with her deposition testimony. Upon careful consideration, we affirm.

I. 

 After Ramos’s stepdaughter accused him of sexually abusing 

her, the State of Florida charged him with four counts of sexual 

battery upon a child, a count of indecent assault, and a count of

lewd or lascivious molestation. At trial, the victim and her sisters 

testified about Ramos’s prolonged abuse, including forcing her to 

participate in oral, digital, and anal sex as a child. The victim also 

testified that this abuse caused her to bleed when she used the restroom. 

The victim’s mother had previously given a deposition describing how the victim had told her about Ramos’s inappropriate 

touching. But that deposition also stated that the victim denied that 

Ramos had “put something in” her. And it stated that, when the 

mother physically checked the victim and washed her clothes, she 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 2 of 8
21-10006 Opinion of the Court 3

did not see signs of bleeding. Neither Ramos nor the government 

called the victim’s mother to testify at trial.

The jury found Ramos guilty on all counts, and Ramos was

given multiple concurrent sentences of life in prison. 

After undergoing the direct appeal process, Ramos filed a petition for postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850. That petition asserted various claims for relief, two 

of which are relevant here. First, Ramos argued that his counsel 

was ineffective for failing to call the victim’s mother as a witness 

because she would have contradicted some of the victim’s testimony. Second, he argued that his counsel was ineffective for failing 

to impeach the victim with her deposition testimony that her 

mother did not physically examine her, that she did not tell her 

mother about any penetration by Ramos, and that she was experiencing bleeding when she reported the abuse. 

After holding an evidentiary hearing, the postconviction 

court denied both claims. Regarding the first claim, it reasoned that 

Ramos had failed to establish the substance of the mother’s testimony that was not offered, or how it would have affected the outcome of the trial. And it noted that the decision not to call a witness 

is strategic in nature. As to the second claim, the court reasoned 

that Ramos presented insufficient evidence at the evidentiary hearing. Ramos appealed, and Florida’s Fourth District Court of Appeal 

affirmed the denial of the relevant claims without comment. Ramos v. State, 264 So. 3d 180 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2019).

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 3 of 8
4 Opinion of the Court 21-10006

Ramos then filed a Section 2254 petition in the Southern District of Florida, reasserting the claims he raised before the state 

postconviction court. The district court denied the petition. It reasoned that Ramos’s trial counsel made a reasonable strategic decision not to call the victim’s mother, and that he could only speculate as to the substance of her testimony because she did not testify 

at the evidentiary hearing. It also determined that the victim’s testimony at trial was consistent with her deposition, so Ramos could 

not establish that the failure to impeach her with her deposition 

was ineffective assistance. 

We later granted Ramos a certificate of appealability on the 

two claims discussed above. Ramos now appeals.

II. 

“[W]e review the district court’s denial of [a] § 2254 petition de novo, but we ‘owe deference to the final state habeas judgment.’” Reed v. Sec’y, Fla. Dep’t of Corr., 593 F.3d 1217, 1239 (11th 

Cir. 2010) (quoting Peterka v. McNeil, 532 F.3d 1199, 1200 (11th 

Cir. 2008)). When the final state court decision does not contain 

reasoning for the denial of relief, we look to the last related state 

court decision that provides rationale and “presume that the unexplained decision adopted the same reasoning.” Wilson v. Sellers, 

138 S. Ct. 1188, 1192 (2018). 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 4 of 8
21-10006 Opinion of the Court 5

III. 

A federal court cannot grant habeas relief on a claim that was 

“adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings” unless the 

state court’s decision was (1) “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States” or (2) “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). For 

purposes of Section 2254(d)(1), “clearly established Federal law” refers only to the legal principles embodied in the holdings of the Supreme Court. Thaler v. Haynes, 559 U.S. 43, 47 (2010). 

The Sixth Amendment provides criminal defendants the 

right to effective assistance of counsel. Strickland v. Washington, 

466 U.S. 668, 684-86 (1984). To succeed on an ineffective assistance 

of counsel claim, a petitioner must show that (1) his counsel’s performance was deficient and (2) the deficient performance prejudiced his defense. Id. at 687. 

Counsel’s performance is deficient where it “fell below an 

objective standard of reasonableness.” Id. at 688. A court considering an ineffective assistance claim “must indulge a strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance.” Id. at 689. Thus, our analysis under 

Section 2254 is “doubly deferential” where the state court decided 

that counsel performed adequately. Dunn v. Reeves, 141 S. Ct. 

2405, 2410 (2021) (quoting Burt v. Titlow, 571 U.S. 12, 15 (2013)). 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 5 of 8
6 Opinion of the Court 21-10006

In other words, we may grant relief only if “every ‘fairminded jurist’ would agree that every reasonable lawyer would have made a 

different decision.” Id. at 2411 (cleaned up) (quoting Harrington v. 

Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 101 (2011)).

To prove the prejudice element under Strickland, the defendant must show “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's 

unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have 

been different.” 466 U.S. at 694. 

Here, Ramos maintains that the state court unreasonably 

applied Strickland by rejecting two of his claims for ineffective assistance of counsel. As to the first claim, he argues that his trial 

counsel was ineffective for failing to call the victim’s mother as a 

defense witness. He specifically asserts that the mother would have 

testified that she heard the victim deny that Ramos sexually abused 

her. 

Regarding the second claim, Ramos argues that his trial 

counsel was ineffective for failing to impeach the victim with her 

deposition testimony that her mother never physically examined 

her for signs of abuse. He states that trial counsel needed only ask 

her one question: “Are you sure you did not tell your mother about 

the allegations made against Mr. Ramos?” 

We discuss each of these arguments in turn. 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 6 of 8
21-10006 Opinion of the Court 7

A.

The state court reasonably applied Strickland as to Ramos’s 

claim regarding his trial counsel’s decision not to call the victim’s 

mother as a defense witness. Counsel’s decision as to which witnesses, if any, to call at trial “is the epitome of a strategic decision, 

and it is one that we will seldom, if ever, second guess.” Conklin v. 

Schofield, 366 F.3d 1191, 1204 (11th Cir. 2004) (quoting Waters v. 

Thomas, 46 F.3d 1506, 1512 (11th Cir. 1995)). “Even if counsel’s 

decision appears to have been unwise in retrospect, the decision 

will be held to have been ineffective assistance only if it was ‘so 

patently unreasonable that no competent attorney would have 

chosen it.’” Dingle v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Corr., 480 F.3d 1092, 1099 

(11th Cir. 2007) (quoting Adams v. Wainwright, 709 F.2d 1443, 

1445 (11th Cir. 1983)).

On this record, we cannot say the state court unreasonably 

determined that Ramos’s counsel was not ineffective. Trial counsel

testified that he chose not to call the victim’s mother because he

did not believe her testimony would be helpful to Ramos’s defense.

We owe substantial deference to that strategic determination, and 

it is supported by the record. Contrary to Ramos’s assertions on 

appeal, the mother’s deposition corroborated some parts of the victim’s testimony, such as her underlying assertion that Ramos 

touched her inappropriately. Moreover, because the victim’s 

mother did not testify at the evidentiary hearing, Ramos has not 

established that the mother’s testimony would have been overall 

favorable to his defense, much less that there was a reasonable 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 7 of 8
8 Opinion of the Court 21-10006

probability of it changing the outcome of the trial. So the district 

court correctly denied the Section 2254 petition as to this claim.

B.

The state court also applied Strickland reasonably to Ramos’s claim concerning his trial counsel’s failure to impeach the 

victim with her deposition testimony. Failure to impeach a key 

prosecution witness with earlier testimony may amount to ineffective assistance when that testimony was “much more favorable to 

the defendant.” Fugate v. Head, 261 F.3d 1206, 1219 (11th Cir. 

2001).

The record supports the state court’s conclusion that Ramos’s counsel was not ineffective. Ramos’s trial counsel cross-examined the victim—he questioned her thoroughly and reviewed 

her deposition transcript both before and after he conducted the 

cross-examination. Afterward, both he and Ramos agreed that he 

had covered all the necessary questions. Additionally, the victim 

testified in her deposition and at trial that her mother never examined her after she told her mother about the abuse. The victim also 

testified at trial that she told her mother about the inappropriate 

touching, which answers the sole question that Ramos suggests his 

trial counsel should have asked—whether she told her mother 

about the allegations against him. So the district court correctly denied Ramos’s Section 2254 petition.

AFFIRMED. 

 

USCA11 Case: 21-10006 Date Filed: 06/02/2022 Page: 8 of 8