IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

No. 19-0520

Filed June 3, 2020

STATE OF IOWA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

vs.

MONROE COUNTY DISTRICT COURT (MAGISTRATE DIVISION),

Defendant-Appellant.

________________________________________________________________

Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Monroe County, Gregory Milani, 

Judge.

Steven Dees appeals the entry of a writ of certiorari in favor of the State 

setting aside an order granting Dees’s motion for return of seized property. 

AFFIRMED.

Matt O’Hollearn of Brick Gentry, P.C., West Des Moines, for appellant

Steven Dees.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Eric M. Dirth, Jacob J. Larson, and 

David S. Steward, Assistant Attorneys General, for appellee.

Considered by Vaitheswaran, P.J., and Doyle and May, JJ.
2

DOYLE, Judge.

Steven Dees appeals the entry of a writ of certiorari in favor of the State on 

its claim a magistrate judge acted illegally in granting Dees’s motion for return of 

seized property. The property at issue is the cape1 and antlers from a deer that 

Dees shot and killed in December 2017.2 An officer of the Iowa Department of 

Natural Resources (DNR) seized the property after citing Dees for unlawful taking 

of an antlered deer and failure to tag a deer within fifteen minutes of discovering 

the carcass, in violation of Iowa Code section 481A.38 (2017) and Iowa 

Administrative Code rule 571-94. Section 481A.38 provides, “It is unlawful for a 

person to take, pursue, kill . . . possess . . . any game . . . , except upon the terms, 

conditions, limitations, and restrictions set forth herein, and administrative rules 

necessary to carry out the purposes . . . as provided by the Code.” Iowa 

Administrative Code rule 571-94.9 provides, “A transportation tag . . . shall be 

 

1 A cape is the “pelt from the head and neck of an animal, for preparation as a 

hunting trophy.” https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/cape (last visited May 13, 

2020); “A deer cape is nothing more than a deer hide from the nose of the deer to 

just behind the front shoulders in length.” https://cliffordstaxidermy.com/taxidermyblog/deer-cape/ (last visited May 13, 2020). The cape is saved for a taxidermy 

mount.

2 Dees, a Florida resident, owns property in Monroe County. Dees obtained a

nonresident deer license to hunt antlerless deer on his own property. To legally 

hunt antlered deer, Dees paid an Iowa resident to obtain a license to hunt antlered 

deer, remain on his property while Dees hunted, and tag any deer Dees killed. The 

arrangement, as planned, did not violate “party hunting” rules. See Iowa Admin. 

Code r. 571-106.9. An Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) officer 

acknowledged that if the Iowa resident was present with Dees, Dees could shoot 

an antlered deer as long as the resident tagged it with the resident’s antlered deer 

tag. But the Iowa resident was not present when Dees shot at a deer or when 

Dees located the deer the next day. Instead, the resident arrived to tag the deer 

forty-five minutes after Dees located it. The Iowa resident was cited with a violation 

of Iowa Code section 481A.38 (2017) – unlawfully providing deer tag for illegal 

deer. He pled guilty to the charge. 
3

attached to the carcass of the deer within 15 minutes of the time the deer carcass 

is located after being taken, . . .”

3

 A magistrate judge found Dees not guilty of the 

unlawful-taking charge but guilty of the failure-to-timely-tag charge. On appeal, 

the district court affirmed the conviction. 

After Dees was acquitted of the unlawful-taking charge, he moved for the 

return of the cape and antlers. A magistrate judge concluded:

After trial [Dees] was found not guilty of illegal taking of the 

deer. It is therefore the conclusion of the court that the title to the 

antlers and cape would not belong to the state under Section 481A.34

as there was not violation for taking. [Dees] would therefore be

entitled to the antlers and cape based on the not guilty finding in the 

illegal taking charge.

In noting Dees had been found guilty of the failure-to-timely-tag charge, the 

magistrate judge found:

The facts associated with that charge showed that [Dees] shot 

at the deer while party hunting. [Dees] did not locate the deer on the 

evening he shot at the deer. [Dees] located the deer the next 

morning, backed away and did not take possession of the deer and 

move the deer until the other member of the party arrived to tag the 

deer. The deer was not tagged within 15 minutes of locating the 

deer, but [Dees] did not take possession of the deer until it was 

tagged.

The magistrate judge determined that Dees “did not catch, take, kill, or have 

possession of the deer with regard to the violation for failing to tag the deer within 

 

3 Dees was not charged under Iowa Code section 483A.8(2)(a) that provides

“When a deer is taken, the deer shall be tagged and the tag shall be dated. The 

tag shall be attached to the carcass of a deer taken within fifteen minutes of the 

time the deer carcass is located after being taken . . . .”

4

Iowa Code section 481A.3 provides, “Any person catching, taking, killing, or 

having in possession any of such . . . game, in violation of the provisions of this 

chapter, shall be held to consent that the title to the same shall be and remain in 

the state . . . .”
4

15 minutes of location. Therefore, the DNR cannot claim consent to the State’s 

possession under Section 481A.3.” The magistrate judge ordered the State to 

return the cape and antlers to Dees. 

On the State’s certiorari petition, the district court determined the State was 

entitled to the confiscated property based on Dees’s conviction for illegally tagging

the deer. Because the court found the magistrate judge acted illegally, it entered 

a writ of certiorari and set aside the order to return the seized property. Iowa R. 

Civ. P. 1.1404 (“A district court judge may order the issuance of a writ to an inferior 

tribunal, board, or officer, or to a judicial magistrate.”). Dees appeals. 

We review certiorari proceedings for correction of errors at law. See 

O’Malley v. Gundermann, 618 N.W.2d 286, 290 (Iowa 2000). The district court’s 

findings are binding on us if supported by substantial evidence. See id.

Iowa Code chapter 481A governs the conservation of wildlife. It declares

that, with rare exception, the State owns all wildlife within its borders.5 See Iowa 

Code § 481A.2, Democko v. Iowa Dep’t of Nat. Res., 840 N.W.2d 281, 293 (Iowa 

2013). “[T]he purpose of vesting ownership in all of the state’s wildlife in the state 

is ‘for the conservation of resources of the state.’” Democko, 840 N.W.2d at 294 

(citing Iowa Code § 483A.1). “Because the State has ownership of all the wild 

animals, including deer, in Iowa, it follows the State may properly regulate deer 

hunting. See [Iowa Code] § 483A.1 (providing a person may not hunt wild animals, 

including deer, without first obtaining a hunting license).” Carter v. Iowa Dep’t of 

 

5

“At common law, title to game was in the king (with us now, in the sovereign 

people), and no one could hunt game, even on his own land, without a franchise 

from the sovereign.” State v. Gallop, 35 S.E. 180, 181 (N.C. 1900) (citation 

omitted).
5

Nat. Res., No. 18-0087, 2019 WL 479096, at *4 (Iowa Ct. App. Feb. 6, 2019). Any 

person who violates the provisions of chapter 481A in catching, taking, killing, or 

possessing wildlife “shall be held to consent that the title to the same shall be and 

remain in the state for the purpose of regulating and controlling the catching, 

taking, or having in possession the same, and disposing thereof after such 

catching, taking, or killing.” Iowa Code § 481A.3. To that end, the State “shall 

seize with or without warrant and take possession” of an animal that has been 

caught, taken, or killed “in a manner,” “or had in possession or under 

control . . . contrary to the Code.” Id. § 481A.12. 

“The state shall not confiscate property seized under section 481A.12 . . . 

unless the person from whom the property was seized is convicted of the violation 

for which the property was seized.” Id. § 481A.13A(1). “If the person from whom 

the property was seized is not convicted of the violation for which the property was 

seized” the State shall return the property to the person from whom it was seized. 

Id. § 481A.13A(2). Dees asserts the State seized the cape and antlers pursuant 

only to the unlawful taking charge, not the untimely-tagging charge. He argues 

that since he was not found guilty of the unlawful taking charge, he was not 

convicted on “the violation for which the property was seized.” So he maintains 

the State is obligated under section 481A.13A to return to him the confiscated 

property. In support of his argument, Dees notes that the State requested 

liquidated damages under Iowa Code section 481A.130 as part of its unlawfultaking prosecution but not as part of its untimely-tagging prosecution. Besides the 

penalties provided for violating chapter 481A, the State may seek civil damages. 

“[A] person convicted of unlawfully selling, taking, catching, killing, injuring, 
6

destroying, or having in possession any animal, shall reimburse the state for the 

value of such . . . .” Iowa Code § 481A.130(1). This remedy is a separate remedy 

from the seizure provision of section 481A.12. We fail to see how the State’s 

pursuit of civil damages “coupled with the nature of the unlawful taking charge 

shows that the State seized the antlers and cape pursuant to [the unlawful-taking] 

charge only.” We therefore reject Dees’s argument on this point.

Dees also claims that the State could not seize the property under section 

481A.12 based on his failure to tag the deer within fifteen minutes because that 

violation falls under chapter 483A, not chapter 481A. But section 481A.12 states 

that the State may take possession of an animal taken or handled a manner 

contrary to the Iowa Code; it does not limit seizures to violations of chapter 481A. 

Even if it did, the State cited Dees for violating section 481A.38, which prohibits 

the taking or killing of animals in violation of the DNR’s administrative rules. 

Although the section cited by Dees, Iowa Code section 483A.8, includes tagging 

requirements for deer hunting, the DNR has administrative rules that further detail 

the tagging requirements. See Iowa Admin. Code r. 571-94.9 (addressing 

tagging). The magistrate judge found Dees guilty of violating the fifteen-minutetagging rule. The failure-to-timely-tag charge supports the State’s confiscation of 

the deer cape and antlers. The State does not have to return the property to Dees 

under section 481A.13A(2).

For all the above reasons, the grant of the writ of certiorari was proper. So 

we affirm.

AFFIRMED.