348
Opinion of the Court
institutions. Sawyer alleges ineffective assistance of counsel in trial counsel's failure to introduce these records in the sentencing phase of his trial.
The Court of Appeals held that petitioner's failure to assert his Brady claim in his first petition constituted an abuse of the writ, and that he had not shown cause for failing to raise the claim earlier under McCleskey. 945 F. 2d, at 824. The ineffective-assistance claim was held by the Court of Appeals to be a successive claim because it was rejected on the merits in Sawyer's first petition, and petitioner failed to show cause for not bringing all the evidence in support of this claim earlier. Id., at 823. Petitioner does not contest these findings of the Court of Appeals. Tr. of Oral Arg. 7. Therefore, we must determine if petitioner has shown by clear and convincing evidence that but for constitutional error, no reasonable juror would find him eligible for the death penalty under Louisiana law.
Under Louisiana law, petitioner is eligible for the death penalty because he was convicted of first-degree murder— that is, an intentional killing while in the process of committing an aggravated arson—and because at the sentencing phase the jury found two valid aggravating circumstances: that the murder was committed in the course of an aggravated arson, and that the murder was especially cruel, atrocious, and heinous. The psychological evidence petitioner alleges was kept from the jury due to the ineffective assistance of counsel does not relate to petitioner's guilt or innocence of the crime.16 Neither does it relate to either of the aggravating factors found by the jury that made petitioner eligible for the death penalty. Even if this evidence had been before the jury, it cannot be said that a reasonable juror would not have found both of the aggravating factors that
16 Petitioner does not allege that his mental condition was such that he could not form criminal intent under Louisiana law. Tr. of Oral Arg. 10.
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