Jesse Bonvillain v. Frank Blackburn, Warden, Louisiana State Penitentiary and William J. Guste, Jr., Attorney General, State of Louisiana

GARWOOD, Circuit Judge:

Jesse Bonvillain appeals the denial of his habeas corpus petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, challenging his Louisiana conviction and sentence for forcible rape. Petitioner, who had been charged with the more serious offense of aggravated rape, pleaded guilty to forcible rape pursuant to a plea bargain, and was sentenced to seventeen years’ confinement. At that time he was on parole after serving five years of an earlier Louisiana rape conviction for which he had received a twenty-year sentence that had been commuted to fifteen years.

Petitioner’s principal claim is that…