Corey Allen Trott v. State of Iowa

• Court: Court of Appeals of Iowa
• Decided: April 23, 2025
• Docket: 24-0200
• Status: Published

Opinion

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 24-0200 Filed April 23, 2025

COREY ALLEN TROTT, Applicant-Appellant,

vs.

STATE OF IOWA, Respondent-Appellee. ________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Calhoun County, DeDra Schroeder,

Judge.

Corey Trott appeals the district court’s dismissal of his application for

postconviction relief. AFFIRMED.

Kent A. Simmons, Bettendorf, for appellant.

Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Joshua Henry, Assistant Attorney

General, for appellee.

Considered without oral argument by Ahlers, P.J., Chicchelly, J., and

Bower, S.J.*

*Senior judge assigned by order pursuant to Iowa Code section 602.9206

(2025). 2

BOWER, Senior Judge.

Corey Trott appeals the district court’s dismissal of his second application

for postconviction relief (PCR) as untimely. Trott claims his PCR counsel was

ineffective by failing to argue the 2019 amendment to Iowa Code section 822.3

(Supp. 2019) is unconstitutional. Trott further claims his PCR counsel was

ineffective by failing to argue “previous appellate decisions” have unreasonably

interpreted “the use of the word ‘promptly’” in State v. Allison, 914 N.W.2d 866,

891 (Iowa 2019). Upon our review, we affirm.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings

In 2014, a Calhoun County jury convicted Trott of first-degree murder after

he shot and killed a police officer. The district court entered judgment and

sentenced Trott to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Trott’s conviction

was affirmed on appeal. State v. Trott, No. 14-1608, 2015 WL 9450670, at *1

(Iowa Ct. App. Dec. 23, 2015). Procedendo issued in February 2016.

Trott filed a PCR application later that year, raising claims of ineffective

assistance of counsel. Following a hearing, the district court denied the

application. Trott appealed. A panel of this court affirmed the denial of Trott’s

application, preserving some of his claims for possible further PCR proceedings.

Trott v. State, No. 18-0624, 2019 WL 1300418, at *1 (Iowa Ct. App. Mar. 20, 2019).

Procedendo issued in April 2019.

In January 2020, Trott filed a second PCR application, raising claims of

ineffective assistance of appellate counsel, ineffective assistance of first-PCR

counsel, and prosecutorial misconduct in the first PCR proceeding. The State filed

a motion for summary disposition, arguing Trott’s application was untimely 3

because it was filed nearly four years after procedendo issued on his direct appeal.

See Iowa Code § 822.3 (2020). Trott resisted, arguing dismissal would prevent

him “from accepting the Court of Appeals’ invitation to file another action and more

fully develop the record.”

The district court granted the State’s motion. The court observed at the time

of Trott’s appellate ruling, which “preserved certain issues for subsequent PCR

proceedings,” Allison v. State, 914 N.W.2d 866 (Iowa 2018), “was still good law”;

accordingly, the nine-month delay between procedendo and Trott’s second PCR

application would not meet Allison’s “filed promptly” requirement. The court further

noted Allison was later abrogated by the legislature’s amendment of Iowa Code

section 822.3.1 The court concluded, “So even if the Allison case had not been

abrogated by the amendment to [section] 822.3, the pending postconviction relief

matter was not promptly filed according to case law. Even though issues may have

been preserved in the Court of Appeals ruling, this does not overcome timing

issues.” Trott appeals.

II. Standard of Review

“We typically review postconviction relief proceedings on error.” Ledezma

v. State, 626 N.W.2d 134, 141 (Iowa 2021) (citation omitted)). However, when an

applicant asserts claims of a constitutional nature, such as ineffective assistance

of counsel, our review is de novo. Id.

1 See 2019 Iowa Acts ch. 140, § 34. 4

III. Analysis

On appeal, Trott claims his PCR counsel was ineffective by failing “to argue

that the instant action was timely filed under the state constitutional protections of

Allison.”2 Trott claims by “[u]sing Allison’s formula for calculating the limitations

period, the time that elapsed [after procedendo in the first PCR] before the filing of

the second PCR was only about one year and seven months.” Trott’s claim

focuses on the language that was added as part of the 2019 amendment of

section 822.3: “An allegation of ineffective assistance of counsel in a prior case

under this chapter shall not toll or extend the limitation periods in this section nor

shall such claim relate back to a prior filing to avoid the application of the limitation

periods.” See 2019 Iowa Acts ch. 140, § 34. According to Trott, the amendment

“violates a PCR applicant’s state constitutional right to effective assistance of

counsel.”

This court recently rejected a similar claim. In McCoy v. State, the court

addressed the applicant’s invitation “to find section 822.3 unconstitutional in light

of the discussion in Allison over the entitlement to effective assistance of PCR

counsel.” No. 23-1286, 2025 WL 400745, at *3 (Iowa Ct. App. Feb. 5, 2025). The

court denied the applicant’s request and instead “appl[ied] the language of

section 822.3 as we did before Allison; noting our binding precedent suggests this

application has been consistent with state and federal constitutional law.” Id. at *4

2 We find the record is adequate to address this claim. But see Goode v. State, 920 N.W.2d 520, 526–27 (Iowa 2018) (declining to address a claim that PCR counsel provided ineffective assistance raised for the first time on appeal from the PCR action because, without evidence to support the claim, “the record on appeal [was] inadequate to address the new claim of ineffective assistance of [PCR] counsel”). 5

(citing Lado v. State, 804 N.W.2d 248, 250 (Iowa 2011), and Fuhrmann v. State,

433 N.W.2d 720, 722 (Iowa 1988)). Because “our courts have refused to hold

section 822.3 unconstitutional” for violating an applicant’s right to counsel,3

Johnson v. State, No. 19-1949, 2021 WL 210700, at *4 (Iowa Ct. App. Jan. 21,

2021), accord McCoy, 2025 WL 400745, at *4, Trott’s PCR counsel was not

ineffective for failing to raise this claim, see State v. Hochmuth, 585 N.W.2d 234,

238 (Iowa 1998) (noting “counsel was not ineffective for failing to pursue a

meritless issue”). Considering our resolution of this claim, we need to address

Trott’s additional, sequential issue relating to the application of Allison, in the event

it was not abrogated.

We affirm the district court’s dismissal of Trott’s second PCR application as

untimely.

AFFIRMED.

3 Moreover, as the State notes, Trott only has a statutory right to PCR counsel.

See Lado, 804 N.W.2d at 250.