Cite as: 529 U. S. 362 (2000)
Opinion of Rehnquist, C. J.
Supreme Court's adjudication was "contrary to" or an "un-reasonable application of" Strickland.
Generally, in an ineffective-assistance-of-counsel case where the state court applies Strickland, federal habeas courts can proceed directly to "unreasonable application" review. But, according to the substance of petitioner's argument, this could be one of the rare cases where a state court applied the wrong Supreme Court precedent, and, consequently, reached an incorrect result. Petitioner argues, and the Court agrees, that the Virginia Supreme Court improperly held that Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U. S. 364 (1993), "modified or in some way supplanted" the rule set down in Strickland. See ante, at 391. I agree that such a holding would be improper. But the Virginia Supreme Court did not so hold as it did not rely on Lockhart to reach its decision.
Before delving into the evidence presented at the sentencing proceeding, the Virginia Supreme Court stated:
"We shall demonstrate that the criminal proceeding sentencing defendant to death was not fundamentally unfair or unreliable, and that the prisoner's assertions about the potential effects of the omitted proof do not establish a 'reasonable probability' that the result of the proceeding would have been different, nor any probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome. Therefore, any ineffective assistance of counsel did not result in actual prejudice to the accused." Williams v. Warden, 254 Va. 16, 25, 487 S. E. 2d 194, 199 (1997).
While the first part of this statement refers to Lockhart, the rest of the statement is straight out of Strickland. Indeed, after the initial allusion to Lockhart, the Virginia Supreme Court's analysis explicitly proceeds under Strickland alone.*
*In analyzing the evidence that was presented to the sentencing jury, the Virginia Supreme Court stated: "Drawing on Strickland, we hold that, even assuming the challenged conduct of counsel was unreasonable, the prisoner 'suffered insufficient prejudice to warrant setting aside his death
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