Giarratano alleged that he and other death row inmates had a constitutional right to counsel in collateral proceedings challenging their convictions and sentences, and that the state of Virginia was not meeting its obligations to guarantee this right.

The District Court agreed that Virginia was not meeting its constitutional obligations and ordered it to appoint postconviction counsel for indigent death row inmates who sought to file habeas corpus petitions.

[2] The Supreme Court voted 5–4 to reverse the en banc Fourth Circuit on the grounds that, under the circumstances of the case, Virginia had taken adequate steps to make counsel available to indigent death row inmates.

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote an opinion concurring in the judgment only, stating that While Virginia has not adopted procedures for securing representation that are as far reaching and effective as those available in other States, no prisoner on death row in Virginia has been unable to obtain counsel to represent him in postconviction proceedings, and Virginia's prison system is staffed with institutional lawyers to assist in preparing petitions for postconviction relief.

[2]Because all four dissenting justices argued that there was a right to government-appointed counsel in capital postconviction proceedings, and because Kennedy's concurrence also endorsed the existence of this right, some legal commentators have argued that Giarratano did not rule that there was no right to counsel in such proceedings.