378
Opinion of the Court
§ 2255 as well as in federal sentencing proceedings, we granted certiorari. 530 U. S. 1299 (2000).
II
The petitioner in Custis attempted, during his federal sentencing proceeding, to attack prior state convictions used to enhance his sentence under the ACCA. Like petitioner here, Custis challenged his prior convictions as the product of allegedly faulty guilty pleas and ineffective assistance of counsel. 511 U. S., at 488. We held that with the sole exception of convictions obtained in violation of the right to counsel, Custis had no right under the ACCA or the Constitution "to collaterally attack prior convictions" in the course of his federal sentencing proceeding. Id., at 490-497. While the "failure to appoint counsel for an indigent defendant was a unique constitutional defect" that justified the exception for challenges concerning Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963), 511 U. S., at 496, challenges of the type Custis sought to bring did not "ris[e] to the level of a jurisdictional defect," ibid.
Two considerations supported our constitutional conclusion in Custis: ease of administration and the interest in promoting the finality of judgments. With respect to the former, we noted that resolving non-Gideon-type constitutional attacks on prior convictions "would require sentencing courts to rummage through frequently nonexistent or diffi-cult to obtain state-court transcripts or records." 511 U. S., at 496. With respect to the latter, we observed that allowing collateral attacks would "inevitably delay and impair the orderly administration of justice" and "deprive the state-court judgment of its normal force and effect." Id., at 497 (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted).
A
Petitioner contends that the Custis rule should not extend to § 2255 proceedings because the concerns we articulated
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