IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 19-1179

Filed April 29, 2020

MICHAEL B. WEATHERSPOON,

Applicant-Appellant,

vs.

STATE OF IOWA,

Respondent-Appellee.

________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Cerro Gordo County, Colleen D. 

Weiland, Judge.

Michael Weatherspoon appeals from the summary dismissal of his fifth 

postconviction-relief application. AFFIRMED.

Shawn Smith of The Smith Law Firm, PC, Ames, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Kyle Hanson, Assistant Attorney 

General, for appellee State.

Considered by Vaitheswaran, P.J., and Mullins and Ahlers, JJ.
2

VAITHESWARAN, Presiding Judge.

A jury found Michael Weatherspoon guilty of first-degree murder in 

connection with a stabbing in 1998. This court affirmed his judgment and 

sentence. See State v. Weatherspoon, No. 98-2214, 2000 WL 328056, at *3 (Iowa 

Ct. App. Mar. 29, 2000). We also affirmed the denial of several postconvictionrelief applications. See Weatherspoon v. State, 16-0115, 2016 WL 5408155, at *2 

(Iowa Ct. App. Sept. 28, 2016); Weatherspoon v. State, No. 13-0094, 2014 WL 

250243, at *2 (Iowa Ct. App. Jan. 23, 2014); Weatherspoon v. State, No. 03-0498, 

2005 WL 723882, at *2 (Iowa Ct. App. Mar. 31, 2005). This is an appeal from the 

summary dismissal of Weatherspoon’s fifth postconviction-relief application.

Weatherspoon alleged in part that he “was denied a jury that represented a 

fair cross-section of the community” and the supreme court’s recent opinion in 

State v. Plain, 898 N.W.2d 801, 829 (Iowa 2017), should afford him relief.1 The 

State responded with a motion to dismiss, asserting the three-year statute of 

limitations generally applicable to postconviction-relief applications barred 

Weatherspoon’s claim. See Iowa Code § 822.3 (2017). Weatherspoon countered 

that the Plain issue fell within an exception to the three-year time bar for a ground 

 

1

In Plain, the court applied the second prong of what has come to be known as 

the Duren test governing fair cross-section challenges. 898 N.W.2d at 827; see

Duren v. Missouri, 439 U.S. 357, 364 (1979) (requiring a showing “that the 

representation of this group in venires from which juries are selected is not fair and 

reasonable in relation to the number of such persons in the community”). The 

court held “the district court made an error of law in concluding the absolute 

disparity test must be used in deciding whether the jury pool was drawn from a fair 

cross-section of the community.” Plain, 898 N.W.2d at 829, holding modified by 

State v. Lilly, 930 N.W.2d 293 (Iowa 2019). The court further held “[p]arties 

challenging jury pools on the ground that they are unrepresentative may base their 

challenges on multiple analytical models.” Id. at 827.
3

of law “that could not have been raised within the applicable time period.” Id. The 

district court concluded Weatherspoon’s claims were not time-barred but the 

grounds of law on which he relied, including Plain, could not be “applied 

retroactively” to afford him any relief. 

On appeal, Weatherspoon argues “the district court committed an error of 

law” in summarily ruling that Plain did not apply retroactively. In his view, “the 

potential retroactivity of a statute or court decision is a disputed matter of fact until 

reported decisions of Iowa appellate courts conclude otherwise.”

A reported decision of the Iowa Supreme Court recently concluded 

otherwise. In Thongvanh v. State, 938 N.W.2d 2, 12–14 (Iowa 2020), the court 

applied the federal framework for analyzing retroactivity set forth in Teague v. 

Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989). The court concluded, “Plain’s holding on the second 

prong of the Duren test constitutes a new rule under the Teague framework. 

However, because it is not a watershed rule of criminal procedure, it does not apply 

retroactively to cases on collateral review.” Thongvanh, 938 N.W.2d at 14. The 

court also concluded the Iowa Constitution did not require retroactive application 

of Plain “to convictions that were already final at the time” Plain was decided. Id.

at 16. 

Thongvanh is controlling. The postconviction court did not err in summarily 

dismissing Weatherspoon’s postconviction-relief application.

AFFIRMED.