Title: STATE OF IOWA, Appellee, vs. LEWIS E. MADISON, JR., Appellant.

State: iowa

Issuer: Iowa Supreme Court

Document:

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF IOWA

No. 9 / 99-1331

Filed February 14, 2001

STATE OF IOWA,

Appellee,

vs.

LEWIS E. MADISON, JR.,

Appellant. 

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, Linda R. Reade, Judge.

Defendant appeals judgment of conviction and sentence for third-degree sexual abuse, contending district court erred in overruling his motion in limine.  AFFIRMED.

Linda Del Gallo, State Appellate Defender, and John P. Messina, Assistant State Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Mary E. Tabor, Assistant Attorney General, John P. Sarcone, County Attorney, and Jeff Noble, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.

	Considered en banc.
PER CURIAM.
Following his conviction by a jury, Lewis “Butch” Madison appeals from his judgment of conviction and sentence for third-degree sexual abuse in violation of Iowa Code section 709.4(2) (Supp. 1997).  Madison filed a pretrial motion in limine, challenging medical evidence stemming from blood samples and an aborted fetus taken from the thirteen-year-old victim.  He contended the victim lacked the competency to waive her patient-physician privilege, and for this reason, the evidence was inadmissible under Iowa Code section 622.10 (codifying patient-physician privilege).  The district court overruled the motion.  Finding no error, we affirm.
	J.C., a mildly mentally retarded child, became pregnant in the summer of 1998.  The following September, she voluntarily aborted the ten-week-old fetus at the Planned Parenthood clinic of Des Moines.  
	Before the abortion, J.C. and her mother, K.C., signed a patient waiver that permitted police to recover the fetal tissue and blood samples from J.C.  Madison voluntarily provided blood samples for DNA comparison with the fetal tissue.  The state crime lab performed two separate DNA tests, which linked Madison as the father of the aborted fetus.
	The State charged Madison with sexual abuse in the third degree.  Before trial, the State filed a motion for separate adjudication of law points.  Among other things, the State asked the district court to rule that the patient-physician privilege did not apply.  Madison and Planned Parenthood, whose employees the State intended to call as witnesses, resisted the motion.
The district court ruled there was no privilege.  The court based its ruling on its interpretation of Iowa Code section 232.74, which provides:  
	Sections 622.9 and 622.10 and any other statute or rule of evidence which excludes or makes privileged the testimony of . . . a health practitioner or mental health professional as to confidential communications, do not apply to evidence regarding a child’s injuries or the cause of the injuries in any judicial proceeding, civil or criminal, resulting from a report pursuant to this chapter or relating to the subject matter of such a report.
Iowa Code § 232.74 (1997).
	Meanwhile, Madison filed a pretrial motion in limine, seeking to exclude from evidence the results of the DNA testing.  He contended that because of J.C.’s age and intelligence level she was not competent to release evidence to the police.  He further contended that the police knew or should have known J.C. was not competent to release the evidence and for that reason the evidence was obtained in violation of his rights.  
	The State resisted Madison’s motion, contending that he could not challenge the constitutionality of the search because he had no reasonable expectation of privacy as to the body specimen taken from the victim’s body.  The State also contended that pursuant to the court’s prior ruling on the motion to adjudicate law points the patient-physician privilege did not apply, and for that reason, the release was not necessary. 
	During the hearing on the motion in limine, Madison admitted that, in light of the previous ruling on the motion to adjudicate law points, he could not assert the patient-physician privilege himself.  However, he continued to argue that J.C. was not competent to release the fetal tissue and blood samples, and for that reason, the police should have obtained an authorization from the court or other competent person for the release.  
	The district court agreed with both of the State’s contentions and denied Madison’s motion in limine.
	On appeal, Madison contends the district court erred in ruling that he had no reasonable expectation of privacy as to the body specimen taken from the victim.  He asks that we reverse and remand to allow the district court to conduct further proceedings to determine the lawfulness of the police’s seizure of the fetal remains.
	We need not address Madison’s contention because the second part of the district court’s ruling on the motion in limine requires us to affirm.  As mentioned, in its ruling on the motion in limine, the district court also relied on the previous ruling on the motion to adjudicate law points, which held there was no patient-physician privilege.  On appeal, Madison raises no issues as to the correctness of the ruling on the motion to adjudicate law points, so we have nothing to review on that issue.  The ruling on the motion to adjudicate law points is therefore the law of the case.  See Grinnell Mut. Reins. Co. v. Recker, 561 N.W.2d 63, 71 (Iowa 1997) (holding that, when a party fails to appeal a lower court ruling on a motion to adjudicate law points, that ruling becomes the law of the case).  Because there was no patient-physician privilege, the district court committed no error in denying the motion in limine.
	AFFIRMED.  
	All justices concur except Neuman, J., who concurs in the result only.
	This is not a published opinion.