In the case of Jimmie Burden, Jr. v. Walter Zant, Warden (1990), the United States Supreme Court was asked to consider whether a Georgia state court had violated Burden's constitutional rights by denying him an evidentiary hearing on his claim that he received ineffective assistance of counsel during his trial for murder and armed robbery. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Zant, upholding the decision made by lower courts which denied Burden’s petition for habeas corpus relief without conducting an evidentiary hearing on his claims about inadequate legal representation at trial. The high court found no violation of due process as it concluded that there were no factual disputes regarding the performance or competence of Burden’s defense attorney necessitating such a hearing.

In the dissenting opinion for Jimmie Burden, Jr. v. Walter Zant, Warden, Justice Marshall argued that the majority's decision to deny habeas corpus relief was incorrect and unjust. He contended that Burden had been denied his constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel during his trial because his lawyer failed to investigate or present mitigating evidence at sentencing phase which could have potentially spared him from death penalty. This failure by defense counsel constituted ineffective representation under Strickland v Washington standard according to Justice Marshall’s interpretation of it; hence he believed a new sentencing hearing should be granted where such evidence can be presented properly before jury makes its determination on life or death sentence.