Did the Fifth Circuit impose an improper ineffective-assistance-of-counsel standard, which required him to show prejudice, to Barbee's claim that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated by the unauthorized confession of guilt to his jury by his trial counsel?

QUESTIONS PRESENTED In McCoy v. Louisiana, _U.S.___, 138 S. Ct. 1500 (2018) this Court reaffirmed clearly-established principles of client autonomy and that the client is the master of the case in holding that the defendant’s Sixth Amendment rights were violated when trial counsel told the jury that McCoy was guilty, without his permission and against his wishes. This Court also reaffirmed that this was structural error not requiring a showing of prejudice. In this capital case, Stephen Barbee’s lead counsel likewise conceded Barbee’s guilt to the jury during closing argument without his permission. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit denied this claim based on the incorrect standard of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), which required him to show prejudice. A grant of certiorari is needed to correct these errors; to clarify that McCoy is not “new law” but a re-affirmation of the long-standing Sixth Amendment principle that the client is master of the case; and to re-affirm that structural error of this sort does not require a showing of prejudice. This case therefore presents the following questions: 1. Did the Fifth Circuit impose an improper standard, which required him to show prejudice, to Barbee’s claim that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated by the unauthorized confession of guilt to his jury by his trial counsel? 2. Whether structural error, raised in post-conviction proceedings, requires a showing of prejudice? -ii