State v. Wilson

• Decision Date: 19 February 2016
• Docket Number: No. 13–0712.,13–0712.
• Citation: State v. Wilson, 878 N.W.2d 203 (Iowa 2016)
• Parties: STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. John Arthur WILSON, Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

878 N.W.2d 203

STATE of Iowa, Appellee,

v.John Arthur WILSON, Appellant.

No. 13–0712.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Feb. 19, 2016.

Rehearing Denied April 13, 2016.

Nicholas Dial of Benzoni Law Office, P.L.C., Des Moines, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Kelli Huser and Kevin Cmelik, Assistant Attorney Generals, John P. Sarcone, County Attorney, and Justin Allen, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.

WIGGINS, Justice.

The State charged the defendant with forgery and falsifying a public document. After a jury found the defendant guilty, the district court sentenced him to a term of imprisonment. The defendant appealed. We transferred the case to the court of appeals, and the court of appeals affirmed the convictions. The defendant asked for further review, which we granted. On further review, we allow the court of appeals decision to stand as the final decision of this court as to the district court's denial of the motion for new trial and the ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims. We affirm the court of appeals decision affirming the district court's admission of evidence of the defendant's flight from law enforcement on August 11, 2011, because it was admissible as evidence of his consciousness of guilt for the charged crimes. We reverse the court of appeals decision affirming the district court's admission of evidence of the defendant's attempt to evade detection by law enforcement on September 20, 2011, because it was inadmissible as evidence of his consciousness of guilt for the charged crimes. However, because we find the improper admission of this evidence to be harmless error, we affirm in part and vacate in part the decision of the court of appeals and affirm the judgment of the district court.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings.

In 2010, a jury convicted John Arthur Wilson of second- and third-degree theft. The district court sentenced Wilson to a term of imprisonment not to exceed seven years but released him from custody pending resolution of his appeal after he posted an appeal bond. The court appointed John Audlehelm to represent him in the appeal.

On July 12, 2011, the day before his proof brief was due in that appeal, Wilson filed an ethics complaint against Audlehelm with the Iowa Supreme Court Attorney Disciplinary Board and a pro se motion with this court requesting new counsel. At approximately 10:10 p.m. that night, Wilson delivered copies of the ethics complaint and the pro se motion to Audlehelm at his home. Wilson's mother accompanied him and filmed his interaction with Audlehelm. In both the complaint and the motion, Wilson alleged Audlehelm had not adequately prepared to represent him in his appeal.

On July 13, Audlehelm filed by mail a resistance to Wilson's pro se motion for new counsel and a motion requesting a one-week extension of the deadline for filing the proof brief. On July 18, Audlehelm filed the proof brief in person at the clerk's office.

On July 27, the clerk's office received a document captioned "withdrawal of resistance to motion for new counsel and motion to void brief and to withdraw." The document purportedly bore Audlehelm's signature, as did an accompanying certificate of service indicating copies of the document had been mailed to Wilson and the criminal appeals division of the attorney general's office. However, the director of the criminal appeals division testified at trial the division never received a copy of the document.

On August 2, Wilson filed by mail a document captioned "motion for enlargement of time for continuance of deadlines to file a pro se supplemental brief and a second motion for new counsel." The motion stated Audlehelm had "filed a motion to withdraw" as Wilson's counsel on July 27.

On August 4, this court issued an order granting the motion for appointment of new counsel. The order referenced the document purportedly signed and filed by Audlehelm on July 27. The clerk mailed copies of the order to Wilson and Audlehelm that day.

On August 8, Audlehelm learned that someone had filed the document purporting to bear his signature when he received by mail his copy of this court's order granting the motion for appointment of new counsel. Audlehelm went to the clerk's office to inspect the document referenced in the order. After determining he did not sign or file the document, he reported the fraudulent filing to law enforcement and the county attorney's office. On August 10, Audlehelm filed a motion for review of the order granting the motion for appointment of new counsel in which he asked this court to review the document filed on July 27.

Detective Denise Schafnitz, a detective assigned to the unit of the Des Moines Police Department that investigates crimes involving forgery and fraud, led the initial investigation into the filing of the forged document. Based on her investigation, law enforcement obtained an arrest warrant for Wilson and a search warrant authorizing a search of Wilson's home for evidence that might establish he produced the forged document.

On August 11, three law enforcement officers headed to Wilson's home to serve the warrants. As they neared the home, they observed Wilson sitting behind the wheel of his truck talking on his cell phone. The officers parked their unmarked Ford Crown Victoria directly in front of the truck. Detective Schafnitz exited the Crown Victoria and began walking toward Wilson's truck. Though she was not in uniform, she wore her gun and her badge on her belt over her right hip. Wilson put his truck into reverse and began backing down the street. Officer Schafnitz ran back to the Crown Victoria. The officers began chasing Wilson, and he turned a corner while still driving in reverse. After the officers followed, Wilson drove over the curb and through a yard before taking off again in another direction. At that point, a marked patrol car arrived and took over the chase, but Wilson did not stop. The marked patrol car pursued Wilson at high speeds through a residential neighborhood for several blocks, but eventually lost sight of him. The chase ended after Wilson disabled his truck in an accident and fled on foot. Because the officers were unable to locate Wilson, they did not arrest him that day. The officers executed the search warrant and seized one computer, two printers, several USB drives, CDs, DVDs, and several papers referencing this court from Wilson's home. The seized materials yielded no physical evidence Wilson produced the forged document in his home.

On September 20, law enforcement officers again went to Wilson's home to execute two arrest warrants¹ and another search warrant authorizing a search of Wilson's home for evidence relating to the forged document. The officers had been advised that Wilson might hide in a hole in the basement floor or behind a fake wall. Officer Patrick Moody, an officer assigned to the special weapons and tactics team trained to execute high-risk warrants, assisted in the execution of the warrants. A canine also accompanied the officers. When the officers entered the home, no one responded to their verbal warnings or the barking canine. With the canine's assistance, officers located Wilson hiding in a hole in the basement floor beneath a blue plastic storage bin. The officers arrested Wilson and seized a laptop computer found during their search of his home. Forensic analysis of the laptop failed to yield any evidence related to the forged document.

The State charged Wilson with forgery and falsifying a public document. See Iowa Code § 715A.2(1)(b), .2(2)(b) (2011); id. § 718.5. In addition, the State separately charged Wilson with eluding law enforcement based on the events of August 11. See id. § 321.279(3). Trial for all three matters was originally set for December 14. During a hearing on Wilson's motion to dismiss the charges, his counsel orally moved to sever the eluding charge on the ground that it was unrelated to the forgery and falsifying charges. The district court granted the motion after the State declined to resist it.

The district court rescheduled the trial on the forgery and falsifying charges numerous times over the course of the following year. Wilson was represented by different court-appointed and privately retained counsel at various times, but he was unrepresented for several months after his privately retained counsel withdrew from representing him. On July 25, 2012, while Wilson was unrepresented by counsel, he filed a pro se "notice of intent to call expert witnesses and motion for compensation of witnesses" in which he requested the services of a private investigator and a forensic handwriting expert. On September 10, the district court appointed a private investigator to assist Wilson. However, the court did not explicitly address Wilson's request for a forensic handwriting expert.

On December 5, a jury trial on the forgery and falsifying-a-public-document charges commenced. Before trial, Wilson's counsel moved in limine to exclude "all references to Wilson being found by law enforcement in a hole in the basement of a house, and any reference to Wilson's pending eluding charge or to Wilson's prior bad acts." The judge denied the request to exclude all references to Wilson eluding law enforcement and hiding in the hole. However, the judge excluded all references to hoarding or the condition of Wilson's home upon his counsel's oral request.

At trial, Detective Schafnitz and Officer Moody testified regarding the events that took place on August 11 and September 20, 2011, but did not reference the State charging Wilson with the crime of eluding a law enforcement vehicle. Christine Mayberry, deputy clerk of appellate courts, testified regarding relevant practices of the clerk's office and the online docket search feature on the judicial branch website, which permits members of the public to view a list of documents filed in any criminal appeal. The district court also admitted into evidence two photos showing the hole in the basement...