Opinion ID: 1984609
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Stalking Statute.

Text: Our statute provides: 2. A person commits stalking when all of the following occur: a. The person purposefully engages in a course of conduct directed at a specific person that would cause a reasonable person to fear bodily injury to, or the death of, that specific person or a member of the specific person's immediate family. b. The person has knowledge or should have knowledge that the specific person will be placed in reasonable fear of bodily injury to, or the death of, that specific person or a member of the specific person's immediate family by the course of conduct. c. The person's course of conduct induces fear in the specific person of bodily injury to, or the death of, the specific person or a member of the specific person's immediate family. Iowa Code § 708.11(2). The district court found these elements were proven. It also found that Bellows violated the Illinois protective order, and this elevated Bellows' offense to a class D felony under section 708.11(3): b. A person who commits stalking in violation of this section commits a class D felony if any of the following apply: (1) The person commits stalking in violation of a criminal or civil protective order or injunction, or any other court order. Bellows contends the Iowa trial information should have been dismissed, arguing that the State was required to file the Illinois protective order in Johnson County, Iowa, before the district court could consider it. Section 626A.2 (the registration statute) provides: A copy of a foreign judgment authenticated in accordance with an Act of Congress or the statutes of this state may be filed in the office of the clerk of the district court of a county of this state which would have venue if the original action was being commenced in this state. The clerk shall treat the foreign judgment in the same manner as a judgment of the district court of this state. A judgment so filed has the same effect and is subject to the same procedures, defenses and proceedings for reopening, vacating, or staying as a judgment of the district court of this state and may be enforced or satisfied in like manner. (Emphasis added.) He also relies on section 236.19: 2. A copy of a foreign protective order authenticated in accordance with the statutes of this state may be filed with the clerk of the district court of the county in which the person in whose favor the order was entered resides. The clerk shall provide copies of the order as required by section 236.5. 3. A foreign protective order so filed has the same effect and shall be enforced in the same manner as a protective order issued in this state. Iowa Code § 236.19 (Supp.1995) (emphasis added). The State responds that (1) Iowa should accord full faith and credit to the Illinois order under the United States Constitution and 18 U.S.C. § 2265 (1994) (providing for full faith and credit to protective orders), regardless of whether it was filed in Iowa; and (2) even if the Illinois protective order did not have legal effect in Iowa, the State satisfied the elements of the charge by proving Bellows violated the order partially in Illinois and partially in Iowa. Here, the court found: 1. On or about March 15, 1998, Mr. Bellows purposely engaged in a course of conduct directed at Ms. Cardwell that would cause a reasonable person to fear bodily injury or her death. 2. That Mr. Bellows knew or should have known that Ms. Cardwell would be placed in reasonable fear of bodily injury or death. 3. That his course of conduct induced fear in Ms. Cardwell of bodily injury or death. Thus, the court found that Bellows' acts in Johnson County violated Iowa's stalking statute and the Illinois protective order as well. Bellows' violation of the Illinois order subjected him to an enhanced penalty because he had acted in violation of a criminal or civil protective order or injunction, or any other court order, under section 708.11(3)(b)(1). (Other aggravating circumstances, not involved here, include stalking while armed and stalking a person under eighteen years of age. See Iowa Code §§ 708.11(3)(b)(2), (3)). We consider convictions from other jurisdictions to enhance punishment for violations of other Iowa criminal laws. For example, Iowa Code section 901A.2(5) (1999), with respect to punishment for a sexually predatory offense, provides: In determining whether a conviction is a first or second conviction under this subsection, a prior conviction for a criminal offense committed in another jurisdiction which would constitute a violation of [an Iowa statute] if committed in this state, shall be considered a conviction under this subsection. Also, in license revocation cases, our statute provides for enhancement of penalties based on foreign offenses: For the purpose of determining if a violation charged is a second, third, or subsequent offense ... convictions or the equivalent of deferred judgments for violations in any other states under statutes substantially corresponding to this section shall be counted as previous offenses. The courts shall judicially notice the statutes of other states which define offenses substantially equivalent to the one defined in this section and can therefore be considered corresponding statutes. Iowa Code § 321J.2(3). These analogous statutes turn on whether a person has been convicted of another offense. The Iowa stalking statute does not require a prior judgment or conviction under a protective order; it only requires that a judge find, in the Iowa proceeding, that the terms of the order had been violated. Iowa Code § 708.11(3)(b)(1). We said recently with respect to enhanced revocation in drivers' licenses cases that [t]he enhanced punishment prescribed... is not directedcertainly not entirelyat the cumulative effect of successive affronts to Iowa law. The main focus is on the last offense here in Iowa. We think the legislature called for the enhancement because, notwithstanding ample experience, the accused simply was not getting the point. This interpretation promotes the legislative purpose of section 321J.4(3), which is to protect the public by removing repeat-offenders from our roadways. State v. O'Malley, 593 N.W.2d 517, 519 (Iowa 1999). Likewise, enhancing the penalty for violation of a foreign protective order promotes one of the goals of the legislature in enacting the stalking statute. A study by our Domestic Abuse Task Force, which prompted this stalking legislation stated: No sound policy reason exists for protecting the survivor only in the state in which she obtained the order. Future violence ought to be constrained in any state in which the victim is located. Final Report of the Supreme Court's Task Force on Courts' and Communities' Response to Domestic Abuse, at 63 (1994). Because we consider the Illinois protective order only with respect to punishment for an offense committed in Iowa, we do not purport to enforce the order itself. Therefore, we need not consider whether we should grant full faith and credit to the Illinois order or require registration of it before we give effect to it. We hold that the Iowa district court had jurisdiction to try this offense, and it properly denied the motion to dismiss.