Case Title: Perez v. State

Citation: 

Docket Number: 

State: nevada

Court: Nevada Supreme Court

Date: 2008-07-11T00:00:00Z

Document:
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF IOWA 
 
No. 10–1315 
 
Filed June 8, 2012 
 
 
SERGIO PEREZ, 
 
 
Appellant, 
 
vs. 
 
STATE OF IOWA, 
 
 
Appellee. 
 
 
 
On review from the Iowa Court of Appeals. 
 
 
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Marshall County, 
Michael J. Moon, Judge. 
 
Appellant seeks further review of a court of appeals decision 
affirming 
the 
district 
court’s 
dismissal 
of 
his 
application 
for 
postconviction relief.  COURT OF APPEALS DECISION AND DISTRICT 
COURT JUDGMENT AFFIRMED. 
 
 
Michael H. Said of Law Offices of Michael H. Said, P.C., for 
appellant. 
 
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Linda J. Hines, Assistant 
Attorney General, Jennifer A. Miller, County Attorney, and James S. 
Scheetz, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee. 
 
 
 
 
2 
MANSFIELD, Justice. 
In Padilla v. Kentucky, the United States Supreme Court decided a 
criminal defendant has a Sixth Amendment right to receive advice from 
counsel regarding the risk of deportation before pleading guilty.  ___ U.S. 
___, ___, 130 S. Ct. 1473, 1486, 176 L. Ed. 2d 284, 299 (2010).  Sergio 
Perez argues he did not receive such advice from his attorney in 2000 
before he pled guilty to a misdemeanor drug possession charge.  For this 
reason, Perez has filed an application for postconviction relief seeking to 
have that conviction set aside. 
We conclude Perez is not entitled to relief because only two 
possibilities exist here.  One alternative is Padilla establishes a “new” 
rule of constitutional criminal procedure.  If that is so, however, Padilla 
does not apply retroactively, and Perez may not rely upon it to set aside 
an earlier conviction.  See Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288, 310, 109 S. Ct. 
1060, 1075, 103 L. Ed. 2d 334, 356 (1989) (generally denying 
retroactivity when a Supreme Court decision establishes a new rule of 
constitutional criminal procedure).  The other possibility is that Padilla is 
not a new rule.  But if that is the case, then Perez’s application is time-
barred because he could have filed it within three years of the date when 
his conviction became final and failed to do so.  See Iowa Code § 822.3 
(2009) (generally requiring postconviction relief applications to be filed 
within three years from the date the conviction is final unless the ground 
could not have been raised within the applicable time period).  In short, 
Perez’s claim cannot go forward because either it may not be raised 
retroactively or it is barred by the statute of limitations.  Therefore, we 
affirm the judgment of the district court and the decision of the court of 
appeals, both of which denied Perez’s claims. 
 
 
 
3 
I.  Background Facts and Proceedings. 
According to the original minutes of testimony, on October 22, 
2000, a large fight broke out at the El Parral Bar in Marshalltown.  Police 
found the defendant Sergio Perez dazed but conscious lying on the 
ground outside.  An ambulance soon arrived.  One of the emergency 
medical technicians (EMT) who was treating Perez saw a plastic bag fall 
from his pants pocket.  The EMT informed a Marshalltown police officer, 
who retrieved the bag.  It contained a powdery substance which was later 
identified as 6.75 grams of methamphetamine. 
Perez was initially charged with possession of more than five grams 
of a Schedule II controlled substance with intent to deliver in violation of 
Iowa Code section 124.401(1)(b) (1999), a class “B” felony, and failure to 
attach a drug tax stamp in violation of Iowa Code section 453B.12, a 
class “D” felony.  Perez agreed to a plea bargain in which the charges 
were reduced to a single misdemeanor charge of possession of a 
Schedule II controlled substance in violation of Iowa Code section 
124.401(5) and signed a written plea of guilty on December 22, 2000. 
Perez’s plea was accepted by the district court, and judgment was 
entered on December 22, 2000.  As part of the plea agreement, Perez 
received a thirty-day jail sentence, with credit for thirty days already 
served.  Perez did not appeal his conviction or sentence. 
Perez is not a United States citizen.  On April 12, 2010, over nine 
years after final judgment was entered in his criminal case and less than 
two weeks after the Supreme Court’s Padilla decision, Perez filed an 
application for postconviction relief.  In the application, he alleged his 
attorney had not notified him of the immigration implications of his 
guilty plea.  Iowa precedent at that time did not require attorneys to 
provide this information.  See State v. Ramirez, 636 N.W.2d 740, 745–46 
 
 
 
4 
(Iowa 2001).  Perez also sought relief on the grounds that his rights to an 
interpreter and a recording of proceedings under Iowa Code sections 
622A.2 and 622A.8 were violated during his guilty plea proceedings. 
The State filed a motion to dismiss, urging that Iowa Code section 
822.3 (2009) requires postconviction relief petitions to be filed within 
three years from the time a conviction becomes final and that Perez’s 
application over nine years later was therefore time-barred.  Perez 
resisted, maintaining that he could not have reasonably been expected to 
raise these objections to his plea proceedings within the applicable time 
period. 
Following a hearing, the district court denied Perez’s application on 
all grounds.  Perez filed a timely appeal, and we transferred the case to 
the court of appeals.  The court of appeals affirmed the district court’s 
dismissal of Perez’s application for postconviction relief, holding among 
other things that Perez had “failed to establish Padilla should apply 
retroactively to his postconviction relief application.” 
We granted Perez’s application for further review. 
II.  Standard of Review. 
“Generally, an appeal from a denial of an application for 
postconviction relief is reviewed for correction of errors at law.”  Goosman 
v. State, 764 N.W.2d 539, 541 (Iowa 2009).  We must “affirm if the trial 
court’s findings of fact are supported by substantial evidence and the law 
was correctly applied.”  Harrington v. State, 659 N.W. 2d 509, 520 (Iowa 
2003).  Where the applicant alleges constitutional error, our “review is de 
novo ‘in light of the totality of the circumstances and the record upon 
which the postconviction court’s rulings w[ere] made.’ ” Goosman, 764 
N.W.2d at 541 (quoting Giles v. State, 511 N.W.2d 622, 627 (Iowa 1994)). 
 
 
 
5 
III.  Analysis. 
A.  The Padilla Decision.  Perez’s primary argument on appeal is 
that his trial counsel failed to advise him regarding the risk of 
deportation, a constitutional duty recognized by the United States 
Supreme Court in Padilla.  See ___ U.S. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1486, 176 L. 
Ed. 2d at 299.  Padilla, like the present case, involved a defendant who 
pled guilty to drug-related charges.  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1477, 176 L. 
Ed. 2d at 290.  He later petitioned for postconviction relief, claiming 
ineffective assistance of counsel because he was not told that his plea 
could negatively affect his immigration status (and allegedly was 
affirmatively told he “did not have to worry about [his] immigration 
status since he had been in the country so long”).  ___ U.S. at ___, 130 S. 
Ct. at 1478, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 290 (citation and internal quotation marks 
omitted).1  The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the denial of Padilla’s 
petition.  Id.  It held, as had eleven federal circuit courts and most state 
supreme courts, that the Sixth Amendment guarantee of effective 
assistance of counsel did not require an attorney to notify his or her 
client about collateral consequences of a guilty plea, including the effect 
on immigration status.  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1481, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 
293; id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1487, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 300 (Alito, J., 
concurring). 
                                                 
1Federal law provides: 
Any alien who at any time after admission has been convicted of a 
violation of (or a conspiracy or attempt to violate) any law or regulation of 
a State, the United States, or a foreign country relating to a controlled 
substance (as defined in section 802 of Title 21), other than a single 
offense involving possession for one’s own use of 30 grams or less of 
marijuana, is deportable. 
8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(B)(i) (2000). 
 
 
 
6 
The United States Supreme Court reversed.  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. 
at 1487, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 299.  The Court concluded that 
“constitutionally competent counsel” should have informed Padilla of the 
risk of deportation resulting from his plea.  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1478, 
1480, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 290.  The Court noted it had “never applied a 
distinction between direct and collateral consequences to define the 
scope of constitutionally ‘reasonable professional assistance’ required 
under Strickland.”  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1481, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 293 
(quoting Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 689, 104 S. Ct. 2052, 
2065, 80 L. Ed. 2d 674, 694 (1984)).  The Court concluded that “[t]he 
collateral versus direct distinction is . . . ill-suited to evaluating a 
Strickland claim concerning the specific risk of deportation” and that 
“advice regarding deportation is not categorically removed from the ambit 
of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel.”  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1482, 
176 L. Ed. 2d at 294. 
Thus, applying the first part of the Strickland framework, the Court 
found that the assistance of Padilla’s attorney fell below an objective 
standard of reasonableness established by “prevailing professional 
norms” as defined by American Bar Association standards and similar 
practice guides.  Id.  The Court noted that “[f]or at least the past 15 
years, professional norms have generally imposed an obligation on 
counsel to provide advice on the deportation consequences of a client’s 
plea.”  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1485, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 297–98.  The Court 
added that “the terms of the relevant immigration statute are succinct, 
clear, and explicit in defining the removal consequence for Padilla’s 
conviction.”  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1483, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 295.  Hence, 
the Court concluded that “[o]ur longstanding Sixth Amendment 
precedents, the seriousness of deportation as a consequence of a 
 
 
 
7 
criminal plea, and the concomitant impact of deportation on families 
living lawfully in this country demand” that counsel inform a defendant if 
his or her plea subjects him or her to the risk of deportation.  Id. at ___, 
130 S. Ct. at 1486, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 299. 
The Court did not ultimately find that Padilla was entitled to relief.  
Under the two-part framework established in Strickland, Padilla still had 
to demonstrate prejudice, i.e., that he would not have pled guilty if 
properly informed of the risk of deportation.  The Court noted that those 
“who collaterally attack their guilty pleas lose the benefit of the bargain 
obtained as a result of the plea.”  Id. at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1485, 176 L. 
Ed. 2d at 298.  Thus, it remanded the case for further proceedings in the 
Kentucky courts to determine whether Padilla had suffered prejudice.  Id. 
at ___, 130 S. Ct. at 1487, 176 L. Ed. 2d at 299. 
B.  Teague Standards for Retroactivity.  As we have noted, 
within two weeks of the Padilla decision, Perez applied for postconviction 
relief, asserting his trial counsel had failed to advise him of the risk of 
deportation when he pled guilty in 2000.  Perez maintains that Padilla 
applies retroactively and that he may rely upon it to collaterally attack 
his 2000 conviction.  Teague is the Supreme Court’s leading 
pronouncement on when a federal constitutional rule of criminal 
procedure may be applied retroactively to a conviction that became final 
before the rule was announced.  There, the Court indicated that “[u]nless 
they fall within an exception to the general rule, new constitutional rules 
of criminal procedure will not be applicable to those cases which have 
become final before the new rules are announced.”  Id. at 310, 109 S. Ct. 
at 1075, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 356 (emphasis added).2 
                                                 
2Potentially, this court could grant retroactive effect to a United States Supreme 
Court decision announcing a rule of constitutional criminal procedure even if that 
Court would not do so.  However, this court has so far followed the Teague framework.  
 
 
 
8 
Teague defined a new rule as one that “breaks new ground or 
imposes a new obligation on the States or the Federal Government” or, to 
put it another way, “was not dictated by precedent existing at the time 
the defendant’s conviction became final.”  Id. at 301, 109 S. Ct. at 1070, 
103 L. Ed. 2d at 349.  Such new rules “generally should not be applied 
retroactively to cases on collateral review.”  Id. at 305, 109 S. Ct. at 
1073, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 352.  The Teague Court determined that it is 
“ ‘sounder, in adjudicating [collateral] petitions, generally to apply the 
law prevailing at the time a conviction became final than it is to seek to 
dispose of [collateral] cases on the basis of intervening changes in 
constitutional interpretation.’ ”  Id. at 306, 109 S. Ct. at 1073, 103 L. Ed. 
2d at 353 (quoting Mackey v. United States, 401 U.S. 667, 689, 91 S. Ct. 
1160, 1178, 28 L. Ed. 2d 404, 418 (1971) (Harlan, J., concurring)).  The 
Court invoked the principle of finality: 
Application of constitutional rules not in existence at the 
time a conviction became final seriously undermines the 
principle of finality which is essential to the operation of our 
criminal justice system.  Without finality, the criminal law is 
deprived of much of its deterrent effect. 
Id. at 309, 109 S. Ct. at 1074, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 355.  In sum, the Court 
concluded, “The costs imposed upon the State[s] by retroactive 
application of new rules of constitutional law on [collateral review] . . . 
generally far outweigh the benefits of this application.”  Id. at 310, 109 S. 
Ct. at 1075, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 355 (citation and internal quotation marks 
omitted). 
 
Teague allowed for two narrow exceptions to its principle that new 
rules do not apply retroactively.  One is for new rules of criminal 
_____________________________ 
See Morgan v. State, 469 N.W.2d 419, 422–25 (Iowa 1991); Brewer v. State, 444 N.W.2d 
77, 81–82 (Iowa 1989). 
 
 
 
9 
procedure that are actually substantive because they place “certain 
kinds of primary, private individual conduct beyond the power of the 
criminal law-making authority to proscribe.”  Id. at 311, 109 S. Ct. at 
1075, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 356 (citation and internal quotation marks 
omitted).  Thus, the first exception to nonretroactivity arises when 
previously illegal conduct is no longer prohibited by the law.  The second 
exception is “reserved for watershed rules of criminal procedure . . . 
without which the likelihood of an accurate conviction is seriously 
diminished.”  Id. at 311, 313, 109 S. Ct. at 1076, 1077, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 
356, 358.  Hence, the second exception involves new rules that are 
“central to an accurate determination of innocence or guilt” and also 
“implicit in the concept of ordered liberty.”  Id. at 313–14, 109 S. Ct. at 
1077, 103 L. Ed. 2d at 358 (internal quotation marks omitted).3 
Padilla clearly falls into neither exception.  Padilla does not shield 
previously illegal conduct from the reach of the criminal law, nor is it 
based on a concern about the accuracy of prior determinations of guilt.  
In fact, no court has so far held the Padilla rule qualifies for the 
watershed/ordered liberty exception, and we agree that the exception 
does not apply.  See, e.g., Figuereo-Sanchez v. United States, No. 10–
14235, 2012 WL 1499871, *6 (11th Cir. May 1, 2012) (holding that 
“Padilla did not announce a watershed rule of criminal procedure”); see 
also United States v. Aceves, No. 10–00738, 2011 WL 976706, *4 (D. 
Haw. Mar. 17, 2011) (stating that “this court has found no judicial 
decision construing Padilla as stating a new rule that falls within the 
                                                 
3To highlight the narrowness of the second exception, since Teague the Supreme 
Court has rejected every claim that a new rule of constitutional criminal procedure 
qualifies for watershed status.  See Whorton v. Bockting, 549 U.S. 406, 417–18, 127 S. 
Ct. 1173, 1181–82, 167 L. Ed. 2d 1, 11–12 (2007). 
 
 
 
10 
‘ordered liberty’ exception”).  Therefore, Padilla only applies retroactively 
if it is not deemed a new rule. 
There is a substantial split of authority on this point.  The United 
States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and two state supreme 
courts have held that Padilla is merely an application of the general 
principle announced in Strickland that defendants are entitled to 
“reasonably effective assistance” of counsel.  See United States v. Orocio, 
645 F.3d 630, 641 (3d Cir. 2011); Denisyuk v. State, 30 A.3d 914, 923–
25 (Md. 2011); Commonwealth v. Clarke, 949 N.E.2d 892, 904 (Mass. 
2011); see also Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687, 104 S. Ct. at 2064, 80 L. Ed. 
2d at 693.  Generally, these courts have reasoned that if Strickland was 
the basic law at the time that counsel neglected to properly inform a 
defendant concerning potential immigration issues, then the Padilla 
application, interpretation, or restatement of Strickland should be 
applied retroactively even if it was only raised in a collateral attack on 
the conviction.  These courts do not consider Padilla a new rule, but 
rather a new application or clarification of an old rule, and therefore 
eligible for retroactivity.  See Orocio, 645 F.3d at 641 (stating that 
“Padilla 
followed 
directly 
from 
Strickland 
and 
long-established 
professional norms”); Denisyuk, 30 A.3d at 925 (stating that “Padilla is 
an application of Strickland to a specific set of facts”); Clarke, 949 N.E.2d 
at 904 (stating that “the defendant in Padilla sought only an application 
of Strickland that several courts had already reached”). 
On the other hand, the Fifth, Seventh, and Tenth Circuits have 
concluded that Padilla announced a new rule of law and have declined to 
apply it retroactively, citing among other things the previously prevailing 
view among lower federal courts and state courts that counsel did not 
have an obligation to advise concerning deportation risk.  See United 
 
 
 
11 
States v. Amer, No. 11–60522, 2012 WL 1621005, *2 (5th Cir. May 9, 
2012) (“Padilla departed markedly from the ‘legal landscape’ extant when 
[the defendants] conviction became final in February 2009.”  (quoting 
Beard v. Banks, 542 U.S. 406, 413, 124 S. Ct. 2504, 2511, 159 L. Ed. 2d 
494, 504 (2004))); United States v. Chang Hong, 671 F.3d 1147, 1155 
(10th Cir. 2011) (“We find a reasonable jurist at the time of Hong’s 
conviction would not have considered Supreme Court precedent to 
compel the application of Strickland to the immigration consequences of 
a guilty plea.”); Chaidez v. United States, 655 F.3d 684, 690 (7th Cir. 
2011) (“Such rare unanimity among the lower courts is compelling 
evidence that reasonable jurists reading the Supreme Court’s precedents 
in April 2004 could have disagreed about the outcome of Padilla.”), cert. 
granted, __ S. Ct. __, 2012 WL 1468539 (April 30, 2012).  One state 
supreme court has ruled likewise that Padilla sets forth a new rule of 
constitutional criminal procedure.  State v. Gaitan, 37 A.3d 1089, 1105 
(N.J. 2012) (stating that “Padilla involved no simple application of the 
well-established Strickland rule to a new set of facts”). 
On April 30, 2012, the United States Supreme Court granted 
certiorari in Chaidez, the Seventh Circuit case.  Chaidez, __ S. Ct. __, 
2012 WL 1468539.  Thus, the Supreme Court will determine in its 
October 2012 term whether Padilla is to be applied retroactively.  
However, as we discuss below, we can decide this case without predicting 
how the Supreme Court will decide Chaidez. 
C.  Iowa Code Section 822.3.  Iowa Code section 822.3 provides 
the statute of limitations for postconviction relief applications.  Such 
applications  
must be filed within three years from the date the conviction 
or decision is final or, in the event of an appeal, from the 
date the writ of procedendo is issued.  However, this 
 
 
 
12 
limitation does not apply to a ground of fact or law that 
could not have been raised within the applicable time period. 
Iowa Code § 822.3.  We have upheld the constitutionality of this 
provision.  See Davis v. State, 443 N.W.2d 707, 710 (Iowa 1989) 
(commenting that “[a] legitimate concern is that the process . . . end 
within reasonable time limits”).  There is no dispute that Perez filed his 
application more than three years after the judgment in his criminal case 
became final.  Thus, in order to avoid the time bar of section 822.3, Perez 
must be asserting a ground of fact or law that “could not have been 
raised” earlier. 
We agree with the State that it would be “contradictory” for Perez 
to argue that Padilla is merely an application of preexisting law for 
Teague retroactivity purposes while simultaneously arguing that he 
could not have raised the issue within the three-year limitations period.  
“A reasonable interpretation of the statute compels the conclusion that 
exceptions to the time bar would be, for example, newly-discovered 
evidence or a ground that the applicant was at least not alerted to in 
some way.”  Wilkins v. State, 522 N.W.2d 822, 824 (Iowa 1994). 
We recognize that prior to Padilla, our precedents (like those of the 
federal courts of appeals and most other states) rejected the notion that 
counsel had a constitutional duty to advise clients about deportation 
consequences.  See Ramirez, 636 N.W.2d at 745–46; Mott v. State, 407 
N.W.2d 581, 583–84 (Iowa 1987).  But we acknowledged there was “some 
merit” in the contrary position.  Ramirez, 636 N.W.2d at 746; Mott, 407 
N.W.2d at 583.  The Ramirez case, which considered whether Mott 
should be overruled, was pending at the time Perez’s conviction became 
final and was not decided until almost nine months thereafter.  
Furthermore, at any time our precedents could have been overturned by 
 
 
 
13 
the United States Supreme Court, which is in fact what happened when 
Padilla was decided.  And shortly after our decision in Ramirez, we 
amended rule 2.8 to require defendants pleading guilty to be informed 
that “a criminal conviction, deferred judgment, or deferred sentence may 
affect a defendant’s status under federal immigration laws.”  See Iowa R. 
Crim. P. 2.8(2)(b)(3) (effective February 15, 2002).  Hence, if Padilla does 
not embody a new rule of constitutional criminal procedure, we believe 
the matter could have been raised by Perez, as that term is used in 
section 822.3, within the applicable time period. 
The federal postconviction relief statute has a one-year statute of 
limitations that is subject to tolling when the right asserted “has been 
newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively 
applicable to cases on collateral review.”  28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)(3) (2006).  
Since Padilla was decided, many federal district courts have rejected 
efforts by defendants to thread the needle and argue at the same time 
that (1) Padilla has retroactive effect under Teague because it was 
dictated by earlier Supreme Court precedent and (2) Padilla involves a 
“newly recognized” right for federal habeas tolling purposes.  See, e.g., 
Rodriguez v. United States, No. 1:10-CV-23718-WKW, 2011 WL 3419614, 
*8 (S.D. Fla. Aug. 4, 2011) (“[T]he Padilla decision, if an ‘old rule,’ is not a 
change in the law; and if a ‘new rule,’ it is not fully retroactive to cases 
on collateral review.”); Aceves, 2011 WL 976706, at *3 (stating that if 
Padilla was a restatement of existing law applicable to cases on collateral 
review it “cannot [also] serve as the reason to restart the limitations 
period” under 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)); Mudahinyuka v. United States, No. 10 
C 5812, 2011 WL 528804, *4 (N.D. Ill. Feb. 7, 2011) (holding that 
because Padilla did not announce a new rule it was not a newly 
recognized right for the purpose of tolling the one-year limitations period 
 
 
 
14 
in 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)); United States v. Shafeek, No. 10–12670, 2010 WL 
3789747, *3 (E.D. Mich. Sept. 22, 2010) (“Because the Padilla opinion 
may not be considered a ‘new rule,’ [the defendant] cannot show that the 
Padilla opinion should be applied retroactively [under 28 U.S.C. 
§ 2255(3)]”); United States v. Dass, No. 05–140 (3) (JRT/FLN), 2011 WL 
2746181, *6 (D. Minn. July 14, 2011) (“[I]t would be illogical to determine 
Padilla is not a new constitutional rule of criminal procedure, but is a 
right newly recognized by the Supreme Court.”). 
 
A few state courts have similarly rejected claims that Padilla 
constitutes both an old rule, eligible for retroactive application, and a 
new rule in the context of a postconviction relief statute of limitations.  
See Commonwealth v. Garcia, 23 A.3d 1059, 1064–66 (Pa. Super. Ct. 
2011) (stating that the holding in Padilla was a clarification and did not 
constitute a “new constitutional right” as required to qualify for 
Pennsylvania’s postconviction relief statute’s timeliness exception); State 
v. Cervantes, 273 P.3d 484, 487 (Wash. Ct. App. 2012) (“Padilla does not 
represent a significant change in the law and therefore does not create 
an exception to the one-year time limit in [Washington’s postconviction 
relief statute].”). 
 
Perez’s filings in this court, although generally helpful and well-
written, illustrate the internal contradiction in his position.  In his 
original appellate brief, Perez urged that the district court erred in 
applying section 822.3 because “[u]ntil Padilla, immigration issues were 
considered collateral consequences of a plea.”  But in his later 
application for further review, in which he contested the court of appeals’ 
view that Padilla did not have retroactive effect, Perez insisted that 
“Padilla simply ‘clarified’ what may have been ambiguities in existing 
law.”  What Perez does not explain is how Padilla can be both a 
 
 
 
15 
clarification of the law and a ground he could not have raised within the 
three-year time bar. 
 
Accordingly, we leave it to the Supreme Court to decide next term 
whether Padilla is retroactive.  We hold only that if it is, Perez should 
have raised his claim regarding failure to advise of immigration 
consequences within the three-year limitations period of section 822.3.4 
IV.  Conclusion. 
For the reasons stated, we affirm the district court’s dismissal of 
Perez’s application for postconviction relief. 
DECISION OF COURT OF APPEALS AND JUDGMENT OF 
DISTRICT COURT AFFIRMED. 
 
                                                 
4Perez also contends that at the time of his plea, he could not adequately 
understand English and that he was improperly denied an interpreter in violation of 
Iowa Code section 622A.2 (1999) and a recording of non-English testimony in violation 
of section 622A.8.  In the exercise of our discretion, we will let the court of appeals 
opinion stand as the final decision on these matters.  See State v. Marin, 788 N.W.2d 
833, 836 (Iowa 2010).