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 timebarred 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. 

1171, 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 wellwritten, 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).