The Anti-Te rrorism and Effe ctive De ath Penalty Act (A EDPA) re quires a f ederal habe as
corpus c ourt to g ive substantial defe rence to the finding s and conc lusions of a state cour t that has
revie wed a post-conviction petitioner's c laim of ineff ective a ssistance of c ounsel. Must the
federal court, howeve r, accept that tria l counsel's pe rformance was a dequate simply beca use trial
counsel testified his per formanc e was adequa te and the sta te post-conviction cour t found counsel
to be cr edible?

Whether the federal court must accept that trial counsel's performance was adequate simply because trial counsel testified his performance was adequate and the state post-conviction court found counsel to be credible