24
Per Curiam
standard by use of the term "probable" without the modifier may perhaps be imprecise, but if so it can no more be considered a repudiation of the standard than can this Court's own occasional indulgence in the same imprecision. See Mick-ens v. Taylor, 535 U. S. 162, 166 (2002) ("probable effect upon the outcome"); Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 362, 393 (2000) ("probably affected the outcome").
The Court of Appeals made no effort to reconcile the state court's use of the term "probable" with its use, elsewhere, of Strickland's term "reasonably probable," nor did it even acknowledge, much less discuss, the California Supreme Court's proper framing of the question as whether the evidence "undermines confidence" in the outcome of the sentencing proceeding. This readiness to attribute error is inconsistent with the presumption that state courts know and follow the law. See, e. g., Parker v. Dugger, 498 U. S. 308, 314-316 (1991); Walton v. Arizona, 497 U. S. 639, 653 (1990), overruled on other grounds, Ring v. Arizona, 536 U. S. 584 (2002); LaVallee v. Delle Rose, 410 U. S. 690, 694-695 (1973) (per curiam). It is also incompatible with § 2254(d)'s "highly deferential standard for evaluating state-court rulings," Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U. S. 320, 333, n. 7 (1997), which demands that state-court decisions be given the benefit of the doubt.
B
The Court of Appeals also held that, regardless of whether the California Supreme Court applied the proper standard for determining prejudice under Strickland, its decision involved an unreasonable application of our clearly established precedents. 288 F. 3d, at 1118. Specifically, the Ninth Circuit concluded that the determination that Visciotti suffered no prejudice as a result of his trial counsel's deficiencies was "objectively unreasonable." Ibid. Under § 2254(d)'s "un-reasonable application" clause, a federal habeas court may not issue the writ simply because that court concludes in its independent judgment that the state-court decision applied
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007