Opinion ID: 2897994
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: General Habeas Standards

Text: Federal law permits a prisoner held “in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court” to seek habeas relief “only on the ground that he is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). Generally, a prisoner must first “fairly present” his federal claims to the state court and exhaust his state-court remedies before seeking federal habeas relief. Snowden v. Singletary, 135 F.3d 732, 735 (11th Cir. 1998). We review a district court’s denial of a § 2254 petition de novo. Sims v. Singletary, 155 F.3d 1297, 1304 (11th Cir. 1998). If the state courts do not address the merits of a fairly presented claim, a federal court’s review of that claim is de novo. See Davis v. Sec’y for the Dep’t of Corr., 341 F.3d 1310, 1313 (11th Cir. 2003) (per curiam). But when a state court has adjudicated a prisoner’s claim on the merits, a federal court may not grant habeas relief with respect to such a claim unless the state court’s adjudication (1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or (2) resulted in a decision that was 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). 28 Case: 14-14869 Date Filed: 09/08/2015 Page: 29 of 42 These standards are highly deferential and demand that we give state-court decisions the benefit of the doubt. Evans v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Corr., 703 F.3d 1316, 1325 (11th Cir. 2013) (en banc). A decision “is not ‘contrary to’ federal law unless it ‘contradicts the United States Supreme Court on a settled question of law or holds differently than did that Court on a set of materially indistinguishable facts.’” Id. (quoting Cummings v. Sec’y for Dep’t of Corr., 588 F.3d 1331, 1355 (11th Cir. 2009)). Nor is a state court’s decision “an ‘unreasonable application’ of federal law unless the state court ‘identifies the correct governing legal principle as articulated by the United States Supreme Court, but unreasonably applies that principle to the facts of the petitioner’s case, unreasonably extends the principle to a new context where it should not apply, or unreasonably refuses to extend it to a new context where it should apply.’” Id. The federal court does not ask whether the state decision is correct, but rather whether it is unreasonable. Id.