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Williams v. Taylor | 529 U.S. 362 (2000)
Federal courts have the authority to demand the release of state court prisoners who have been unconstitutionally imprisoned by a court order known as a writ of habeas corpus. But the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 substantially limited this authority to instances where a state court’s decision was contrary to or unreasonably applied clearly established federal law. In Williams versus Taylor, the United States Supreme Court tackled the difficult question of how courts should interpret this new standard of review.
Terry Williams was convicted of capital murder. At sentencing, the prosecutor presented evidence of Williams’s numerous prior convictions for violent crimes. The jury found that Williams was a future danger to society and recommended a death sentence.
The Virginia Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence, and the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari. Williams filed a petition for relief in the circuit court, which found Williams was denied his constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel at sentencing when his attorneys failed to present mitigating evidence, including Williams’s experiences of childhood abuse, his intellectual disability, and his favorable conduct in prison. The Virginia Supreme Court denied rehearing, holding that there was no reasonable probability that the lack of mitigating evidence affected the sentence.
Williams petitioned for a federal writ of habeas corpus. The district court found the sentence invalid based on ineffective assistance of counsel, but the Fourth Circuit reversed. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
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