Michael Stephen Combs v. Nathan Gaughan, Warden

In Combs v. Broomfield, the Ninth Circuit held that the California Supreme Court could reasonably have determined that trial counsel did not render deficient performance at the penalty phase under Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), when investigators abandoned the search for Combs’s biological mother after tracing her to Texas, but stopping due to time and financial constraints. Post-conviction investigation located her and obtained evidence that Combs had a family history of mental illness and suffered prenatal exposure to alcohol, amphetamines, and other drugs, resulting in fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. This evidence, which was not presented to the jury, would have rebutted the prosecution’s argument that Combs was not actually mentally ill and explained the brain damage his trial experts identified. The question presented is: Does the Ninth Circuit’s decision conflict with this Court’s decisions in Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362 (2000), Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510 (2003), and Rompilla v. Beard, 545 U.S. 374 (2005), which require capital defense counsel to conduct a thorough investigation?