Opinion ID: 411288
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Decoster Standard

Text: 71 In Wright v. Estelle, Chief Judge Godbold stated: 72 In this circuit, we have consistently held that one suffering inadequate counsel need not show to receive a new trial that adequate counsel would change the result on retrial. 73 572 F.2d at 1084 (Godbold, J., dissenting). The plurality opinion in United States v. Decoster, however, requires the petitioner to prove precisely that. 624 F.2d at 208, 211-12; see supra note 5. We reject the outcome-determinative test in Decoster for reasons analogous to those that lead us to reject the Chapman standard. First, in cases where the allegation of ineffective assistance is based upon counsel's failure to raise certain objections, the Decoster test requires the petitioner to carry a burden of showing prejudice that is different from and greater than the analogous burden in the cause and prejudice formulation of Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U.S. 72, 87, 97 S.Ct. 2497, 2506, 53 L.Ed.2d 594 (1977). Application of the Decoster rule may thus have the surprising result of holding a petitioner who has established a deprivation of his constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel to a greater showing of prejudice than if he was merely trying to present a claim of constitutional error not raised in the state courts. 32 74 Additionally, when counsel is faulted for failing to develop a certain line of evidence, Decoster would require the petitioner to demonstrate, first, what evidence would have been produced and, second, that in the context of the entire case the additional evidence would have altered the result. While the first showing is properly allocated to the petitioner because he is better situated to show what evidence could be uncovered in his favor, he is no better situated than the state to demonstrate that the new evidence was likely to alter the outcome of the case. We believe that where the petitioner has shouldered the considerable burden of showing a violation of his sixth amendment rights that resulted in actual and substantial disadvantage to his case, it is inequitable to encumber him with the further responsibility of showing that the disadvantage determined the outcome of the entire case. See McQueen v. Swenson, 498 F.2d at 220.