State of Iowa v. Falon Taris Kapayou

• Court: Court of Appeals of Iowa
• Decided: July 23, 2025
• Docket: 24-1216
• Status: Published

Opinion

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 24-1216 Filed July 23, 2025

STATE OF IOWA, Plaintiff-Appellee,

vs.

FALON TARIS KAPAYOU, Defendant-Appellant. ________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Tama County, Ian K. Thornhill,

Judge.

A defendant appeals her convictions after a conditional guilty plea,

challenging the district court’s denial of her motion to dismiss for an alleged

speedy-indictment violation. AFFIRMED.

Martha J. Lucey, State Appellate Defender, and Shellie L. Knipfer, Assistant

Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Aaron Rogers, Assistant Attorney

General, for appellee.

Considered without oral argument by Greer, P.J., and Langholz and

Sandy, JJ. 2

LANGHOLZ, Judge.

Late in the evening of January 22, 2023, Falon Kapayou was driving within

Meskwaki Settlement—territory of the Meskwaki Nation located near Tama. As

she left the Settlement, she was pulled over by a Meskwaki Nation police officer

for an expired vehicle registration. The officer noticed Kapayou smelled strongly

of alcohol and asked her to perform field sobriety tests and a preliminary breath

test. Kapayou refused. So the officer took her into custody, and a Meskwaki

Nation criminal complaint charged her with operating while intoxicated, third

offense. Kapayou had her initial appearance before the tribal court on January 23.

About nine months later, while the tribal charges were pending, two criminal

complaints were filed in the Iowa District Court for Tama County, charging

Kapayou with operating while intoxicated, third offense, and driving while barred—

both arising from the January 22 event. Kapayou had her initial appearance before

the Iowa district court on October 14.

The State promptly filed a trial information, adding an additional count and

ultimately charging Kapayou with operating while intoxicated, third offense; driving

while barred as a habitual offender; and driving while license revoked or denied.

See Iowa Code §§ 321J.2, 321.561, 321J.21 (2023). In response, Kapayou moved

to dismiss the charges. She argued the speedy-indictment window began running

on January 23, when she was brought before the tribal court for an initial

appearance for essentially the same charges. And she contended that because

the State’s charges were filed well beyond the forty-five-day limitation under

amended Iowa Rule of Criminal Procedure 2.33(2), they should be dismissed. The 3

court denied the motion, reasoning that her appearance before another sovereign

did not start the forty-five-day clock for any offenses charged under Iowa law.

Kapayou then entered a conditional guilty plea to all three charges, wherein

she and the State agreed to preserve the denial of her motion to dismiss. The

court sentenced her to three concurrent terms of incarceration—two years for the

first two counts and one year for the third—with all but seven days suspended.

And she now appeals, arguing she was “denied her right to a speedy indictment.”

We begin by confirming our jurisdiction. Appellate courts have jurisdiction

over a conditional guilty plea reserving an issue for appeal only when “entered by

the court with the consent of the prosecuting attorney and the defendant or the

defendant’s counsel” and “when the appellate adjudication of the reserved issue

is in the interest of justice.” Iowa Code § 814.6(3). Here, Kapayou raised a

speedy-indictment issue in her motion to dismiss, the parties below consented to

reserving the denial of that motion for appeal, and “success on appeal of that issue

would give [Kapayou] some relief.” State v. Scullark, __ N.W.3d __, __, 2025 WL

1717213, at *2 (Iowa 2025). So our interest-of-justice threshold is satisfied.

But that is where our work must end. Although we may have jurisdiction

over an issue within a conditional guilty plea, our ability to reach the merits is still

subject to “our normal rules of error preservation.” State v. McClain, 20 N.W.3d

488, 495 (Iowa 2025) (holding interest-of-justice jurisdiction was satisfied when

party nominally appealed the reserved issues within the conditional guilty plea, but

declining to reach the merits of one issue because the defendant failed to preserve

error). And the arguments Kapayou made in the district court are different than

those she advances on appeal. 4

For starters, Kapayou changes which rule she believes was violated.

Kapayou argued below that the State’s charges violate amended rule 2.33(2),

asserting “the 45-day window began when she was brought in front of the tribal

court and seen by a judge on January 23.” See Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.33(2)(a). But

on appeal, Kapayou abandons that approach and argues that the charges violate

the pre-amendment rule. See Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.33(2)(a) (2022). The distinction

between the two standards is material—different events start the clock. State v.

Harris, 12 N.W.3d 333, 334 (Iowa 2024). While we recognize that under her same-

charges theory either triggering event is outside the forty-five-day window, her

appellate position ultimately rests on a distinct authority and analysis than her

position below. What’s more, she also injects a new claim, arguing for the first

time that because she was pulled over and arrested on state land outside the

Meskwaki Settlement, any initial appearance following arrest should have been

before a state magistrate within twenty-four hours, rather than the tribal court.

Adding “additional ammunition” to arguments on appeal is one thing, but

resting on wholly new arguments is another. See Brodie v. Foxhoven, __ N.W.3d

__, __, 2025 WL 1477818, at *11 (Iowa 2025) (cleaned up). And, at bottom,

Kapayou asks us to answer different questions than those answered by the district

court—whether the charges violate a different rule and whether failure to bring her

before a state magistrate within twenty-four hours of her arrest was lawful. We

thus agree with the State that Kapayou has failed to preserve error for our review.

Even if we could ignore this error-preservation problem, Kapayou’s appeal

runs into another barrier. She cites no authority in support of her position that

being arrested or appearing before one sovereign—for the offense of operating 5

her vehicle within the Settlement while intoxicated—constitutes an arrest by or

initial appearance before the separate sovereign of the State of Iowa—for the

discrete offense of operating her vehicle outside of the Settlement while

intoxicated. And we decline to supply that advocacy for her. See Hyler v. Garner,

548 N.W.2d 864, 876 (Iowa 1996). So her failure to cite authority in support of her

argument waives the issue too. Iowa R. App. P. 6.903(2)(a)(8)(3). We thus affirm

the district court’s denial of Kapayou’s motion to dismiss and her convictions.

AFFIRMED.