Full opinion text
TJOFLAT, Circuit Judge: On December 7, 1983, in the Circuit Court for Talladega County, Alabama, a jury found the Petitioner, John W. Peoples, Jr., guilty on five counts of capital murder. The trial judge accepted the jury’s sentencing recommendations and on January 27, 1984, sentenced Peoples to death on each count. After exhausting his direct-appeal and post-conviction remedies in state court, Peoples applied to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama for a writ of habeas corpus. The district court denied relief, and Peoples now appeals. We affirm. This opinion is organized as follows. In Part I, we recite the facts established by the evidence presented to the jury during Peoples’s trial. Part II recounts the procedural history of the case in the Alabama courts — at the prosecution stage, on direct appeal, and on collateral attack — and in the district court on habeas corpus. Part III states the issues we address and the legal standards we apply in resolving them. In Part IV, we analyze these issues and decide them. Part V briefly concludes. I. In the evening of Wednesday, July 6, 1983, after the sun had gone down, Peoples, accompanied by his younger cousin, Timothy Gooden, drove his Toyota pick-up truck to the lakeside residence of Paul and Judy Franklin in St. Clair County, Alabama. Peoples went there intending to purchase Paul Franklin’s red 1968 Chevrolet Corvette. When the two men arrived, Peoples got out of the pick-up truck and entered the residence. Meanwhile, Goo-den drove off to a nearby store to buy a pack of cigarettes. Gooden returned around 9:30 p.m., and he joined Peoples and the Franklins who were sitting around a table. Peoples soon left the table to look for the Franklins’ ten-year old son, Paul, Jr. He found Paul, Jr. wearing his pajamas and watching television in another part of the house, and he brought him to the table where Gooden and the boy’s parents were sitting. At this point, Peoples asked Paul Franklin to sell him his Chevrolet Corvette. Franklin refused, explaining he wanted to keep the car for his son. Peoples persisted, but to no avail. So, he became angry and left the room. Peoples returned moments later with Paul Franklin’s .22 caliber Winchester rifle and some blankets and ropes. With Goo-den’s help, he gagged and blindfolded Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr., then took Paul Franklin downstairs to the basement, leaving Gooden to keep an eye on Judy and the boy. In a minute or two, Gooden heard a commotion from the basement and started down the stairs with Judy and Paul, Jr. At this point, Judy Franklin nudged Gooden in the side; he removed her gag, and she told him she needed to go to the bathroom. Gooden consented. Once inside the bathroom, Judy Franklin found an eyebrow pencil, scribbled the name “John Peoples” on the lid of the laundry hamper, and covered the lid with clothing. When she left the bathroom, Gooden replaced her gag and blindfold and took her and Paul, Jr. to the basement where they found Paul Franklin lying on the floor by the pool table. He appeared to be dead. Following Peoples’s instructions, Gooden moved the Toyota pick-up truck to the basement door. That done, Peoples and Gooden secured Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr. in the pick-up truck. Peoples then covered Paul Franklin’s body with a blanket and placed it in the Corvette along with Franklin’s Winchester rifle. With Gooden following in the pick-up truck, Peoples drove the Corvette to a wooded area in neighboring Talladega County. After parking, he dragged Paul Franklin’s body into the woods. On returning, he armed himself with the Winchester rifle and took Judy and Paul, Jr. out of the truck. With Judy Franklin screaming and begging for their lives, he pulled them into the woods. There, he murdered them by crushing their skulls with the rifle. Goo-den remained with the Corvette and pickup truck while all of this was taking place. When Peoples had finished, he and Goo-den returned to the Franklin residence and rummaged around the house in search of money. They stayed for ten to fifteen minutes then left. Peoples, driving the Corvette, went to his apartment in the City of Talladega, at the Talladega Downs complex, arriving after midnight. Gooden drove Peoples’s pick-up truck to his home, also located in Talladega. Barbara Eastwood, one of Peoples’s neighbors, was walking toward the Tal-ladega Downs when Peoples arrived at the apartment complex. After Peoples got out of the Corvette, they had a brief conversation about the car, which she had not seen before. He told her that it was an early birthday present for his wife. As they were talking, she noticed what he was wearing — a light colored shirt and blue jeans. A half hour later, around 2:00 a.m., Peoples left his apartment with his wife and drove to Gooden’s home to retrieve his pick-up truck. There, he showed Gooden some cash — in excess of $1,100 — and told him he would “fix him up” later. After a brief conversation, Peoples and his wife departed. Later that morning, Thursday, July 7, the Franklins’ housekeeper of three years, Rosa Lee Truss, arrived at the Franklin residence. She found the front door unlocked and no one at home. Most of the lights in the house and two television sets were on, and the Corvette, which was usually parked in the garage, was missing. As she began her housekeeping chores, “a little voice” told her that something was wrong and to get out of the house. So, she left the residence in a hurry. Mr. Franklin's mother, Rose Franklin, came to the Franklin residence at approximately 2:00 p.m. that day and was surprised to find no one home. After waiting at the house for some time, she became increasingly concerned. She called her other son, Hugh Franklin, in Blakely, Georgia, and Dean Choron, Judy Franklin’s mother, to find out if either knew the whereabouts of the family. Neither had heard from Paul or Judy, so she called the St. Clair County Sheriffs Office to report that the family was missing. That night, at around 8:00 p.m., two deputies in that office, Gary Cone and Jimmy Martin, responding to the phone call, came to the Franklin residence. They looked around the house but saw nothing suspicious. Nonetheless, they radioed a message to the sheriffs office that the Franklin family and their Corvette were missing. Later, when the deputies returned to the sheriffs office, Cone filed an incident report and inputted the Corvette’s license tag number into the National Crime Information Computer (the “NCIC”), which tracks and compiles a list of automobiles reported as stolen or missing. The following evening, Friday, July 8, Investigators Marvin Roye and Ed Traylor of the Alabama Bureau of Investigation (the “ABI”) arrived at the Franklin residence along with Owen Harmon, an investigator in the St. Clair County Sheriffs Office. Rose Franklin and Dean Choron greeted them when they arrived. Among other things, the investigators wanted to know whether they had noticed anything missing other than the Corvette. Both women had looked around the house and felt that everything seemed to be in place; nothing appeared to be missing. The inspectors spent approximately three hours going about the house. When they came to the basement, to the place where the Corvette was usually parked, they noticed a boot print in an oh slick on the floor. The print matched the sole of one of the boots Peoples was wearing the night of July 6, when he and Gooden came to the Franklin residence. Two days later, on Sunday, July 10, with the Franklin family still missing, Roye and Traylor returned to the residence. They discovered John Peoples’s name written on the laundry hamper in the upstairs bathroom. Dean Choron recognized the handwriting as her daughter’s. When Roye asked her if the name John Peoples was familiar to her, she told him that she had heard the name mentioned but had never met the man. Rose Franklin said that a John Peoples had done some work around the house, had borrowed money from her son in the past, and recently had been trying to borrow more money. The next day, Monday, July 11, Paul Wesson, the owner and proprietor of Wesson’s Pharmacy, which was located in Childersburg, Alabama, called the town’s chief of police, Ira Finn. A man was trying to sell Wesson a red 1968 Corvette, and he was interested in buying it. Something about the offer seemed strange, though,.so Wesson decided to call the chief to find out if anything was amiss about the car. Finn was aware that a red 1968 Corvette had been reported as missing on the NCIC. He told Wesson that another police department was looking for a car like the one he was describing and that some of his officers would be arriving at the drug store in a few minutes. Shortly after 1:30 p.m., two squad cars carrying Captain Lewis Finn and Officers Harlow and Watson arrived at the drug store. The Corvette was parked in front of the store; Peoples was inside the store with Wesson. Captain Finn told Peoples why they were there and asked him if he would be willing to come down to the Childersburg police station to discuss the matter. Peoples agreed. He drove the Corvette to the station, with Harlow as a passenger; Finn and Watson drove the squad cars. Meanwhile, Chief Finn notified Investigators Traylor and 'Harmon that a Corvette matching the missing car’s description had been located and that the man possessing it was on his way to see him. Peoples got to the police station at approximately 1:55 p.m. and met with Chief Finn. Peoples told Finn that he had purchased the car from Paul Franklin and produced a handwritten document, which he referred to as a “Bill of Sale,” which reads “I Paul Franklin trade John Peoples one 1968 Corvette for 50 percent ownership of the C.J. Supper Club.” The document bears the following signatures: “Paul G. Franklin, John W. Peoples, and Judy Franklin.” Two sets of figures, also handwritten, appear at the bottom of the document: “1946785406573 and 59A7093 59-5560.” Traylor and Harmon arrived at the police station at 2:15 p.m. and met with Chief Finn for twenty to thirty minutes. After that, they met with Peoples and read him his Miranda rights. They then asked him about the circumstances surrounding his acquisition of the Corvette and the document he had given Chief Finn. At some point during the interview, Traylor asked Peoples if he would give them permission to search the Corvette, his Toyota pick-up truck, and his apartment in Talladega. Peoples agreed and signed a “Permission to Search” form. After he executed the form, Peoples and the two investigators left the police station and rode to the home of Peoples’s parents in Childersburg, where he had left his pick-up truck. The investigators surveyed the truck but found nothing of interest. Next, they headed to Talladega to search Peoples’s apartment. There, Traylor found a box of dirty clothes which contained a light-colored shirt and a pair of blue jeans that appeared to be bloodstained. Peoples was wearing these clothes when he encountered Barbara Easterwood outside the Taladega Downs apartment complex the night of the murders. When Traylor inquired about the stains, Peoples, now visibly upset, explained that they were probably caused by barbecue sauce he spilled while barbecuing on the Fourth of July. Traylor took custody of the shirt and blue jeans (and they were introduced into evidence at Peoples’s trial). On July 13, 1983, law enforcement officers recovered the bodies of the missing Franklins in a wooded area near Talladega County Road No. 377. Sometime around midnight on July 14, or very early the next day, July 15, Traylor and Harmon showed Gooden the blood-stained shirt and blue jeans they had recovered from Peoples’s apartment. They had learned that Goo-den was present when Peoples acquired the Corvette. At this point, Gooden decided to lead them to the location where the bodies had been found on July 13. He took them there shortly after daylight, and he told them how the murders had occurred. The next week, on Tuesday, July 19, Peoples, who had at some point been taken to the Ashville County Jail, gave Neil Woo-dall, a police officer in Ashville, a handwritten note in which he stated that he wanted to see the Sheriff of St. Clair County, Lewis Brown. Brown promptly came to the jail, arriving around 8:30 p.m. Peoples told Brown that he also wanted to speak to the Sheriff of Talladega County, Jerry Studdard, so Brown summoned him to the jail. When Studdard arrived, Peoples told the two sheriffs that he wanted to tell them something. Brown asked him if he wanted an attorney present. Peoples said yes, Ray Robbins. Brown found Robbins’s home telephone number in the telephone book and gave it to Peoples. Peoples dialed the number but received no answer. Brown then asked Peoples if he would like to try another attorney. Peoples suggested George Sims. Brown called information for Sims’s telephone number and gave -it to Peoples. Peoples then said he did not need an attorney; he would “just speak to y’all.” Brown began reading Peoples his Miranda rights, but Peoples interrupted, pointing out that he had “heard those hundreds of times. I probably know more about them than you do.” Brown nevertheless continued reading Peoples his rights. After Peoples acknowledged that he understood his Miranda rights and repeated that he did not want to have an attorney present, he began telling the sheriffs what was on his mind and promptly confessed to the crime. He told the sheriffs where they could find the blanket he used to cover Paul Franklin’s body. He also informed them of the approximate location of the rifle he had used to murder Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr. When he finished, Peoples wrote a brief statement on a waiver of rights form he and the two sheriffs had signed. The statement reads, “The Case I am in I did DO IT Concerning the Franklin Family I did DO IT.” After making this statement, Peoples told the sheriffs -that he felt relieved sharing this information with them. Three days later, on Friday, July 22, 1983, Peoples volunteered to take Terry Brewer and Ricky Daniel, deputies in the Talladega County Sheriffs Office, to the murder weapon which the police had not been able to locate. Daniel immediately read Peoples his Miranda rights from a waiver of rights form, and Peoples signed the form. He also initialed the following statement that Daniel had added to the form: “I already have a Lawyer, but I do not wish to talk to him or have him present with me at this time.” After this, Peoples led Daniel and Brewer to the .22 caliber Winchester rifle he had taken from the Franklin residence on July 6. He had wrapped the rifle in an orange towel and hidden it in some underbrush shortly after committing the murders. The rifle was noticeably bent and damaged. Strands of hair stuck to the rifle’s barrel were “microscopically consistent” with Judy Franklin’s hair. Autopsy findings confirmed that Judy Franklin and Paul, Jr. had died as a result of blunt trauma to the skull; these findings were consistent with the impact a tremendous blow from the rifle would cause. II. A. . On August 3, 1983, a Talladega County grand jury indicted Peoples for the Franklin murders. After the indictment was lodged in the Talladaga County Circuit Court, William A. Short, Jr., a lawyer practicing out of Bessemer, Alabama, filed his appearance as Peoples’s attorney. Short represented Peoples throughout the pretrial, trial and sentencing proceedings in the Talladega County Circuit Court and, after Peoples was convicted and sentenced, prosecuted his appeals to the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals and the Alabama Supreme Court. Short also represented Peoples in his collateral attacks on his convictions and sentences in the Alabama courts. On August 19, Short moved the circuit court to dismiss the indictment on the ground that the State had granted Peoples immunity. Short alleged that, during the period July 13 — 15, an Assistant District Attorney of St. Clair County, Dennis Abbott, had promised Peoples that if he “would give a statement!,] assist law enforcement authorities in locating the bodies of the victims ... and submit to a polygraph examination!,] he would not be further charged in the matter.” Short further alleged that Peoples gave the statement and assisted the police in locating the victims’ bodies, and that he was prepared to take a polygraph examination when the District Attorney of Talladega County, Robert Rumsey, acting for the State of Alabama, revoked Abbott’s offer of immunity. The court held an evidentiary hearing on the motion on October 4, 1983. On October 14, it entered a written order denying the motion. In the order, the court found the following facts: On July 13, Peoples, still insisting that he bought the allegedly stolen Corvette from Paul Franklin and that he had no knowledge of the Franklins’ disappearance, informed an officer at the St. Clair County jail (where he was being detained in connection with his arrest for the theft of the 1968 Corvette) that he wanted to take a polygraph examination. After Peoples discussed the matter with Ray Robbins, his attorney, Robbins met with Dennis Abbott, and they agreed that if Peoples submitted to a polygraph examination and the examination “establish[ed] that he was not involved in the disappearance and murders of the Franklins,” he would be released from custody on the theft charge. On July 15, Peoples, accompanied by Robbins, appeared in Gadsden, Alabama, for the polygraph examination. The examiner told Peoples that he would ask him these questions: “did he take the Franklin family from their house that night; did he hit Judy Franklin in the head last week; were you physically present when Judy Franklin was hit in the head; and do you know for sure who hit Judy Franklin.” At that point, Peoples “said that he was having trouble remembering if he committed the crime.” Then, after the examiner “told [him] that if he lied during the examination the test would show it, [Peoples] refused to take the polygraph examination.” Peoples later “acknowledged ... that the story [he] had told was false.” The court found that “[t]he reason [Peoples] refused to take the polygraph examination was that he knew or believed the examination would show that the story he had been telling that he was not involved in the murders was false and would show that in fact he was involved in the murders.” Assuming that the State .had struck the immunity agreement Peoples alleged it had made, the court found that “his refusal to take the examination amounted to a material breach of the agreement’s terms.” The court concluded its findings with this statement: “none of the ... representatives of the State of Alabama violated any agreement with [Peoples], revoked or attempted to revoke any agreement with [him], or engage[d] in any trickery, deceit, or sharp practices involving him.” On August 19, the same day he moved the court to dismiss the indictment, Short moved the court to suppress “any and all statements and the fruits thereof including physical evidence [Peoples gave] to any law enforcement officer after he was taken to police headquarters in Childersburg” on July 11, 1983. According to Short, the police arrested Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy without probable cause; therefore, what Peoples said and gave (the Bill of Sale) . to Chief Finn and Inspectors Tray-lor and Harmon at the police station, the evidence Traylor and Harmon obtained at his apartment with his consent, and the incriminating evidence he disclosed (including the location of the victims’ bodies and Paul Franklin’s 22. caliber Winchester rifle) after he was taken to the St. Clair County jail and held for the theft of the 1968 Corvette constituted the fruit of a poisonous tree. The court deferred ruling on the motion to suppress until trial. B. The trial began on November 30, 1983. The court entertained Peoples’s motion to suppress during the second and third days of the proceeding. What prompted the hearing was a question the prosecutor put to Investigator Ed Traylor. The prosecutor asked Traylor whether he had a conversation with Peoples on July 11 at the Childersburg Police Station; Short objected, and the court excused the jury. The prosecutor thereafter presented the testimony of the law enforcement officers who had interacted with Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and at the police station. Captain Finn told of encountering Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and asking him to accompany him and Officers Harlow and Watson to the police station to see Chief Finn. They arrived at the police station shortly before 2:00 p.m. and took Peoples to Chief Finn’s office. Chief Finn described what took place next: John — he was asking me why the hell we had him, what we were arresting him for and I told him we did not arrest him. What we was after, I said, “John, see right here in the paper, this car is on the NCIC Machine and it’s also in the paper and I had it wrote down on this big pad on my desk.” I had the tag number and all and I said this car is reported stolen from Pell City, and three members of a family. Peoples responded to what Finn said by throwing down a handwritten document, and exclaiming, ‘Well, by God, I didn’t steal the damn car. I’ve got [this] bill of sale for it.” (The “Bill of Sale” is described in Part I, supra. It was introduced into evidence after the court denied Peoples’s motion to suppress.) Chief Finn looked at the document and said, “well that ain’t too much [of] a bill of sale. It’s not notarized.” In response, Peoples said, “well, I’ve got a goddamn tag receipt” and slammed down another piece of paper on the Chiefs desk. At this point, Chief Finn said, “Well, John, me and you don’t have too much problems.... Now, I do have a warrant on you for a bad check.” Peoples asked, “who in the hell got that?” and Chief Finn answered, “Mr. Dennis out there at the auction barn.” Peoples replied, “Well, I done told that son-of-a-bitch when I was going to pick this check up.” Finn concluded the conversation by telling Peoples, Well me and you don’t have any problems. We are waiting for the ABI [Alabama Bureau of Investigators] to get down here.” When the hearing ended, on December 2, the court read its findings of fact into the record and denied Peoples’s motion to suppress. The court concluded that the police had probable cause on July 11 to arrest Peoples without a warrant for theft of a motor vehicle. However, the court neglected to pinpoint when on July 11 they acquired such probable cause or whether Peoples was arrested before or after Tray-lor and Harmon, having found what appeared to be blood-stained blue jeans and shirt in Peoples’s Talladega apartment, decided to take him to the St. Clair County jail. The court also concluded that Peoples knowingly and voluntarily gave the Bill of Sale to Chief Finn at the police station. The court did not address the question of whether Peoples was in custody at the time — and thus entitled to an advice of rights — apparently because Short’s motion to suppress did not allege that Peoples was in custody when he arrived at Chief Finn’s office and thereafter. In announcing its findings of fact and conclusions of law from the bench, the , court stated that it would enter a written order on the motion. It did so on January 23, 1984. Although the findings of fact and conclusions of law contained in that order were expressed in far greater detail than what the court announced from the bench on December 2, the order echoed the findings of fact and conclusions of law the court made that day. During the hearing on Peoples’s motion to suppress, Short renewed his August 19 motion to dismiss the indictment. He contended once again that the State had breached its promise to give Peoples immunity for having revealed the location of the victims’ bodies and agreeing to a polygraph examination. Short rested his motion on the evidence presented to the court at the October 4 hearing. After hearing further argument on the motion — -which, in essence, replicated the arguments the parties made at the October 4 hearing — the court denied it. Following the court’s denial of Peoples’s motion to suppress, the State continued with its case-in-chief, during which time it introduced some of the tangible evidence that the motion had challenged under the fruit-of-the-poisonous-tree doctrine. After the prosecution rested, the defense called two witnesses, Gooden and Peoples’s mother, Rebecca. Short called Gooden as an adverse witness and, with leading questions, attempted to have him retract the testimony he gave in the State’s case-in-chief — that Peoples had killed the Frank-lins. Gooden did not recant. Rebecca Peoples, though obviously sympathetic to the defendant, could say nothing to rebut the prosecution’s case. The guilt phase of the trial concluded on December 7 with the jury’s verdicts of guilty on all counts. The penalty phase of the case began, and ended, the same day. The State rested its case on the evidence presented during the guilt phase; the defense called four witnesses. They attested to Peoples’s good character and urged the jury to spare Peoples’s life. By a vote of eleven to one, the jury recommended the death penalty on all five counts. On January 27, 1984, the court convened a sentencing hearing. As required by Alabama law, Ala.Code § 13A-5-47 (1975), the court reviewed the jury’s sentencing recommendations and heard argument of counsel. The court thereafter entered its “Findings of Fact in Regard to the Punishment Phase of the Trial.” It found that “the aggravating factors far outweigh the mitigating circumstances” and that the death penalty was the appropriate punishment. Accordingly, the court sentenced Peoples to death on each count of the indictment. C. On February 1, 1984, Peoples moved the court for a new trial. The motion reiterated what Short had asserted (1) in his August 19 motion to dismiss the indictment which was heard on October 4, and (2) in his August 19 motion to suppress evidence which the court considered on December 1-2 during the State’s case-in-chief. The motion also cited some “new evidence” the State had disclosed during the sentencing hearing of January 27. This new evidence concerned an arrest warrant issued by the magistrate of the Childersburg Municipal Court, Ella Williams, on July 12, 1983, which charged Peoples with a misdemeanor — issuing a worthless check on October 12, 1982 to “Dennis Auction” in the amount of $221.68. Someone had changed the warrant’s date to indicate that it issued on July 10 rather than July 12. According to Short, the warrant had a bearing on whether Peoples was under a lawful arrest and in custody at the-time he arrived at the Childersburg police station to meet Chief Finn on July 11. On March 12, 1984, the court held an evidentiary hearing on the motion. What became clear during the hearing was this: When Chief Finn testified at the suppression hearing the previous December, he said that he told Peoples — after he arrived at the jail — that he had a warrant for a bad check Peoples had given “Mr. Dennis at the auction barn.” See supra Part II.B. As it turned out, and as the court found in its written order denying Peoples’s motion for a new trial, the warrant did not issue on July 10; instead, it issued on July 12, the day Ella Williams signed it. She changed the date to July 10 at Chief Finn’s request. In its order, the court found as fact that when Peoples asked if he was being “arrested, Chief Finn told him no.” The court further found that Chief Finn did not have the warrant in his possession on July 11 and could not have arrested Peoples on the bad check charge that day. However, as the court indicated in its order, the back-dated warrant had no bearing on its decision to deny Peoples’s motion to suppress. The court subsequently denied Peoples’s motion for a new trial. D. Peoples appealed his convictions and death sentences to the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals. That court affirmed, Peoples v. State, 510 So.2d 554 (Ala.Crim.App.1986), and the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed as well, Ex parte Peoples, 510 So.2d 574 (Ala.1987). The United States Supreme Court thereafter denied Peoples certiorari review. Peoples v. Alabama, 484 U.S. 933, 108 S.Ct. 307, 98 L.Ed.2d 266 (1987). E. On January 19, 1988, Peoples petitioned the Talladega County Circuit Court for relief from his convictions and sentences pursuant to Rule 20 of the Alabama Rules of Criminal Procedure. His petition contained eleven claims, eight of which the court found to be barred from review at least in part because they “were raised and decided on appeal from Peoples’s eon-viction[s] and death sentenced,]” or “were not raised at trial or on appeal but could have been.” See Peoples v. State, 565 So.2d 1177, 1180, 1181(Ala.Crim.App.1990). The court therefore addressed the merits of only three claims, one of which we consider today: whether Ray Robbins’s pre-indictment performance as Peoples’s attorney deprived Peoples of his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment right to the effective assistance of counsel. Following a two-day evidentiary hearing, the court entered a comprehensive Memorandum Order denying Peoples’s petition. The court of criminal appeals affirmed the circuit court’s decision, id. at 1180, and the Alabama Supreme Court denied certio-rari without opinion. Ex parte Peoples, 1990 Ala. LEXIS 460 (Ala. Jun. 22, 1990). The United States Supreme Court thereafter denied certiorari review. Peoples v. Alabama, 498 U.S. 973, 111 S.Ct. 443, 112 L.Ed.2d 425 (1990). F. On September 6, 1994, having exhausted his state court remedies, Peoples filed the instant petition for habeas corpus relief. His petition contained twenty-six claims of constitutional error. After receiving and considering the State’s response to the petition, the district court concluded that Peoples’s claims were either foreclosed by the state court rulings on the merits or procedurally barred and therefore denied Peoples’s petition without an evidentiary hearing. Peoples thereafter filed a notice of appeal and applied to the district court for a certificate of probable cause (“CPC”) under the version of 28 U.S.C. § 2253 in place before the effective date of the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (“AEDPA”) of 1996, Pub.L. No. 104-132, 110 Stat. 1214 (1996). The district court granted the CPC, and Peoples’s appeal proceeded. In Peoples v. Haley, 227 F.3d 1342, 1347 (11th Cir.2000), we held that the district court erred in issuing a CPC in lieu of a certificate of appealability (“COA”). We therefore vacated the CPC and remanded the case to the district court for the issuance of a COA indicating “which specific issue or issues satisfy” the standard of a “substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right” as required by AED-PA. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2), (3). The district court issued a COA identifying two issues for our review; (1) Whether Peoples was illegally arrested in the early afternoon of July 11, 1983, outside Wesson’s Pharmacy in Childersburg, and, if so, whether the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments required that the evidence obtained as the result of such illegal arrest should have been suppressed; and (2) Whether the Bill of Sale and tag receipt for the 1968 Corvette should have been suppressed on the ground that Chief Finn obtained them from Peoples, while he was “in custody,” without first advising him of his Miranda rights. After obtaining this COA from the district court, Peoples applied to us for a COA on additional issues the district court had rejected. We partially granted his application and issued a COA on the following issues: (3) Whether, as the district court concluded, Peoples procedurally defaulted his claim that the State failed to prove that Paul Franklin was murdered and, if not defaulted, whether the district court should have granted relief on that claim; (4) Whether the district court correctly concluded that Peoples procedurally defaulted his claim that the performance of his trial and appellate counsel, William A. Short, Jr., was constitutionally ineffective and, if not defaulted, whether the claim is legally sufficient and should be remanded for an evidentiary hearing; (5) Whether Peoples procedurally defaulted part of his claim that the performance of his pre-indictment attorney, Ray Robbins, was constitutionally ineffective and, if not defaulted, whether such part should be remanded to the district court for an eviden-tiary hearing; (6) Whether with respect to the non defaulted part of Peoples’s claim that Robbins rendered ineffective assistance, the district court correctly held that at the time Robbins represented Peoples, his constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel with respect to the murder charges had not yet attached. III. As amended by AEDPA, 28 U.S.C. § 2254 states: (d) An application for a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted with respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings unless the adjudication of the claim— (1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or (2) resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding. According to Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412-13, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 1523, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000), Under the “contrary to” clause, a federal habeas court may grant the writ if the state court arrives at a conclusion opposite to that reached by this Court on a question of law or if the state court decides a case differently than this Court has on a set of materially indistinguishable facts. Under the “unreasonable application” clause, a federal habeas court may grant the writ if the state court identifies the correct governing legal principle from this Court’s decisions but unreasonably applies that principle to the facts of the prisoner’s case. The phrase “clearly established Federal law,” as that term appears in section 2254(d)(1), “refers to the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of [the Supreme Court’s] decisions as of the time of the relevant state-court decision.” Id. at 412, 120 S.Ct. at 1523. Furthermore, a habeas petitioner can overcome a state court’s “presumption of correctness” on factual determinations only by coming forth with “clear and convincing evidence.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). As a general rule, in reviewing a district court’s grant or denial of a habeas petition, we review the district court’s findings of fact for clear error, and review de novo both questions of law and mixed questions of law and fact. Nyland v. Moore, 216 F.3d 1264, 1266 (11th Cir.2000). In this case, because the district court “neither held an evidentiary hearing nor made any independent findings of fact[,]” we review its holdings de novo, mindful that “we (like the district court) are reviewing, in essence, [the] decisions] of the courts of [Alabama].” Putman v. Head, 268 F.3d 1223, 1240 (11th Cir.2001). With the foregoing principles in mind, we proceed to the six issues set out in the COA the district court and this court have granted. IV. A. The first issue is whether the action of the Childersburg police in stopping Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and leading him back to the police station on July 11 amounted to an “illegal arrest” in contravention of his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizure because they seized him without a warrant and lacked probable cause to believe that he had committed a felony. If the arrest was illegal, it would appear that the evidence gathered by law enforcement officials subsequent to this “illegal arrest” including (1) the Bill of Sale; (2) the bloodstained shirt and blue jeans; (3) Peoples’s boots; (4) his disclosure of the location of the victims’ bodies and Paul Franklin’s .22 caliber Winchester rifle; and (5) the forensic analysis of physical evidence, should have been suppressed as the fruits of a poisonous tree. See Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963). The first hurdle Peoples must overcome to obtain our resolution of this claim is the well known rule that when “the State has provided an opportunity for full and fair litigation of a Fourth Amendment claim, a state prisoner may not be granted federal habeas corpus relief on the ground that evidence obtained in an unconstitutional search and seizure was introduced at his trial.” Stone v. Powell, 428 U.S. 465, 494, 96 S.Ct. 3037, 3052, 49 L.Ed.2d 1067 (1976) (footnotes omitted). Thus, before we may review the merits of his Fourth Amendment claim, Peoples must demonstrate that the state courts deprived him of a full and fair opportunity to litigate the claim. In Tukes v. Dugger, 911 F.2d 508, 513-14 (11th Cir.1990), we said this in applying Stone: “For a claim to be fully and fairly considered by the state courts, where there are facts in dispute, full and fair consideration requires consideration by the fact-finding court, and at least the availability of meaningful appellate review by a higher state court.” Peoples concedes that the Alabama trial and appellate courts “considered” his Fourth Amendment claim, but he contends that such consideration was not full and fair because the state courts employed “inconsistent” rationales in rejecting the claim. First, as Peoples correctly observes, the circuit court, in denying his motion to suppress, concluded that the police had probable cause to arrest him for theft of the Corvette on July 11, but (as we indicate in Part II.B, supra) failed to indicate precisely when on July 11 such probable cause arose. Second, the court of criminal appeals, in reviewing the circuit court’s denial of Peoples’s motion to suppress, concluded that Peoples was arrested after Investigators Traylor and Harmon found the blood-stained clothing in his Talladega Downs apartment in the late afternoon of July 11- — not hours before that at Wesson’s Pharmacy. Peoples, 510 So.2d at 569. And third, the supreme court concluded that the officers’ interaction with Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy constituted a lawful Terry stop — a holding the circuit court and the court of criminal appeals apparently neither reached nor even considered- — which encompassed Peoples’s trip to the police station, the questions Chief Finn put to him, and his presentment of the Bill of Sale in response to Finn’s statement that they wanted to know why the car was listed on the NCIC. The supreme court agreed with the court of criminal appeals that Peoples’s arrest did not occur until after Traylor and Harmon found the blood-stained clothing in Peoples’s apartment. Peoples cites no authority in support of his argument that he was not afforded a full and fair hearing because the Alabama courts’s analyses of his Fourth Amendment claim were “inconsistent.” He acknowledges, as he should, that the supreme court’s analysis is coherent and that the court examined the relevant evidence step by step. The court began its analysis by reviewing the circumstances of the officers’ engagement with Peoples at Wesson’s Pharmacy and then examined what transpired in Chief Finn’s office. Then, the court examined what took place at Peoples’s Talladega apartment, where the inspectors found the blood-stained clothing. The final element of the Tukes standard is a meaningful appellate review. We have no difficulty in concluding that Peoples obtained meaningful review here. As for the initial element, the record reveals that Peoples had an exhaustive evidentiary hearing of his Fourth Amendment claim on three separate occasions. The first occurred on October 4, 1983. Although the court scheduled the October 4 hearing to take up Peoples’s motion to dismiss the indictment (on the ground that the State had granted him immunity from prosecution), the circumstances of Peoples’s interaction with the police at Wesson’s Pharmacy, Chief Finn at the police station, and Investigators Traylor and Harmon later in the day (in Childersburg, Talladega, and the St. Clair County jail) were presented in considerable detail. The second occasion occurred during trial on December 1 and 2. The third took place on March 12, 1984, when, in considering Peoples’s motion for a new trial, the court resolved the controversy over whether the bad check warrant for Peoples’s arrest was issued on July 10 or July 12. Peoples, therefore, has had ample opportunities to examine his Fourth Amendment claims in state court. In sum, if ever there was a case for the application of the Stone v. Powell doctrine, this is it. See Cardwell v. Taylor, 461 U.S. 571, 572, 103 S.Ct. 2015, 2016, 76 L.Ed.2d 333 (1983) (per curiam) (finding the Stone v. Powell doctrine applicable where the defendant “argued that evidence used in his trial was the product of an illegal arrest”); Dortch v. O’Leary, 863 F.2d 1337, 1342 (7th Cir.1988) (refusing to reverse state court’s Fourth Amendment rulings concerning evidence that was derived from an allegedly illegal arrest because “it is precisely this type of consideration [that] Stone v. Powell precludes.”) (citation and quotation marks omitted); Jones v. Superintendent of Rahway State Prison, 725 F.2d 40, 42 (3d Cir.1984) (holding that “consideration of a claim that evidence admitted at trial was the fruit of an illegal arrest could not be considered on a habeas corpus petition so long as the state courts had afforded a full and fair opportunity to litigate that claim.”). As the district court correctly observed, the doctrine requires that we stay our hand, and we do so. B. The second issue we address assumes that Peoples was not under arrest while he and Chief Finn were discussing his acquisition of the Corvette and asks whether Peoples was nevertheless “in custody” at the time. If Peoples was in custody, Chief Finn was required to advise him of his Miranda rights before the interview began; otherwise, what Peoples told him about the car and the Bill of Sale (which was part and parcel of what Peoples said) were inadmissible. See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). Peoples did not raise this issue in the state courts until he filed his brief to the Alabama Supreme Court after that court granted his petition for a writ of certiora-ri. In his brief, under Issue XIV, Peoples contended that he was in custody while at Chief Finn’s office and that Finn should have advised him of his Miranda rights before asking him any questions (Peoples’s “Miranda claim”). The supreme court did not mention Issue XIV in its opinion affirming the court of criminal appeals judgment, however. After addressing two of the fifteen issues Peoples presented in his brief — whether his “detention on July 11, 1983, by the Childers-burg police amounted to an illegal arrest” and whether the “evidence from the scene where the bodies ... were found should not have been admitted” — the supreme court stated that it had “carefully reviewed the remaining issues,” Ex parte Peoples, 510 So.2d at 575, 577, 578, and had found them insufficient to require the reversal of Peoples’s convictions or sentences. We read this statement to mean that the supreme court both considered and rejected Peoples’s Miranda claim on the merits. Because the supreme court’s opinion gave no indication as to why it denied Peoples’s Miranda claim, the question becomes whether the district court in the first instance, and this court on appeal, should give the supreme court’s decision any deference under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). Specifically, did the supreme court’s denial of Peoples’s Miranda claim constitute an “adjudication” within the meaning of § 2254(d)(1)? If not, the court’s ruling is entitled to no deference. Wright v. Sec’y for the Dep’t of Corr., 278 F.3d 1245 (11th Cir.2002), cert. denied, 538 U.S. 906, 123 S.Ct. 1511, 155 L.Ed.2d 225 (2003), addressed the question we pose: “whether [a] state court’s summary, which is to say unexplicated, rejection of the federal constitutional issue qualifies as an adjudication under § 2254(d) so that it is entitled to deference[,]” and answered it as follows, “all that is required [to accord the state court’s decision deference] is a rejection of the claim on the merits, not an explanation.” Id. at 1254-55. The Supreme Court of Alabama rejection of Peoples’s Miranda claim therefore qualifies as an adjudication on the merits. See Ex parte Peoples, 510 So.2d at 575, 577, 578. The district court’s task, then, in considering this claim was to determine whether the supreme court’s rejection of the claim constituted a “decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts.... ” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1),(2). When it ruled on Peoples’s habeas petition, the district court did not have the benefit of our Wright decision. The court therefore answered for itself the question of whether Peoples was in custody while in Chief Finn’s office and, thus, whether Finn should have advised him of his Miranda rights. The court looked to the record of the evidentiary hearings held by the trial court on Peoples’s motions to dismiss the indictment, to suppress evidence, and for a new trial- — as well as the opinions of the court of criminal appeals and the supreme court — for the factual basis it needed to decide whether Peoples was in custody. First, the district court accepted the supreme court’s finding that Peoples was not arrested until sometime after he left the Childersburg police station in the afternoon of July 11. Second, the court agreed with the finding of all of the Alabama courts that Chief Finn told Peoples that he was not under arrest. Weighing the circumstances as a whole, the district court found that Peoples “was not under arrest nor was there a ‘restraint on his freedom of movement of the degree associated with a formal arrest’ when he produced the bill of sale to Chief Finn.” Finally, applying the test established by the Supreme Court in Thompson v. Keohane, 516 U.S. 99, 101, 116 S.Ct. 457, 460, 133 L.Ed.2d 383 (1995), the court concluded that Peoples was not in custody; hence, a Miranda warning was not required. We agree with the district court’s Thompson analysis of Peoples’s Miranda claim. In Thompson, the Supreme Court held that two inquiries are essential to the determination of whether a person is “in custody” for Miranda purposes. The first examines “the circumstances surrounding the interrogation[,]” Thompson, 516 U.S. at 112, 116 S.Ct. at 465; the second is whether a reasonable person would have felt that he was “at liberty to terminate the interrogation and leave.” Id. With respect to the first inquiry, the circumstances surrounding Peoples’s initial encounter with officers at Wesson’s Pharmacy and his subsequent meeting with Chief Finn fell far short of the level of “governmental coercion” that lies at the center of Fifth Amendment-based, Miranda concerns. See Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157, 170, 107 S.Ct. 515, 523, 93 L.Ed.2d 473 (1986) (“The sole concern of the Fifth Amendment, on which Miranda was based, is governmental coercion.”). The Alabama Supreme Court found that Peoples voluntarily went to the Childersburg Police Department to discuss the red 1968 Corvette after he was told by Captain Lewis Finn that the car had been reported on the NCIC used to track missing or stolen cars. Peoples drove himself to the police station, albeit with an officer accompanying him in the passenger seat, Ex parte Peoples, 510 So.2d at 576, and he parked the car in a lot adjacent to the station. Shortly after Peoples arrived at the station, Chief Finn told him that he was not under arrest. Id. Although a police officer’s subjective view concerning whether an individual who is being questioned is in custody generally does not bear upon the question whether the individual is in custody for purpose of Miranda, it is relevant where the officer conveys such knowledge or belief to the individual being questioned. Stansbury v. California, 511 U.S. 318, 325, 114 S.Ct. 1526, 1530, 128 L.Ed.2d 293 (1994) (per curiam) (holding that an officer’s subjective beliefs are relevant to the extent they affect how a reasonable person in the petitioner’s situation would perceive whether he or she was free to leave or end the interview). These circumstances, as presented in the state courts’s findings, indicate that a reasonable person in Peoples’s situation would not have felt restrained or “deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way.” Miranda, 384 U.S. at 444, 86 S.Ct. at 1612. Chief Finn had known Peoples all of Peoples’s life; the grandfather of Mrs. Finn (Chief Finn’s wife) was the brother of one of Peoples’s grandfathers, and Peoples’s parents lived in Childersburg, a small town of less than 5,000 inhabitants. Peoples had a habit of issuing bad checks, and when they came to Chief Finn’s attention — because the check’s recipient got a warrant for Peoples’s arrest — Finn would call Peoples’s father and the check would be covered. Under the circumstances, Peoples had no reason to believe that his “freedom of action” was limited as a result of duress imposed by governmental coercion. What Peoples did shortly after leaving Chief Finn’s office bears this out. Answering the telephone call from his attorney, Ray Robbins, Peoples told Robbins that he did not need his assistance because he and the police were merely discussing the car he had purchased from his friend, Paul Franklin. At most, the actions of the Childersburg police in the early afternoon of July 11 constituted “traditional investigatory functions of police where the compulsive atmosphere triggering Miranda is absent.” Sullivan v. Alabama, 666 F.2d 478, 482 (11th Cir.1982) (quotation marks omitted). Peoples was not compelled to remain at the station, nor, as his phone conversation with his attorney reveals, did he feel under constraint or duress. Instead, he willingly spoke with Chief Finn and voluntarily produced the Bill of Sale shortly upon his arrival. In Sullivan, we found that the appellant was not in custody, and therefore not entitled to Miranda warnings, where a police officer’s “initial inquiry was merely an attempt to investigate and probe the situation,” and the appellant “remained at the station of his own accord and freely answered the questions asked of him.” Id. at 482. This reasoning applies with similar force to Peoples’s claim before us, particularly since Peoples knew from Chief Finn that he was not under arrest when he volunteered to provide Finn with information about the Corvette. Because Peoples’s interactions with the police officers prior to his disclosure of the purported Bill of Sale fall far short of resembling “a formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement of the degree associated with a formal arrest,” Peoples’s rights under the Fifth Amendment were not violated. California v. Beheler, 463 U.S. 1121, 1125, 103 S.Ct. 3517, 3520, 77 L.Ed.2d 1275 (1983) (quotation marks omitted). Hence, the Alabama Supreme Court correctly rejected Peoples’s claim. Moreover, we could hardly say that the supreme court’s decision “resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. 2254(d)(1); see Beheler, 463 U.S. at 1125, 103 S.Ct. 3517, 77 L.Ed.2d 1275 (holding that defendant was not in custody for Miranda purposes when police told him he was not under arrest even though the police questioned him at the police station). We therefore affirm the district court’s denial of Peoples’s Miranda claim. C. The third issue to be addressed concerns the district court’s ruling that Peoples procedurally defaulted his claim that the State failed to prove that Paul Franklin was murdered. In Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 324, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2791-92, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979), the Supreme Court stated, in a challenge to a state criminal conviction brought under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 — if the settled procedural prerequisites for such a claim have otherwise been satisfied — the applicant is entitled to habeas corpus relief if it is found that upon the record evidence adduced at the trial no rational trier of fact could have found proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Peoples concedes that he failed to satisfy the “procedural prerequisites” for his Jackson claim by not challenging the sufficiency of the evidence on the Paul Franklin murder counts before the Alabama appellate courts when he appealed his convictions. He attempts to circumvent this procedural default by contending that permitting his conviction for Paul Franklin’s murder to stand would amount to a “fundamental miscarriage of justice” and “the conviction of one who is actually innocent [of the murder].” Murray v. Carrier, 477 U.S. 478, 495-96, 106 S.Ct. 2639, 2649, 91 L.Ed.2d 397 (1986). The district court concluded that the circumstantial evidence adduced at Peoples’s trial demonstrated that Peoples was not “actually innocent” of Paul Franklin’s murder. The court focused on the following evidence: Peoples gagged and blindfolded Mrs. Franklin and Paul Franklin, Jr. and then took Mr. Franklin downstairs. Following a “commotion” downstairs, Gooden (the accomplice and co-defendant) took Mrs. Franklin and Paul Franklin, Jr. downstairs where he found Mr. Franklin lying prone on the floor. Gooden and Peoples then drove the Franklins to the wooded area in Tallade-ga County. After dragging Mr. Franklin into the woods and then leading his wife and child into the woods, as well, the overwhelming evidence showed that Peoples proceeded to brutally murder Mrs. Franklin and Paul Franklin, Jr. Although the exact cause of death of Mr. Franklin was never determined, significant circumstantial evidence exists to support the theory that Peoples was actually guilty as opposed to actually innocent of the murder of Paul Franklin, Sr. Peoples v. Haley, No. 98-6882, mem. op. at 32 (N.D.Ala. Sept. 30, 1998) (emphasis in the original). We find no error in the district court’s conclusion that the evidence presented to the jury during Peoples’s trial was sufficient to convict Peoples of Paul Franklin’s murder. In Jackson’s language, Peoples has not shown that “upon the record evidence adduced at trial no rational trier of fact could have found proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.” 443 U.S. at 324, 99 S.Ct. at 2791-92. The district court’s rejection of Peoples’s Jackson claim is therefore affirmed. D. The next issue we address concerns Peoples’s claim that the performance of his attorney, William A. Short, Jr., in preparing for trial, at trial, and on appeal, failed to satisfy the Sixth Amendment’s effective-assistance-of-counsel standard set forth in Strickland v. Washington, 466. U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984). The district court found the claim procedurally barred and thus refused to entertain it on the merits because (1) Peoples failed to bring the claim to the attention of the Alabama courts; (2) Rule 20 would preclude the Alabama courts from considering the claim at the time Peoples filed the instant habeas petition; and (3) Peoples had not established a lawful basis for excusing the default. Peoples concedes point (2) but questions the district court’s rulings on points (1) and (3). As we explain in the ensuing discussion, the district court erred in concluding that Peoples procedurally defaulted his claim. We reach this holding not because we agree with Peoples — that he presented the claim to the Alabama courts — but because the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals declined to enforce the procedural default rule that applies in Rule 20 proceedings. Peoples contends that “a close reading” of the court of criminal appeals opinion, which affirmed the circuit court’s denial of his Rule 20 petition, reveals that he presented his ineffective assistance claim to the Alabama courts. He cites the following statement from the court of criminal appeals opinion in support: [Peoples,] in addition to the matters which were set forth in the original trial, sought to assert that his trial counsel was inadequate and ineffective as a matter of law and, secondly, that trial counsel failed to properly raise the issues on original direct appeal and that he, therefore, was not effectively represented on appeal of the original conviction. Peoples, 565 So.2d at 1179. This statement, if established by the record before the court of criminal appeals, appears to vindicate Peoples’s position. The problem, however, is that there is no record support for the statement. We begin with Peoples’s Rule 20 petition. The petition, which was drafted and filed by Short, contained eleven claims. The circuit court dismissed seven of the claims on the ground that they were barred from review because they had been raised and decided in Peoples’s appeal of his convictions, and it dismissed one of the claims because it should have been raised at trial or on direct appeal. Id. at 1180-81. The court dismissed the three remaining claims on the merits following an evi-dentiary hearing. Id. at 1181-86. One of those claims challenged the representation Ray Robbins provided Peoples between the evening of July 11 (after Peoples had been arrested for theft of the Corvette and taken to the St. Clair County jail) and July 19 (when Peoples confessed to Sheriffs Brown and Studdard at the Ashville County Jail). However, none of the claims challenged the representation Short provided Peoples in the trial court or on appeal. Nevertheless, because it is possible that the issue of Short’s performance arose during the evidentiary hearing, we examine the record of that hearing. After it received the Rule 20 petition, the State filed a motion with the circuit court requesting that the court advise Peoples of his right to bring an ineffective assistance of counsel claim against Short. At the hearing, Short addressed the State’s motion and stated that he had no qualms with the court asking Peoples if he was satisfied with his performance. The court then informed Peoples of his Sixth Amendment rights and explained that a claim challenging Short’s performance would apply “just for the trial and for the appeal up to the time the U.S. Supreme Court said they weren’t going to hear your case.” The court next asked Peoples if he was unsatisfied with Short’s representation. Peoples replied that he had no problem with Short’s performance up until that point and that he wanted Short to continue as his attorney. When the court asked, “So, you want to go forward with Mr. Short as your lawyer? You are not going to raise this Rule 20 Motion which is relative to ineffective counsel relative to Mr. Short on all the proceedings we’ve had up until now?” Peoples responded, “No, sir.” The court then stated, “You’re satisfied with him? Then the Court is satisfied with him.” Peoples responded, “Yes, sir. Most definitely.” With the exception of the State’s brief and Peoples’s colloquy with the circuit judge, the record of the Rule 20 proceeding in the circuit court contains no reference to the constitutional adequacy of Short’s performance. Neither does the Memorandum Opinion that accompanied the circuit court order denying Peoples Rule 20 relief. And there is nothing in the brief Short filed with the court of criminal appeals to indicate that Peoples was somehow troubled with his representation at the trial and appellate stages of the criminal prosecutio