Opinion ID: 151921
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Deference Under the AEDPA

Text: Under the AEDPA, a state prisoner's habeas petition must be denied as to any claim that was `adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings' unless the adjudication was `contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,' or was `based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.' Holloway, 355 F.3d at 718 (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) & (2)). We have interpreted § 2254(d)'s `adjudication on the merits' language to mean that `when, although properly preserved by the defendant, the state court has not reached the merits of a claim thereafter presented to a federal habeas court, the deferential standards provided by AEDPA ... do not apply.' Id. (quoting Appel v. Horn, 250 F.3d 203, 210 (3d Cir.2001)) (additional citations omitted). In Holloway, we concluded that because the state court found it `impossible to determine' whether Holloway's underlying Batson claim `has arguable merit,' it plainly did not render an `adjudication on the merits' of that claim for purposes of applying the AEDPA standards. Id. at 719 (applying the pre-AEDPA standard where the Pennsylvania Supreme Court dismissed a PCRA claim that alleged a Batson violation because the claim did not meet Spence's procedural requirements). [4] Coombs' claim here was treated the same as Holloway's was. In both cases, the state appellate court refused to address the merits of the Batson claim because the defendant had not satisfied the requirements of Pennsylvania's Spence rule. Inasmuch as the state courts did not reach the merits of Coombs' Batson challenge, our review of that claim is not subject to AEDPA's deferential standard, and we therefore afford de novo review. Nevertheless, we still presume that the state courts' conclusions of fact are correct unless, inter alia, they are not fairly supported by the record. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(8); Holloway, 355 F.3d at 719.