Felix Stroud Hammontree v. C. Paul Phelps, Director, Louisiana Department of Corrections, Respondent

WISDOM, Circuit Judge:

We skate on thin ice. This habeas case involves a statutory presumption in a criminal action, an interpretation of the statute by the Louisiana Supreme Court, and the propriety of the state trial court’s instructions on the “presumption”.1 The ice was thinned by a recent major decision of the Supreme Court, County Court of Ulster County v. Allen, 1979, - U.S. -, 99 S.Ct. 2213, 60 L.Ed.2d 777. In explication of the decision, the associate justices divided four-four. The Chief Justice concurred fully in the opinion for the Court but found on the facts that it was…