Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/558bv.pdf
Page Number: 459

298 

WOOD  v.  ALLEN 

Opinion of the Court 

Dr. Kirkland’s report, such as details about Wood’s 19 earlier 
arrests  and  his  previous  attempt  to  murder  another  ex-
girlfriend, as well as Dr. Kirkland’s conclusion that, notwith­
standing  Wood’s  mental  deﬁciencies,  Wood  had  a  high  level 
of adaptive functioning.  Id., at 1304–1306.  The court 
added that the investigation preceding counsel’s decision was 
sufﬁcient to permit them to make a reasoned decision, credit­
ing  the  Rule  32  court’s  ﬁndings  that,  inter  alia,  counsel  not 
only  employed  an  investigator  who  sought  mitigation  evi­
dence  from  family  members  but  also  themselves  met  with 
family  members  and  sought  guidance  from  capital  defense 
organizations.  Id.,  at  1307–1308.  The  court  also  accepted 
as  not  “objectively  unreasonable”  the  state  court’s  determi­
nation that Wood had failed to show prejudice from counsel’s 
failure to present evidence of his mental deﬁciencies.  Id., at 
1309, 1314. 

The  dissent,  implicitly  considering  the  factual  question 
whether counsel made a strategic decision as part and parcel 
of the legal question whether any strategic decision was rea­
sonable,  concluded  that  “[n]o  such  strategic  decisions  could 
possibly  have  been  made  in  this  case  because  counsel  had 
failed to adequately investigate the available mitigating evi­
dence.”  Id.,  at  1316  (opinion  of  Barkett,  J.).  According  to 
the dissent, “the weight of the evidence in the record demon­
strates  that  Trotter,  an  inexperienced  and  overwhelmed  at­
torney,”  unassisted  by  senior  counsel,  “realized  too  late”— 
only  in  time  to  present  it  to  the  sentencing  judge,  not  to 
the  penalty  jury—“what  any  reasonably  prepared  attorney 
would  have  known:  that  evidence  of  Wood’s  mental  impair­
ments  could  have  served  as  mitigating  evidence  and  de­
served  investigation  so  that  it  could  properly  be  presented 
before  sentencing.”  Id.,  at  1320.  The  dissent  also  con­
cluded that there was a reasonable probability of a different 
outcome  at  the  penalty  phase  had  the  evidence  been  pre­
sented, because the jury could have concluded that Wood was 
less  culpable  as  a  result  of  his  diminished  abilities.  Id.,  at