IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 18-1434

Filed April 15, 2020

BRYAN DEBARGE SHUFORD,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

vs.

IOWA DISTRICT COURT FOR SCOTT COUNTY,

Defendant-Appellee.

________________________________________________________________

Certiorari to the Iowa District Court for Scott County, Nancy S. Tabor, 

Judge. 

On a petition for writ of certiorari, the defendant challenges the district 

court’s summary denial of his motion to correct an illegal sentence without 

appointing him counsel. WRIT ANNULLED. 

Thomas Hurd of Greenberg & Hurd, LLP, Des Moines, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Zachary Miller, Assistant Attorney 

General, for appellee.

Considered by Bower, C.J., and May and Greer, JJ. Tabor, J., takes no 

part.
2

GREER, Judge.

On petition for a writ of certiorari,1 Bryan Shuford contends his statutory and 

constitutional right to counsel was violated by the district court when his pro se 

motion for illegal sentence and request for counsel was summarily denied by the 

district court without hearing and without appointing him an attorney. Fifteen years 

after his sentencing, he now appeals from the order denying his 2018 motion to 

correct his sentence. In Jefferson v. Iowa District Court, 926 N.W.2d 519, 524 

(Iowa 2019), filed after the district court summarily denied Shuford’s motion, the 

Iowa Supreme Court clarified that an indigent defendant has a right to counsel to 

advocate a motion to correct an illegal sentence. We must determine whether 

Shuford’s motion and requested relief constitutes an attack on an illegal sentence, 

see Goodwin v. Iowa District Court, 936 N.W.2d 634, 644 (Iowa 2019), and, if so, 

whether Jefferson applies retroactively. 

To answer these questions, we review the case process. On July 12, 2018, 

Shuford moved to correct an illegal sentence and requested court-appointed 

counsel.2 The district court denied the motion without hearing and without the 

benefit of counsel for Shuford. In his self-filed motion, Shuford contended an 

eighteen year old should be afforded the sentencing limitations allowed for 

juveniles provided in State v. Lyle, 854 N.W.2d 378, 403–04 (Iowa 2014) (holding 

 

1 Shuford filed a petition for writ of certiorari, which our supreme court granted 

before transferring the case to us. 

2 Shuford murdered a nine-year-old child with a stray bullet he fired. After a trial in 

2003, Shuford was convicted of second-degree murder, willful injury, and 

intimidation. Sentenced in February 2003, he is serving a term not to exceed fifty 

years on the murder conviction and ten years on the other two crimes concurrent 

with each other but consecutive to the murder term. Seventy percent of the 

sentence term was to be mandatory.
3

that a mandatory minimum sentencing scheme is unconstitutional as applied to a 

juvenile conduct, and that this holding has “no application to sentencing laws 

affecting adult offenders”). Shuford was eighteen years old at the time of his crime 

and nineteen years old at sentencing. 

In making his illegal-sentence claim, Shuford referenced arguments made 

in the Lyle dissent challenging studies cited by the majority. Shuford urged:

In State v. Lyle Justice Waterman made an attempt in his dissent

(pg.16) but made a valid point in stating the court shouldn’t stop at 

the age 18 but stay true to the study and go all the way to the age of 

26. He states: “Will the majority stop here? Under the majority’s 

reasoning, if the teen brain is still evolving, what about nineteen year 

olds? If the brain is still maturing into the mid-20s, why not prohibit

mandatory minimum sentences for any offender under age twentysix?” I too now say “why not stay true to the studies conducted and 

referred to in the Lyle case?”

In the same motion, Shuford asked for an attorney to represent him.

In its two-page ruling, the district court addressed the clear case law 

authority of Lyle and the nature of Shuford’s crimes and pronounced that the 

sentence was “within statutory guidelines and appropriate based on the offender’s 

needs, the severity of the crime and the circumstances.”

A challenge of an illegal sentence can be made at any time. State v. Zarate,

908 N.W.2d 831, 840 (Iowa 2018). The standard of review for constitutional issues 

is de novo. State v. Harrison, 914 N.W.2d 178, 187–88 (Iowa 2018). Questions 

of statutory interpretation are reviewed for correction of errors at law. State v. 

Coleman, 907 N.W.2d 124, 134 (Iowa 2018). The relevant statutory law is found 
4

at Iowa Rule of Criminal Procedure 2.28(1).3 In a case decided after Shuford’s

motion was denied, a combined motion to correct an illegal sentence and request 

for appointed counsel was summarily denied, and our supreme court found,

A motion to correct illegal sentence is a stage of the original criminal 

case. It “takes place entirely in the context of [that case].” Such a 

motion is not filed as a separate action. Indeed, rule 2.24(1) authorizes 

it as one of the “[p]ermissible motions after trial.” It is true that such a 

motion may be filed at any time. Still, it is not filed as a separate action 

but within the original criminal case. It is merely a “motion,” not an 

“application,” see Iowa Code § 822.3 (application for postconviction 

relief), or even a “petition,” see id. § 910.7 (petition to modify plan of 

restitution or restitution plan of payment). Thus, we believe that under 

rule 2.28(1), [State v.] Alspach, [554 N.W.2d 882 (Iowa 1996),] and 

[State v.] Dudley, [766 N.W.2d 606 (Iowa 2009),] a right to counsel is 

triggered.

Jefferson, 926 N.W.2d at 524 (citations omitted). 

Yet Shuford maintains the district court had no discretion and erred by 

failing to appoint him counsel. The State counters with several points. First, the 

State contends that since Jefferson came after the district court’s denial of 

Shuford’s combined motion, its ruling need not be applied here. Second, even if 

Jefferson applies retroactively, because Shuford’s claim is meritless, a summary 

denial was warranted. 

We recognize that illegal sentence claims can be baseless. See Goodwin, 

936 N.W2d at 644. Simply because Shuford called his a motion to correct an illegal 

 

3

Iowa Rule of Criminal Procedure 2.28(1) provides:

Representation. Every defendant, who is an indigent person as 

defined in Iowa Code section 815.9, is entitled to have counsel 

appointed to represent the defendant at every stage of the 

proceedings from the defendant’s initial appearance before the 

magistrate or the court through appeal, including probation 

revocation hearings, unless the defendant waives such appointment. 
5

sentence does not mean that is what it is. See id. at 644 (“Labels are not 

controlling”). Here Shuford filed a motion captioned “Motion to Correct Illegal 

Sentence” and pled, “As a juvenile offender [Shuford] requests to have the 

mandatory minimum term removed from his sentence, leaving only the term of 

years.” There is nothing in the text of the Iowa Constitution prohibiting a district 

court from sentencing an adult to a mandatory minimum term of incarceration. But 

we recognize a proper motion to challenge “an illegal sentence includes claims 

that the court lacked the power to impose the sentence . . . , including claims that 

the sentence is outside the statutory bounds or that the sentence itself is 

unconstitutional.” State v. Bruegger, 773 N.W.2d 862, 871 (Iowa 2009). Shuford’s 

claim that his sentence is unconstitutional based on an expanded application of 

Lyle is a proper motion to correct an illegal sentence. 

Yet we believe we may avoid the question of whether Jefferson applies 

retroactively. Shuford has counsel on this appeal and missing from his argument 

is any semblance of a valid claim that Shuford’s sentence is illegal. Shuford does 

not challenge the substance of the district court’s denial of his motion to correct 

and does not suggest how the result would have been different if he had been

appointed counsel. Shuford’s claim in his motion to correct—that Lyle should be 

extended to those who have reached majority—has been denied time and time 

again.4 We fail to see how the appointment of counsel, either before the district 

 

4 Our supreme court has explicitly drawn the line at eighteen. See Lyle, 854 

N.W.2d at 402–03; see, e.g., Swan v. State, No. 17-0877, 2018 WL 6706212, at 

*3 (Iowa Ct. App. Dec. 19, 2018); State v. Hall, No. 17-0570, 2018 WL 4635685, 

at *5 (Iowa Ct. App. Sept. 26, 2018); Nassif v. State, No. 17-0762, 2018 WL 

3301828, at *1 (Iowa Ct. App. July 5, 2018); State v. Wise, No. 17-1121, 2018 WL 

2246861, at *3 (Iowa Ct. App. May 16, 2018); Smith v. State, No. 16-1711, 2017 
6

court or now on remand, would change this result. Furthermore, this unsuccessful 

motion to correct an illegal sentence does not prevent Shuford from bringing 

another, different motion at a later date. See Iowa R. Crim P. 2.24(5)(a); Bruegger, 

773 N.W.2d at 869. 

Thus, while Jefferson provides for the appointment of counsel when a 

defendant urges the expansion of Lyle in a motion to correct an illegal sentence, 

we avoid marshalling State resources to answer this single query that requires no 

other record. It fails. We lack the authority to expand Lyle beyond what limitations 

our supreme court has defined, and, on appeal, Shuford has not actually 

challenged the ruling that Lyle provides him no relief. See Jordan v. State, No. 10-

0397, 2012 WL 5954581, at *1 n.1 (Iowa Ct. App. Nov. 29, 2012) (“[T]he Iowa 

Court of Appeals does not have the authority to overrule Iowa Supreme Court 

precedent . . . .” (citing State v. Hastings, 466 N.W.2d 697, 700 (Iowa Ct. App. 

1990))). 

WRIT ANNULLED.

 

WL 3283311, at *3 (Iowa Ct. App. Aug. 2, 2017); Thomas v. State, No. 16-0008, 

2017 WL 2665104, at *2 (Iowa Ct. App. June 21, 2017); Schultz v. State, No. 16-

0626, 2017 WL 1400874, at *1 (Iowa Ct. App. Apr. 19, 2017); Kimpton v. State, 

No. 15-2061, 2017 WL 108303, at *3 (Iowa Ct. App. Jan. 11, 2017); State v. Davis, 

No. 15-0015, 2015 WL 7075820, at *1 (Iowa Ct. App. Nov. 12, 2015) (collecting 

cases); State v. Vance, No. 15-0070, 2015 WL 4936328, at *2 (Iowa Ct. App. Aug. 

19, 2015) (collecting cases); State v. Clayton, No. 13-1771, 2014 WL 5862075, at 

*5 (Iowa Ct. App. Nov. 13, 2014).