The failure of a state appellate court to mention a federal claim does not mean that the claim has not been presented to it. The petitioner had argued in state appellate courts and in federal habeas petitions that the state prosecutor had engaged in flagrant misconduct. A federal appellate panel denied habeas relief on the ground that the claim had not been fairly presented to the state court, noting that the appellate brief was not in the record so the court was unable to determine how the petitioner had framed the issue. The panel thus relied on the fact that the state court’s written opinion did not address the issue on federal grounds. The United States Supreme Court reversed, noting ted that contrary to the appellate court’s findings, the record did include the appellate brief in question, and that the brief framed the prosecutorial misconduct issue in terms of a federal due process violation under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Thus, the federal issue was adequately raised in the state court and the appellate panel erred in denying relief on that basis.