The following excerpt is from Windham v. Merkle, 163 F.3d 1092 (9th Cir. 1998):
Windham contends that his Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process were violated because the evidence was insufficient to support a finding of murder and attempted murder. Federal habeas corpus relief is available to a petitioner who claims that the evidence was insufficient to support his or her conviction only where, considering the trial record in the light most favorable to the prosecution, "no rational trier of fact could have found proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt." Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 324, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). This standard is applied with reference to the substantive elements of the criminal offense as defined by state law. See id. at 324 n. 16, 99 S.Ct. 2781.
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