State of Iowa v. Dallas Dean Hoffman

• Court: Court of Appeals of Iowa
• Decided: May 22, 2024
• Docket: 23-0865
• Status: Published

Opinion

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 23-0865 Filed May 22, 2024

STATE OF IOWA, Plaintiff-Appellee,

vs.

DALLAS DEAN HOFFMAN, Defendant-Appellant. ________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Boone County, John R. Flynn,

Judge.

Dallas Hoffman appeals his convictions after a jury found him guilty of four

counts of second-degree sexual abuse. AFFIRMED.

Cathleen J. Siebrecht of Siebrecht Law Firm, Pleasant Hill, for appellant.

Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Katherine Wenman, Assistant Attorney

General, for appellee.

Considered by Ahlers, P.J., and Chicchelly and Buller, JJ. 2

CHICCHELLY, Judge.

Dallas Hoffman appeals his convictions after a jury found him guilty of four

counts of second-degree sexual abuse. He challenges the sufficiency of the

evidence supporting his convictions. Because substantial evidence supports the

jury’s verdicts, we affirm Hoffman’s convictions.

We review claims of insufficient evidence for correction of errors at law.

State v. Cook, 996 N.W.2d 703, 708 (Iowa 2023). We affirm if substantial evidence

supports the jury’s verdicts. Id. Evidence is substantial if it would “convince a

rational trier of fact the defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. (citation

omitted). When determining whether substantial evidence supports the verdicts,

we view the evidence and all legitimate inferences and presumptions it supports in

the light most favorable to the State. Id.

The State charged Hoffman with four counts of second-degree sexual

abuse, a class “B” felony. It alleged that Hoffman performed sex acts on a child

younger than fourteen years old between January 1, 2022, and July 22, 2022,

when Hoffman was over thirty years old. The trial information described four

different sex acts. Count I alleged contact between Hoffman’s genitalia and the

child’s mouth. Count II alleged contact between Hoffman’s genitalia and the child’s

genitalia. Count III alleged contact between the child’s finger, hand, or other body

part and Hoffman’s genitalia. Finally, Count IV alleged that Hoffman ejaculated on

the child.

Hoffman contends there is insufficient evidence showing he engaged in any

of the sex acts described in the trial information. He argues that there is “no

specific and articulable evidence as to each separate and distinct act presented by 3

the State.” Hoffman also claims that “the evidence was insufficient as to specific

timeframes when the acts allegedly occurred.”

The evidence shows that Hoffman shared a home with the child and her

father in July 2022. Late that month, the child disclosed to a friend that Hoffman

had sexually abused her. Hoffman denied the allegations in recorded phone calls

with the child’s father and stated there was no reason his DNA would be in the

child’s bedding. During a recorded interview with police, Hoffman again denied

the allegations but claimed his DNA could be in the child’s bedding if his hair was

transferred by their pet dogs. A DNA test identifying Hoffman’s sperm in seminal

fluid on the child’s bedding was admitted into evidence at trial, along with the

recorded phone calls and police interview.

The child was ten years old when she testified at trial and described how

Hoffman sexually abused her when they shared a home. She told the jury that

Hoffman touched her vagina and touched his penis to her chest and hand. The

child also testified that Hoffman tried to put his penis in her mouth. Although he

did not succeed, the child testified that there was contact between Hoffman’s penis

and her mouth. Finally, the child described that Hoffman ejaculated on her chest

and clothes.1

An inmate in Hoffman’s jail unit also testified at trial, recounting a

conversation he had with Hoffman. The inmate alleged that Hoffman said “he used

to rub the little girl on himself and touch her and they would touch each other.” The

1 Iowa Code section 702.17(4) defines “[e]jaculation onto the person of another”

as a “sex act” or “sexual activity.” Among the definitions provided in section 702.17, paragraph (4) is the only one that does not require direct contact between bodies or substitutes. 4

inmate also testified that Hoffman admitted “he ejaculated on her a couple of times

by rubbing her.”

Hoffman testified in his own defense, denying the abuse allegations. To

explain the presence of his sperm on the child’s bedding, Hoffman claimed that he

had sex with a woman on a couch where the child left her blanket. This explanation

was not offered during the recorded phone calls or police interview.

There is sufficient evidence to convince a rational juror that Hoffman is guilty

beyond a reasonable doubt of committing each count of sexual abuse. The child

did not provide specific dates on which each sex act took place, but the State is

not required to prove specific dates. See State v. Griffin, 386 N.W.2d 529, 532–

33 (Iowa Ct. App. 1986) (holding that neither the statute nor our case law require

proof of a particular date to support a second-degree-sexual-abuse conviction).

The child’s description of where she lived when the incidents occurred limits the

timeframe of the abuse to the period alleged in the trial information. The child

described how Hoffman committed the sex acts described in each of the four

counts. Although Hoffman criticizes the child’s statements as uncorroborated, no

corroboration is required. See Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.21(3) (“Corroboration of the

testimony of victims shall not be required.”). Still, the test result showing the

presence of Hoffman’s sperm on the child’s bedding supports her testimony. While

Hoffman provided an alternative explanation for how it got there, it is the job of the

jury to decide witness credibility, weigh the evidence, and resolve any factual

disputes. State v. Mathis, 971 N.W.2d 514, 519 (Iowa 2022). It is the job of the 5

appellate court to view the evidence in the light most favorable to the State. 2 See

id. (“In considering a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence, ‘[i]t is not the

province of the court . . . to resolve conflicts in the evidence, to pass upon the

credibility of witnesses, to determine the plausibility of explanations, or to weigh

the evidence; such matters are for the jury.’” (citation omitted)).

Because substantial evidence supports the jury’s verdicts, we affirm.

AFFIRMED.

2 Hoffman argues that we give limited deference to the jury’s findings when based

only on victim testimony that is “inconsistent, self-contradictory, [and] lacking in experiential detail.” State v. Smith, 508 N.W.2d 101, 103 (Iowa Ct. App. 1993). In recent decisions, this court recognized the supreme court and panels of this court have criticized Smith and that it is an outlier case we have never followed to reverse a conviction. See State v. Hagenow, No. 22-1958, 2024 WL 2042137, at *5 (Iowa Ct. App. May 8, 2024); State v. Showers, No. 23-0390, 2024 WL ________, at ___ (Iowa Ct. App. May 22, 2024). In any event, the child’s testimony here is more detailed than the children’s testimony in Smith, and Smith does not control.