William D. Beeman v. State of Iowa

CourtCourt of Appeals of Iowa
DecidedDecember 3, 2025
Docket24-1756
StatusPublished

This text of William D. Beeman v. State of Iowa (William D. Beeman v. State of Iowa) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Iowa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
William D. Beeman v. State of Iowa, (iowactapp 2025).

Opinion

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 24-1756 Filed December 3, 2025

WILLIAM D. BEEMAN, Applicant-Appellant,

vs.

STATE OF IOWA, Respondent-Appellee. ________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Muscatine County, Mark Fowler,

Judge.

An applicant appeals the district court’s dismissal of his claims for post-

conviction relief and the denial of relief based on his sole surviving claim over the

destruction of evidence. AFFIRMED.

Erica Nichols Cook (argued), Assistant State Public Defender—Wrongful

Conviction Unit, Des Moines, and Tricia Rojo Bushnell of The Midwest Innocence

Project, Kansas City, Missouri, for appellant.

Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Louis S. Sloven (argued), Assistant

Attorney General, for appellee State.

Heard at oral argument by Greer, P.J., and Schumacher and Ahlers, JJ. 2

GREER, Presiding Judge.

William Beeman appeals the dismissal and denial of claims in his third

application for post-conviction relief (PCR). First, he challenges the dismissal of

his actual- and factual-innocence claim, arguing he was denied an evidentiary

hearing. On his second challenge, he alleges that the State acted in bad faith

when it destroyed critical biological evidence and thus, he should get a new trial.

Because we find Beeman’s actual-innocence claim was previously rejected

in an earlier PCR challenge and that Beeman failed to prove the State’s bad faith

in destroying evidence, we affirm the PCR court’s decision.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings.

This is Beeman’s second appeal in his third PCR claim.1 These

proceedings stem from a murder that occurred in April 1980 when Michiel Winkel’s

body was found in a state park. She had been stabbed repeatedly, sustained a

head injury, and was not wearing any clothing. The investigators used a sexual

assault kit, including a vaginal swab, which confirmed she had been sexually

assaulted. The sample contained blood and seminal fluid. Beeman was excluded

as the source of the blood, but Winkel was not. Winkel’s belongings, found at the

1 Beeman filed for PCR in 1983 and again in 2007. Beeman’s 1983 application sought relief under Iowa Code section 663A(4) (1983), namely that his trial counsel: allowed Beeman’s inculpatory statements about kicking the victim in the head to be admitted at trial; failed to object to the felony murder instruction; and failed to object to witnesses who were “hypnotized” to remember seeing the victim with a man prior to her death. His second PCR, filed in 2007, alleged that his conviction was in violation of the United States Constitution or the laws of Iowa, the court was without jurisdiction to impose a sentence, the sentence exceed the maximum authorized by law, and there existed new evidence of material facts that required his conviction be vacated under a new case law in State v. Heemstra, 721 N.W.2d 549, 558 (Iowa Aug. 25, 2006). Both were denied. 3

scene, were also evaluated at the state crime laboratory. Her clothing also had

blood stains.

Law enforcement interviewed a number of people, including Beeman. On

the second day of interviews, Beeman initialed a typed statement where he

described attempting to have sexual intercourse with Winkel but did not recall

stabbing or sexually assaulting her. Afterward, charges were filed against Beeman

and a trial was held. A jury convicted Beeman of first-degree murder and he was

sentenced to life in prison. Additional facts underlying Beeman’s criminal

conviction are fully set forth in the opinion on his direct appeal. See State v.

Beeman (Beeman I), 315 N.W.2d 770, 772–79 (Iowa 1982) (affirming his

conviction and denial of his motion for a new trial).

But the procedural history gets complicated starting in 2019,2 when Beeman

sought DNA testing under Iowa Code section 81.10 (2019). But the DNA evidence

was no longer available. The district court ordered the State to locate and provide

access to all available evidence to Beeman’s counsel and investigator. After

reviewing the files, Beeman moved for a new trial on other grounds. The district

court denied this motion, and he appealed. In that appeal, Beeman argued that

he had

“discovered, for the first time, evidence that the State long withheld in violation of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963),” namely witnesses who believed to have seen the victim alive after April 21 and when Beeman had an alibi, detailed information about several other suspects law enforcement pursued, other witnesses unknown

2 Prior to 2019, Beeman also had a federal habeas action Beeman v. Iowa, 108

F.3d 181, 185 (8th Cir. 1997), and a motion to correct an illegal sentence, both were denied. See Beeman v. State, No. 21-1129, 2022 WL 2826015, at *1 n.1 (Iowa Ct. App. July 20, 2022). 4

to the defense, and new scientific evidence disputing the State’s theory of the date of the victim’s death.

State v. Beeman (Beeman II), No. 20-1288, 2021 WL 4891010, at *1–2 (Iowa Ct.

App. Oct. 20, 2021) (holding the district court exercised appropriate discretion in

the denial of Beeman’s motion for a new trial).3

In 2020, Beeman filed this third application for postconviction relief while he

was still awaiting an appellate decision on the dismissed motion for new trial.

Beeman argued in his third PCR application:

he was entitled to a new trial due to the following: (1) actual innocence under Schmidt v. State, 909 N.W.2d 778 (Iowa 2018) based on newly discovered witnesses and scientific evidence, (2) the State’s suppression of exculpatory evidence—the witnesses and alternate suspects—in violation of Brady, (3) the State’s alleged presentation of false testimony, (4) the State’s bad faith destruction of the biological evidence, (5) the admission and use of his unreliable confession violated his constitutional rights to due process, and (6) trial counsel was ineffective in failing to present scientific expert testimony on time of death.

Beeman v. State (Beeman III), No. 21-1129, 2022 WL 2826015, at* 1 (Iowa Ct.

App. July 20, 2022) (cleaned up); see also id. at *1 n.4–n.9 (discussing the grounds

for each of Beeman’s claims). That PCR court dismissed the action as premature

because Beeman’s motion for new trial was ongoing. The PCR court noted that

Beeman’s issues in his “motion for a new trial [were] very similar or the same as

the issues presented for [PCR],” and because the claims were not “ripe for

adjudication” the district court “dismissed the PCR application as premature.”

3 We treated this appeal as a petition for writ of certiorari and granted the writ. See Beeman II, 2021 WL 4891010, at *2. Because we were “unable to conclude the alleged exculpatory evidence ‘could reasonably be taken to put the whole case in such a different light as to undermine confidence in the verdict’ and evidence does not entitle Beeman to a new trial,” we ultimately annulled the writ. Id. at *5 (citation omitted). 5

Beeman III, 2022 WL 2826015, at *2. We affirmed the dismissal of the majority of

his claims “as either time-barred by the statute of limitations or already the subject

of a final adjudication in another proceeding Beeman has taken to secure relief.”

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Related

Brady v. Maryland
373 U.S. 83 (Supreme Court, 1963)
Arizona v. Youngblood
488 U.S. 51 (Supreme Court, 1989)
William Beeman v. State of Iowa
108 F.3d 181 (Eighth Circuit, 1997)
Cornell v. State
529 N.W.2d 606 (Court of Appeals of Iowa, 1994)
State v. Beeman
315 N.W.2d 770 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1982)
Wycoff v. State
382 N.W.2d 462 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1986)
State v. Heemstra
721 N.W.2d 549 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 2006)
State v. Dulaney
493 N.W.2d 787 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1992)
City of Okoboji v. Iowa District Court for Dickinson County
744 N.W.2d 327 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 2008)
State v. Craig
490 N.W.2d 795 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1992)
Harrington v. State
659 N.W.2d 509 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 2003)
Foster v. State
378 N.W.2d 713 (Court of Appeals of Iowa, 1985)
Jacob Lee Schmidt v. State of Iowa
909 N.W.2d 778 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 2018)
Cathryn Ann Linn v. State of Iowa
929 N.W.2d 717 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 2019)
Lopez-Penaloza v. State
804 N.W.2d 537 (Court of Appeals of Iowa, 2011)

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