State of Iowa v. Vanessa Renae Gale

• Court: Supreme Court of Iowa
• Decided: May 16, 2025
• Docket: 23-1786
• Status: Published

Opinion

In the Iowa Supreme Court

No. 23–1786

Submitted March 26, 2025—Filed May 16, 2025

State of Iowa,

Appellee,

vs.

Vanessa Renae Gale,

Appellant.

On review from the Iowa Court of Appeals.

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Scott County, Christine Dalton

(motion to suppress), district associate judge, and Phillip J. Tabor (bench trial),

senior district associate judge.

A defendant seeks further review of a court of appeals decision affirming

her conviction and sentence for possession of a controlled substance, second

offense. Decision of Court of Appeals Affirmed in Part and Vacated in Part;

District Court Judgment Affirmed in Part, Reversed in Part, and Case

Remanded.

McDermott, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which all justices

joined.

Martha J. Lucey, State Appellate Defender, and Ella M. Newell, Assistant

Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Katherine Wenman, Assistant

Attorney General, for appellee. 2

McDermott, Justice.

Vanessa Gale consented to a trial on the minutes of testimony and was

sentenced for second-offense possession of a controlled substance and second-

offense possession of marijuana. The problem? It was only her first offense. In

the district court, the State presented evidence from an online court summary

that, it turns out, misstated the nature of Gale’s prior conviction. On appeal,

both the State and Gale recognize the error and ask us to remand for

resentencing. The court of appeals held that the district court reasonably relied

on the inaccurate court summary and that the court of appeals could not take

judicial notice of filings in Gale’s prior case as a basis for resentencing. We

granted Gale’s application for further review of the court of appeals decision.

Gale was at a convenience store late one night in Davenport when she

encountered Romaro Houston. Gale and Houston walked outside together and

got in Gale’s car. Gale pulled out of her parking spot next to the store and parked

next to one of the store’s gas pumps. Unbeknownst to Gale and Houston, an

undercover Davenport police officer was following Houston, and two uniformed

officers were on their way to arrest Houston. When the officers arrived, they

approached Gale’s car while parked at the gas pump. Their interactions with

Gale and Houston led to a search of Gale’s body and her purse. The search

uncovered cash, four small tablets of methamphetamine, and about forty grams

of marijuana.

Gale was arrested and charged under Iowa Code § 124.401(5) (2022) with

one count of possession of a controlled substance for the methamphetamine and

one count of possession of marijuana. The trial information alleged that this was

her second offense for each count. Section 124.401(5) provides distinct levels of

punishment based on the person’s number of “predicate offenses”—referring to 3

earlier convictions that can enhance the sentence imposed for a later conviction.

See id.

Gale filed a motion to suppress the evidence uncovered during the search,

challenging both the stop of her vehicle and the search of her person and purse.

She argued that the police officer unlawfully seized her during the initial stop,

and that even if the initial stop was lawful, the officer lacked a lawful basis to

search her afterward. The district court denied her motion to suppress.

Gale ultimately consented to a trial on the minutes of testimony. See Iowa

R. Crim. P. 2.17(2). During its colloquy with Gale, the district court confirmed

with Gale that the court would consider the minutes of testimony in her trial.

Gale confirmed that she had reviewed the minutes with her attorney. No one

voiced any objection to the minutes’ contents. The district court found Gale guilty

on both counts.

Based on the minutes of testimony, the district court also concluded that

Gale had “prior convictions for possession of a controlled substance.” The

minutes showed that in 2016, Gale was convicted of possession of a controlled

substance in violation of Iowa Code § 124.401(5) in Cedar County. Based on this

finding, the court sentenced Gale to two concurrent terms of 120 days in jail but

suspended the sentence and placed her on unsupervised probation for one year.

It also imposed fines of $855 for the methamphetamine conviction and $430 for

the marijuana conviction, along with a 15% surcharge. This sentence comports

with what the law specifies for possession of a controlled substance, second

offense, and possession of marijuana, second offense. See id.; id. § 903.1.

Gale appealed. We transferred the case to the court of appeals. Gale

asserted two errors on appeal. First, Gale argued that the district court erred in

denying her motion to suppress. Second, Gale argued that the district court 4

imposed an illegal sentence because her 2016 conviction in the Cedar County

case did not in fact constitute a predicate offense under § 124.401(5). Although

the State resisted Gale’s first argument on the motion to suppress, the State

agreed with Gale that the minutes of testimony were inaccurate and that the

conviction in the Cedar County case was not a predicate offense. Although

neither party presented the actual Cedar County judgment order during Gale’s

trial, both Gale and the State urged the court to take judicial notice of it on

appeal.

The court of appeals affirmed the district court on both questions. On the

suppression ruling, the court of appeals held that the police did not violate Gale’s

constitutional search and seizure protections and affirmed the denial of the

motion to suppress. On the sentencing issue, the court of appeals stated that it

could not take judicial notice of the Cedar County case filings, as they were not

part of the district court’s record. The court of appeals concluded that

substantial evidence in the record supported Gale’s conviction and sentence for

both second-offense possession counts. Gale applied for further review, which

we granted.

When we grant further review, we have discretion to let the court of appeals

decision stand on specific issues. State v. Doolin, 942 N.W.2d 500, 506–07

(Iowa 2020). In this case, we let stand the decision on Gale’s challenge to the

suppression ruling. We focus our attention instead on Gale’s illegal sentence

argument.

Recidivist statutes “punish violators who have not responded to the

restraining influence of conviction and punishment” by increasing criminal

punishment based on the number of certain qualifying prior convictions. State

v. Woody, 613 N.W.2d 215, 218 (Iowa 2000) (en banc) (quoting Hajek v. Iowa 5

State Bd. of Parole, 414 N.W.2d 122, 123 (Iowa 1987) (en banc)). Section

124.401(5), the statute under which Gale’s convictions arise, works in part as a

recidivist statute.

Section 124.401(5) makes a person’s first conviction for possession of a

controlled substance a serious misdemeanor. Iowa Code § 124.401(5). For a

second conviction, or if it is the person’s first conviction but the person has a

prior conviction under chapters 124B, 453B, or a pre-July 1, 2017 version of

124A, the conviction is an aggravated misdemeanor. Id. For the third conviction

and beyond, or if it is the person’s first conviction but the person has two or

more prior convictions under chapters 124B, 453B, or the pre-July 1, 2017

version of 124A, the conviction is a class “D” felony. Id. Possession of marijuana

follows the same pattern as other controlled substances but carries a lesser

punishment. Id.

Gale argued on appeal for the first time that her sentence was illegal

because she did not have a prior conviction to establish a predicate offense under

§ 124.401(5). The court of appeals, viewing this as a challenge to the sufficiency

of the evidence presented in the district court, held that Gale waived any error

regarding the record and concluded that Gale’s convictions were supported by

substantial evidence.

Whether Gale has a prior conviction under § 124.401(5) is relevant only to

her sentence, not to her conviction. Woody, 613 N.W.2d at 217. Defendants

convicted of drug possession under § 124.401(5) are not subject to a harsher

sentence for a second offense unless they have been convicted of a first offense.

See id. at 218. Whether a prior conviction under § 124.401(5) qualifies as a

predicate offense presents an illegal sentence challenge, not a challenge to

whether sufficient evidence supports the conviction. See id.; see also State v. 6

Cortez, 617 N.W.2d 1, 3 (Iowa 2000) (en banc) (applying an illegal sentence

framework to whether a prior conviction qualifies as a predicate offense under

chapter 124).

An illegal sentence is one “that could not have been lawfully imposed for

the defendant’s conviction or convictions.” Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.24(5)(b). As a

result, illegal sentence challenges are not subject to the general rules regarding

waiver and error preservation. Sahinovic v. State, 940 N.W.2d 357, 360

(Iowa 2020). What’s more, “[b]ecause an illegal sentence is void, it is subject to

attack even if the defendant invited it or even specifically requested it.” State v.

Chawech, 15 N.W.3d 78, 85 (Iowa 2024). Gale’s failure to object to the minutes

of testimony at her trial does not prevent her from challenging the legality of her

sentence on appeal.

Gale’s sentence in this case would be illegal if she had no prior conviction

for possession of a controlled substance, possession of marijuana, or a

conviction under chapters 124B, 453B, or the pre-July 1, 2017 version of 124A.

See Iowa Code § 124.401(5). The minutes of testimony contained the following

entry:

CLERK OF COURT, DESIGNEE CEDAR COUNTY IOWA

He/She will testify that he/she is in charge of the records in the District Court, Cedar County, Iowa. He/she will further testify that a review of the records indicate that, VANESSA R. GALE was convicted of POSSESSION OF CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE in SRCR023967 on 4/22/2016.

Attached to the minutes was a criminal-history report that showed this

conviction was for “Possession of Controlled Substance 1st Offense – Possession

of other Schedule I, II substance” in violation of Iowa Code § 124.401(5). This

report, if true, would establish that Gale had a prior conviction under

§ 124.401(5) and thus that her new conviction was a second offense. 7

But this report is inaccurate. As both the State and Gale now acknowledge,

the Cedar County conviction in 2016 was for a violation of Iowa Code § 155A.21.

Section 155A.21 makes it unlawful to possess pharmaceutical drugs without a

prescription. Id. A violation of § 155A.21 is not one of the predicate offenses listed

in § 124.401(5).

Although appellate review is ordinarily limited to the record created in the

district court, State v. Lynch, 200 N.W.2d 896, 897 (Iowa 1972) (per curiam),

both parties ask us to supplement the record by taking judicial notice of the

filings in the Cedar County case. “Judicial notice has an ancient pedigree.”

Jeffrey Bellin & Andrew Guthrie Ferguson, Trial by Google: Judicial Notice in the

Information Age, 108 Nw. U. L. Rev. 1137, 1142 (2014). It developed at common

law as “a useful expedient for speeding trials and curing informalities.” John

Henry Wigmore, A Pocket Code of the Rules of Evidence in Trials at Law § 2120,

at 476 (1910).

The Iowa Rules of Evidence, like their federal counterparts, permit a court

to take judicial notice of certain facts, including those that “[c]an be accurately

and readily determined from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be

questioned.” Iowa R. Evid. 5.201(b)(2). Application of this rule is not limited to

district courts. See State v. Washington, 832 N.W.2d 650, 655–56 (Iowa 2013).

In explaining its decision not to take judicial notice of the Cedar County

case filings, the court of appeals cited our court’s discussion in State v.

Washington. But Washington reads: “[T]he general rule is that it is not proper for

the court to consider or take judicial notice of the records of the same court in a

different proceeding without an agreement of the parties.” Id. (emphasis added)

(quoting Leuchtenmacher v. Farm Bureau Mut. Ins., 460 N.W.2d 858, 861 (Iowa

1990)). 8

In Washington, a defendant in a criminal case challenged a district court’s

sentence of 250 hours of community service as retaliatory. Id. at 655. On appeal,

the defendant asked us to take judicial notice of twenty-nine other district court

files to review contemporaneous sentencing orders from the same judge for the

same offense. Id. The State resisted, arguing that the filings in the twenty-nine

other cases could never fully explain the rationale behind each sentence

imposed. Id. at 656. We rejected the defendant’s request to take judicial notice,

reasoning that “[t]he validity of any comparison between sentences depends on

too many individual variables, not all of which would be reflected in the record.”

Id.

Unlike in Washington, both parties in this case ask us to take judicial

notice of the judgment order filed in the Cedar County case. The general rule

stated in Washington, that courts do not take judicial notice of records in a

different proceeding when a party objects, does not apply here. See id. at 655–

56. Although parties’ agreements and concessions do not necessarily bind

courts, see State v. Hennings, 791 N.W.2d 828, 838 (Iowa 2010), overruled on

other grounds by State v. Hill, 878 N.W.2d 269 (Iowa 2016), we conclude that the

district court’s judgment order filed in the Cedar County case constitutes a

source “whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned,” Iowa R. Evid.

5.201(b)(2); see also 31A C.J.S. Evidence § 100, at 132 (2020) (“A court may take

judicial notice of, and give effect to, its proceedings and records in another, but

interrelated or connected, proceeding or case . . . .” (footnote omitted)). We thus

will accept the parties’ invitation to take judicial notice of the earlier judgment

order.

That judgment order clearly states that Gale’s conviction was for

possession of prescription drugs without a prescription in violation of Iowa Code 9

§ 155A.21. Such a conviction does not constitute a predicate offense subjecting

her to enhanced penalties under § 124.401(5). As a result, Gale’s sentence for

both second-offense possession counts under § 124.401(5) was not permitted by

law and is void as an illegal sentence. See State v. Parker, 747 N.W.2d 196, 212

(Iowa 2008). We thus remand to the district court for resentencing.

Decision of Court of Appeals Affirmed in Part and Vacated in Part;

District Court Judgment Affirmed in Part, Reversed in Part, and Case