Per Curiam SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES JEFFERSON S. DUNN, COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS v. MATTHEW REEVES ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT No. 20–1084. Decided July 2, 2021

PER CURIAM. Willie Johnson towed Matthew Reeves’ broken-down car back to the city after finding Reeves stranded on an Ala- bama dirt road. In payment for this act of kindness, Reeves murdered Johnson, stole his money, and mocked his dying spasms. Years after being convicted of murder and sen- tenced to death, Reeves sought state postconviction relief, arguing that his trial counsel should have hired an expert to develop sentencing-phase mitigation evidence of intellec- tual disability. But despite having the burden to rebut the strong presumption that his attorneys made a legitimate strategic choice, Reeves did not call any of them to testify. The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals denied relief, stressing that lack of evidence about counsel’s decisions im- peded Reeves’ efforts to prove that they acted unreasonably. Reeves v. State, 226 So. 3d 711, 750–751 (2016). On federal habeas review, the Eleventh Circuit held that this analysis was not only wrong, but indefensible. In an unpublished, per curiam opinion that drew heavily on a dis- sent from denial of certiorari, the Eleventh Circuit reinter- preted the Alabama court’s lengthy opinion as imposing a simple per se prohibition on relief in all cases where a pris- oner fails to question his counsel. Reeves v. Commissioner, Ala. Dept. of Corrections, 836 Fed. Appx. 733, 744–747 (2020). It was the Eleventh Circuit, however, that went astray in its “readiness to attribute error.” Woodford v. Vis- ciotti, 537 U. S. 19, 24 (2002) (per curiam). Federal habeas 2 DUNN v. REEVES

Per Curiam courts must defer to reasonable state-court decisions, 28 U. S. C. §2254(d), and the Alabama court’s treatment of the spotty record in this case was consistent with this Court’s recognition that “the absence of evidence cannot overcome the strong presumption that counsel’s conduct fell within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance.” Burt v. Titlow, 571 U. S. 12, 23 (2013) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted). I In November 1996, Reeves and some friends decided to “go out looking for some robberies. ” Reeves, 226 So. 3d, at 719 (internal quotation marks omitted). The group’s initial target was a drug dealer in a nearby town, but their car broke down and left them stranded on the side of the road. A few hours later, however, Johnson happened to drive by in his truck and offered to tow the disabled vehicle to Reeves’ house. After they arrived, Reeves, who was riding in the bed of the truck, stuck a shotgun through the rear window of the cab and shot Johnson in the neck. As Johnson sat slumped in the driver’s seat “bleeding heavily and making gagging noises,” Reeves directed the rest of the group to “go through Johnson’s pockets to get his money.” Id., at 720 (internal quotation marks omitted). Throughout the rest of the day, Reeves repeatedly “brag[ged] about having shot Johnson,” boasting that the murder “would earn him a ‘teardrop,’ a gang tattoo acquired for killing someone.” Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted). And at a party that night, Reeves invented a dance in which he “pretend[ed] to pump a shotgun” and “jerk[ed] his body around in a manner mock- ing the way that Willie Johnson had died.” Ibid. (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). Alabama charged Reeves with murder and appointed counsel for him. His attorneys took several steps to develop mitigating evidence, including exploring the possibility that Cite as: 594 U. S. ____ (2021) 3

Per Curiam Reeves was intellectually disa