Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 447.0

529US2

Unit: $U46

[10-07-01 17:18:24] PAGES PGT: OPIN

372

WILLIAMS v. TAYLOR

Opinion of the Court

eral most recent offenses to which he had confessed.
In
comparison, it found that the excluded mitigating evidence—
which it characterized as merely indicating “that numerous
people, mostly relatives, thought that defendant was nonvio-
lent and could cope very well in a structured environment,”
ibid.—“barely would have altered the proﬁle of this defend-
ant that was presented to the jury,” ibid. On this basis, the
court concluded that there was no reasonable possibility that
the omitted evidence would have affected the jury’s sentenc-
ing recommendation, and that Williams had failed to demon-
strate that his sentencing proceeding was fundamentally
unfair.

Federal Habeas Corpus Proceedings

Having exhausted his state remedies, Williams sought a
federal writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 2254
(1994 ed. and Supp. III). After reviewing the state habeas
hearing transcript and the state courts’ ﬁndings of fact and
conclusions of law, the federal trial judge agreed with the
Virginia trial judge: The death sentence was constitution-
ally inﬁrm.

After noting that the Virginia Supreme Court had not ad-
dressed the question whether trial counsel’s performance at
the sentencing hearing fell below the range of competence
demanded of lawyers in criminal cases, the judge began by
addressing that issue in detail. He identiﬁed ﬁve categories
of mitigating evidence that counsel had failed to introduce,4

4 “(i) Counsel did not introduce evidence of the Petitioner’s back-
ground. . . . (ii) Counsel did not introduce evidence that Petitioner was
abused by his father.
(iii) Counsel did not introduce testimony from cor-
rectional ofﬁcers who were willing to testify that defendant would not
pose a danger while incarcerated. Nor did counsel offer prison commen-
dations awarded to Williams for his help in breaking up a prison drug
ring and for returning a guard’s missing wallet.
(iv) Several character
witnesses were not called to testify. . . . [T]he testimony of Elliott, a re-
spected CPA in the community, could have been quite important to the
(v) Finally, counsel did not introduce evidence that Petitioner
jury . . . .