IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 17-0588

Filed January 24, 2018

STATE OF IOWA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

vs.

DONALD DEAN GRIDLEY,

Defendant-Appellant.

________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Wapello County, Myron L. Gookin, 

Judge.

Donald Dean Gridley appeals the district court decision denying his motion 

for new trial. AFFIRMED.

Mark C. Smith, State Appellate Defender, and Bradley M. Bender, 

Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Louis S. Sloven, Assistant 

Attorney General, for appellee.

Considered by Vogel, P.J., and Tabor and Bower, JJ.
2

BOWER, Judge.

Donald Dean Gridley appeals the district court decision denying his motion 

for new trial. We find the district court did not abuse its discretion and based its 

decision on reasonable factual and legal principles. We affirm the district court.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings

Gridley previously appealed his conviction for homicide by vehicle, in 

violation of Iowa Code 707.6A(3) (2013). State v. Gridley, No. 14–1773, 2016

WL 5930002, at *1 (Iowa Ct. App. October 12, 2016). This court affirmed the 

conviction but remanded the case to the district court in order to apply the correct 

weight of the evidence standard on Gridley’s motion for new trial. Id. at *5. Our 

court found the following facts:

Gridley and his father attended a funeral. At the reception, 

Gridley estimated he consumed at least seven or eight alcoholic 

drinks. Early the following morning, a deputy sheriff responded to a 

911 call from a farmhouse. Gridley was outside. Gridley told the 

deputy he was involved in a vehicle accident and thought “his dad 

was possibly dead.” The deputy noted that Gridley had “bloodshot, 

watery eyes, . . . slurred speech, [and] [smelled] of alcohol.” He 

surmised Gridley had been drinking. A urine test taken several 

hours later revealed “a urine alcohol concentration of 0.198 grams 

per 67 mils of urine,” a level that, according to the tester, could 

impair an individual. The test also was positive for marijuana 

metabolites, oxycodone, and benzodiazepines.

The deputy drove Gridley to the scene of the accident. He 

found Gridley’s father pinned on the floorboard of the passenger 

side of the vehicle, facing the passenger side door. The deputy did 

not see “any evidence that [Gridley’s father] was moved from the 

driver’s seat to the passenger seat.” Other witnesses who arrived 

at the scene confirmed the impracticability of Gridley’s assertion 

that he had repositioned his father.

Two volunteer firemen at the scene heard Gridley ask, “Did I 

kill my father? Is he going to die? Did I kill my father?” A 

paramedic testified Gridley “initially admitted that he was the driver 

of the vehicle.” While the paramedic conceded Gridley “seemed 

confused,” he stated the confusion was “just over [his] questions 

later.”
3

A deputy sheriff testified he “saw a red mark on [Gridley’s] 

chest” that “resembled a steering wheel mark.” A state trooper 

agreed with the prosecutor that “damage to a steering wheel” could 

“cause injuries to the driver of [a] vehicle” and this evidence could 

be used to identify the driver. An agent with the department of 

criminal investigation opined that two blood samples collected from 

the steering wheel and driver’s side of the dashboard “matched the 

known profile of Donald Gridley.” Gridley’s father “was eliminated 

as the source of the DNA found on those two samples.”

Id. at *1. Gridley’s father was removed from the vehicle and later died of his 

injuries.

Gridley points to several pieces of evidence to support his claim he was 

not driving including, having no broken bones or fractures, several witnesses 

testifying Gridley’s father was the only person allowed to drive the truck, and a 

witness who saw Gridley standing by the passenger door when leaving the 

reception. 

A trial was held, and a jury found Gridley guilty. Gridley appealed, and our 

court found the district court applied an improper standard when denying the 

motion for new trial and remanded the case to the district court. After applying 

the proper standard, the district court denied the motion. Gridley now appeals. 

II. Standard of Review

“The district court has broad discretion in ruling on a motion for new trial. 

We reverse where the district court has abused that discretion. . . . [Gridley] must 

show that the district court exercised its discretion on grounds or for reasons 

clearly untenable or to an extent clearly unreasonable.” State v. Reeves, 670 

N.W.2d 199, 202 (Iowa 2003) (citations omitted). “On a weight-of-the-evidence 

claim, appellate review is limited to a review of the exercise of discretion by the 
4

trial court, not of the underlying question of whether the verdict is against the 

weight of the evidence.” Id. 

III. Motion for New Trial 

Gridley claims the district court abused its discretion by finding the weight 

of the evidence supported the conclusion he was driving the vehicle and,

therefore, denying his motion for new trial. The district court made specific and 

expansive credibility findings:

The court hereby applies the “weight of the evidence” 

analysis to the evidence in this case, considering the credibility of 

the evidence and making an independent determination of whether 

the more credible evidence supports the Defendant’s claim that he 

was not driving the vehicle or the State’s claim that Defendant was 

driving the vehicle. In applying this analysis, the court considers 

the following:

1. Observation of the Defendant’s appearance and 

demeanor at trial, as well as the appearance and demeanor of the 

State's witnesses;

2. Defendant’s selective memory and testimony, including 

his admitted intoxication, his refusal to submit to alcohol testing, his 

conflicting versions of who had been operating the vehicle, and his 

questions to firefighters at the scene, "Did I kill my father? ls he 

going to die? Did I kill my father?"

3. The victim being pinned on the floorboard of the 

passenger side of the vehicle in a manner that would make it 

impractical to believe Defendant’s claim he repositioned the victim 

from the driver's side to the passenger side, combined with no 

evidence indicating the victim's body had been moved.

4. Defendant’s blood on the driver's side of the vehicle and 

contusions on Defendant's chest that resembled a steering wheel.

5. Defendant’s bias, candor and motivation to be untruthful 

and the lack of bias or motivation on the part of the State’s 

witnesses to be untruthful.

The district court went on to conclude Gridley’s “testimony he was not the driver 

of the vehicle is not credible or believable, despite other witnesses’ testimony 

that the victim rarely, if ever, let anyone drive his truck.” Finally, the district court 

found “the State’s witnesses’ testimony concerning their investigation of the 
5

accident and their observations and opinions that [Gridley] was driving the 

vehicle at the time of the crash” to be credible and believable.”

Gridley claims the district court abused its discretion by ignoring the 

evidence and testimony favorable to him. We find this evidence alone, especially 

when balanced against evidence contrary to Gridley’s claims, is not sufficient to 

show “the district court exercised its discretion on grounds or for reasons clearly 

untenable or to an extent clearly unreasonable.” Reeves, 670 N.W.2d at 202. 

The district court reasonably relied on the wealth of evidence contradicting 

Gridley’s statements denying he was the driver, including investigatory reports, 

blood tests, a technical collision investigation, and Gridley’s own repeated

question, “Did I kill my father?” The district court’s credibility findings show a 

reasonable reliance on the facts before it as well as consideration of many other

factors. Therefore, we affirm the district court.

AFFIRMED.