The Postconviction Litigation Division defends state felony convictions and sentences against constitutional challenge in federal court. The division's attorneys, representing the Director of the Correctional Institutions Division of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (the inmates' custodian), provide briefing and argument to the federal courts that hear these challenges. The division's attorneys and staff also investigate cases, including thorough review of the record from state court proceedings, and conduct evidentiary hearings when warranted in a case. The division's attorneys appear regularly in federal district courts throughout Texas, in the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and the Supreme Court of the United States. Capital litigation attorneys handle petitions for certiorari review on direct appeal from the Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas and federal habeas corpus challenges from the federal district court through the Supreme Court.