Johnston v. Iowa Dep't of Transp.

• Decision Date: 16 April 2021
• Docket Number: No. 19-0048,19-0048
• Citation: 958 N.W.2d 180
• Parties: David Michael JOHNSTON, Appellant, v. IOWA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, Appellee.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

958 N.W.2d 180

David Michael JOHNSTON, Appellant,

v.IOWA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, Appellee.

No. 19-0048

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Submitted January 21, 2021

Filed April 16, 2021

Christopher Stewart of Gribble, Boles, Stewart & Witosky Law, Des Moines, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Michelle E. Rabe, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.

Oxley, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which Appel, Waterman, Mansfield, and McDonald, JJ., joined. McDermott, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Christensen, C.J., joined.

OXLEY, Justice.

Nearly twenty years ago we held that a deferred judgment counts as a "final conviction" for purposes of mandatory license revocation under Iowa Code section 321.209. Schilling v. Iowa Dep't of Transp. , 646 N.W.2d 69, 73 (Iowa 2002). Today, we reaffirm that holding with respect to administrative license revocations under Iowa Code sections 321.555 and 321.560. Our intervening decision in State v. Tong , 805 N.W.2d 599 (Iowa 2011) did nothing to erode Schilling v. Iowa Department of Transportation .

I.

Context matters. Criminal convictions have collateral consequences in a variety of contexts. Convictions are used, as here, to administratively suspend a person's privilege to drive. They are also used to criminalize otherwise lawful activity, such as possession of a firearm by a person with a felony conviction.

We have long recognized that "our interpretation of the term ‘conviction’ depend[s] upon the statutory context." Daughenbaugh v. State , 805 N.W.2d 591, 598 (Iowa 2011). This is not a new concept; nor is it limited to the statutes at issue in this case. See, e.g. , State v. Brodene , 493 N.W.2d 793, 796 (Iowa 1992) (en banc) (addressing whether a guilty plea without judgment and sentencing constitutes a conviction for purposes of impeachment under Iowa Rule of Evidence 5.609(a ) and explaining that "[w]hen used in a statute or rule, the word ‘conviction’ may have various meanings, depending on its purpose"); State v. Kluesner , 389 N.W.2d 370, 372 (Iowa 1986) (addressing "conviction" for purposes of restitution under Iowa Code section 910.2 ). Where a conviction is used to enhance a criminal penalty, we construe the term "conviction" with a relatively narrow and technical meaning. Schilling , 646 N.W.2d at 71. But where a conviction is used primarily to protect the public rather than as a criminal punishment, we give the term a broader meaning. See id. (discussing cases). Thus, a conviction "may be final for one purpose and not for another." Id. (quoting Maguire v. Fulton , 179 N.W.2d 508, 511 (Iowa 1970) ).¹

The question of whether a person has a "final conviction" often arises when they receive a deferred judgment for a criminal offense. When a district court grants a deferred judgment, it places the defendant on probation and imposes civil penalties. Iowa Code § 907.3(1)(a ) (2018). Once the defendant fulfills all the conditions of probation and pays all required fees, "the defendant shall be discharged without entry of judgment." Id. § 907.3(1)(c ). The criminal record related to the deferred judgment is then expunged. Id. § 907.9(4)(b ).

This case involves the use of a deferred judgment as one of the three underlying convictions counted by the Iowa Department of Transportation (IDOT) to revoke David Johnston's driver's license as a habitual offender. Johnston was arrested for operating while intoxicated (OWI) on December 23, 2011, and was convicted on March 8, 2012. Not quite six years later, Johnston was again arrested on November 12, 2017, and charged both with OWI and with eluding a police officer under Iowa Code section 321.279(1)(a ). Johnston was convicted of both offenses on April 19, 2018, and received a deferred judgment on the eluding charge.

Four days after Johnston was convicted of the two new charges, the IDOT notified Johnston it was revoking his driver's license under Iowa Code section 321.560 for garnering three enumerated convictions in a six-year period, making him a habitual offender under Iowa Code section 321.555(1) (defining "habitual offender" as "any person who has accumulated convictions for separate and distinct offenses ... for which final convictions have been rendered"). Johnston requested a hearing on the revocation. Throughout the agency proceedings, which included the initial hearing and two agency appeals, Johnston argued that the deferred judgment he received on the eluding charge was not a "final conviction" and could not be counted as one of the three predicate convictions under the habitual offender statute. And throughout the agency proceedings, the IDOT rejected Johnston's argument based on our holding in Schilling .

Undeterred, Johnston filed a petition for judicial review of the IDOT's final agency decision on September 28, 2018. The district court upheld the agency action, and Johnston continued his challenge by appealing to this court. We transferred the appeal to the court of appeals. Up to this point, Johnston had challenged Schilling as being eroded by our subsequent decision in Tong , a challenge that was uniformly rejected. The court of appeals likewise "decline[d] to depart from Schilling ," concluding " section 321.555(1) has the purpose of protecting the public."

Johnston added a twist to his argument in his brief on appeal. He had successfully discharged the deferred judgment on May 6, 2019, just before his proof appellate brief was due. So in that brief, he also seized on language in Tong , where we noted that "[w]e have on occasion adopted the compromise view that a deferred judgment remains a conviction until the defendant successfully completes his or her term of probation." 805 N.W.2d at 603. Thus, Johnston argued he was entitled to relief since he has now successfully completed the terms of his probation.

We granted further review and now clarify that our holding in Schilling is alive and well.²

II.

The Iowa Administrative Procedure Act provides a mechanism for judicial review of agency actions, the procedure Johnston utilized here. Iowa Code § 17A.19. In exercising judicial review of the agency's action, the district court acts as an appellate court, and its review is circumscribed by Iowa Code chapter 17A. See Christiansen v. Iowa Bd. of Educ. Exam'rs , 831 N.W.2d 179, 186 (Iowa 2013). To the extent Johnston challenges the legal effect of his deferred judgment, our review, as was the district court's, is for correction of errors at law. See McMahon v. Iowa Dep't of Transp. , 522 N.W.2d 51, 54 (Iowa 1994) ; see also Iowa Code § 17A.19(10)(c ). In a contested case such as this, "the law limits court review to the agency's record." McMahon , 522 N.W.2d at 54. The court's role is to review the specific action taken by the agency, in this case, the IDOT's revocation of Johnston's driver's license as a habitual offender.

III.

In Schilling , Schilling's driver's license was revoked under Iowa Code section 321.209 shortly after he received a deferred judgment for eluding the police. 646 N.W.2d at 70–71. Section 321.209 requires the IDOT to revoke the driver's license "upon receiving a record of the operator's conviction for [enumerated offenses, including eluding under Iowa Code section 321.279 ], when such conviction has become final." Id. at 70 (quoting Iowa Code § 321.209 (1999)). We concluded that statutory scheme "is designed for the protection of the public, not for punishment" and established a broad definition to determine whether the deferred judgment would be considered a "conviction [that] has become final" for purposes of section 321.209. Id. at 73. A defendant has a final conviction under the broad sense of the term if four elements are met:

(1) A judge or jury has found the defendant guilty, or the defendant has entered a plea of guilty; (2) the court has ordered some form of punishment, penalty, or restraint on the person's liberty to be imposed; (3) a judgment of guilty may be entered if the person violates the terms of probation or fails to comply with the requirements of the court's order; and (4) the conviction has become final.

Id. Under the last element, "[a] conviction is final if the defendant has exhausted or waived any postorder challenge." Id.

Here, Johnston argued throughout the agency proceedings, and now on judicial review of those proceedings, that we limited Schilling in Tong . Tong involved the very different context of Iowa Code section 724.26, part of our criminal code, which prohibits possession of a firearm by "[a] person who is convicted of a felony." Iowa Code § 724.26(1). Tong had pleaded guilty to burglary, a felony, and received a deferred judgment. Tong , 805 N.W.2d at 600–01. In rejecting Tong's argument that he had not been "convicted of a felony" because he received a deferred judgment, we noted that our distinction between punitive and protective purposes from Schilling and earlier cases "may be of limited usefulness" where section 724.26 served both to protect the public and to punish the defendant, something of a hybrid. Id. at 602. We found it more salient that the statute applied both to convicted felons and to juveniles "adjudicated delinquent on the basis of conduct that would constitute a felony if committed by an adult." Id. (emphasis added) (quoting Iowa Code § 724.26(1) (2009)). We concluded the general assembly intended "convicted of a felony" to apply more broadly where the statute focused on conduct rather than "convictions" in the strict sense of the word. Id.

We reinforced our conclusion with the fact that Tong had not completed the terms of his deferred judgment and was still on probation. Id. at 603. We noted that "[w]e have on occasion adopted the compromise view that a deferred judgment remains a conviction until the defendant successfully completes his or her term of probation." Id. (citing State v. Birth , 604 N.W.2d 664, 665 (Iowa 2000) ). Ultimately, we held "a deferred judgment constitutes a conviction for purposes of section...