Opinion ID: 3173550
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: standard of review

Text: Although we review de novo a district court’s decision to grant or to deny a 28 U.S.C. § 2254 habeas petition, our review of a state court decision is quite deferential. In this respect, we accept and assiduously apply the Warden’s statement of our demanding standard of review. As amended by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) constitutes a “threshold restriction,” Renico v. Lett, 559 U.S. 766, 773 n.1 (2010), on federal habeas corpus relief as to state prisoners that “bars relitigation of any claim ‘adjudicated on the merits’ in state court” unless the claim meets one of the statute’s two exceptions. Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 98 (2011). Under those exceptions, relief may be available if the state court decision was (1) “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,” or (2) “based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” Id. (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)). Only if a petitioner can survive this threshold review as to claims previously rejected on their merits by a state court is a federal court permitted to reach the merits of a petitioner’s claims, reviewing them de novo. See Panetti v. Quarterman, 551 U.S. 930, 953 (2007) (“When a state court’s adjudication of a claim is dependent on an antecedent unreasonable application of federal law, the requirement set forth in § 2254(d)(1) is satisfied. A federal LIAO V. JUNIOUS 23 court must then resolve the claim without the deference AEDPA otherwise requires.”); see also Howard v. Clark, 608 F.3d 563, 571–72 (9th Cir. 2010); Frantz v. Hazey, 533 F.3d 724, 735–36 (9th Cir. 2008) (en banc). A state court decision is “contrary to” federal law only if it “applies a rule that contradicts the governing law” as set forth in Supreme Court opinions, or reaches a different decision from a Supreme Court opinion when confronted with materially indistinguishable facts. Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 405–06 (2000). A state court engages in an “unreasonable application” of federal law if it identifies the correct governing legal principle from the Supreme Court’s decisions but unreasonably applies it to the facts of the prisoner’s case. Id. at 413. The inquiry under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) is sharply circumscribed. First, “clearly established federal law” is limited to Supreme Court authority that “squarely addresses” the claim at issue and provides a “clear answer.” Wright v. Van Patten, 552 U.S. 120, 125–26 (2008); see also Lopez v. Smith, 135 S. Ct. 1, 5–6 (2014) (per curiam) (grant of habeas relief reversed where court relied heavily on circuit decisions and the Supreme Court had failed to address the specific question presented by that case); Marshall v. Rodgers, 133 S. Ct. 1446, 1450–51 (2013) (federal habeas court may “look to circuit precedent to ascertain whether [a federal appellate court] has already held that the particular point in issue is clearly established by Supreme Court precedent,” but may not use lower court authority “to refine or sharpen a general principle of Supreme Court jurisprudence into a specific legal rule” or “to determine whether a particular rule of law is so widely accepted among the Federal Circuits that it would, if presented to [the Supreme] Court, be accepted as correct”); 24 LIAO V. JUNIOUS Premo v. Moore, 562 U.S. 115, 127–28 (2011); Knowles v. Mirzayance, 556 U.S. 111, 121–22 (2009); Carey v. Musladin, 549 U.S. 70, 77 (2006). And, in light of the record before the state court and the clearly established Supreme Court precedent, the state court decision must have been “objectively unreasonable,” and not merely incorrect in the view of the federal court. Lett, 559 U.S. at 773; Richter, 562 U.S. at 101–02; see also Felkner v. Jackson, 562 U.S. 594, 597–98 (2011) (per curiam). “[E]ven a strong case for relief does not mean the state court’s contrary conclusion was unreasonable.” Richter, 562 U.S. at 102. The standard set forth in § 2254(d) is “difficult to meet . . . because it was meant to be.” Id.; see also Burt v. Titlow, 134 S. Ct. 10, 15–16 (2013) (“Recognizing the duty and ability of our state-court colleagues to adjudicate claims of constitutional wrong, AEDPA erects a formidable barrier to federal habeas relief for prisoners whose claims have been adjudicated in state court.”). It “reflects the view that habeas corpus is a guard against extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems, not a substitute for ordinary error correction through appeal.” Richter, 562 U.S. at 102–03. To that end, it precludes review of any claims previously rejected on their merits by a state court except in the narrow category of cases “where there is no possibility fairminded jurists could disagree that the state court’s decision conflicts with [the Supreme] Court’s precedents.” Id. at 102. Accordingly, to overcome the bar of § 2254(d), a petitioner is required to show at the threshold that “the state court’s ruling on the claim being presented in federal court was so lacking in justification that there was an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.” Id. at 103; see also Titlow, 134 S. Ct. at 16 (“We will not lightly conclude that a State’s LIAO V. JUNIOUS 25 criminal justice system has experienced the ‘extreme malfunction’ for which federal habeas relief is the remedy.”) (quoting Richter, 562 U.S. at 102) (alteration omitted); Johnson v. Williams, 133 S. Ct. 1088, 1091, 1094 (2013) (standard of § 2254(d) is “difficult to meet” and “sharply limits the circumstances in which a federal court may issue a writ of habeas corpus to a state prisoner whose claim was ‘adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings’”) (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)). As for whether or not Liao suffered prejudice because of counsel’s error, our first task therefore is to determine whether the Superior Court’s application of the prejudice prong of Strickland as measured under § 2254(d) “was so lacking in justification that there was an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.” Richter, 562 U.S. 86 at 103. Specifically, does the Superior Court’s conclusion that there was not a reasonable probability that the missing evidence would have resulted in a different result in Liao’s trial survive this rigorous test? V