Cite as: 528 U. S. 259 (2000)
Opinion of the Court
488 U. S., at 86. Here, by contrast, counsel followed a procedure that is constitutional under Anders and our other precedents in this area, and Robbins therefore received all the procedural protection that the Constitution requires. We thus presume that the result of the proceedings on appeal is reliable, and we require Robbins to prove the presumption incorrect in his particular case. See Strickland, 466 U. S., at 694.
Further, the ineffective-assistance claim that Robbins presses does not fall within any of the three categories of cases, described in Strickland, in which we presume preju-dice rather than require a defendant to demonstrate it. First, as noted, we presume prejudice in a case of denial of counsel. Second, "various kinds of state interference with counsel's assistance" can warrant a presumption of prejudice. Id., at 692; see Cronic, 466 U. S., at 659, and n. 25. Third, "prejudice is presumed when counsel is burdened by an actual conflict of interest," Strickland, 466 U. S., at 692, although in such a case we do require the defendant to show that the conflict adversely affected his counsel's performance, ibid. None of these three categories applies to a case such as Robbins'. Nor does the policy reason that we offered in Strickland for the first two categories apply here, for it is not the case that, if an attorney unreasonably chooses to follow a procedure such as Anders or Wende instead of filing a merits brief, prejudice "is so likely that case-by-case inquiry into prejudice is not worth the cost." 466 U. S., at 692; see Cronic, supra, at 658.15 On the contrary, in most cases in which a defendant's appeal has been found, pursuant to a valid state procedure, to be frivolous, it will in fact be frivolous.
It is no harder for a court to apply Strickland in this area than it is when a defendant claims that he received ineffec-15 Moreover, such an error by counsel is neither "easy to identify" (since it is necessary to evaluate a defendant's case in order to find the error) nor attributable to the prosecution. See Strickland, supra, at 692.
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