California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Branch, D067450 (Cal. App. 2015):
"The standards for ineffective assistance of counsel claims are well established. 'We presume that counsel rendered adequate assistance and exercised reasonable professional judgment in making significant trial decisions.' [Citation.] To establish a meritorious claim of ineffective assistance, defendant 'must establish either: (1) As a result of counsel's performance, the prosecution's case was not subjected to meaningful adversarial testing, in which case there is a presumption that the result is unreliable and prejudice need not be affirmatively shown [citations] or (2) counsel's performance fell below an objective standard of reasonableness under prevailing professional norms, and there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional errors . . . or omissions, the trial would have resulted in a more favorable outcome.' " (People v. Prieto (2003) 30 Cal.4th 226, 261 (Prieto).)
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