Opinion ID: 1312684
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Use of a WillfulInjury Offense as the Designated Felony in the Felony Murder Instruction.

Text: Defendant contends that the district court erred in employing a willful-injury offense as a designated felony in its jury instruction on felony murder under Iowa Code section 707.2(2) (1991). He asserts that felonious assaults must be considered to have merged within the lesser offense of second-degree murder. We rejected the contention that defendant is making in State v. Beeman, 315 N.W.2d 770, 777 (Iowa 1982). Unless that decision is to be overruled, his present argument is without merit. The Beeman case was decided in 1982. Since that time, we have been asked to depart from its holding on several occasions. See State v. Ragland, 420 N.W.2d 791, 793 (Iowa 1988); State v. Mayberry, 411 N.W.2d 677, 682-83 (Iowa 1987); State v. Phams, 342 N.W.2d 792, 795 (Iowa 1983). We have steadfastly declined these invitations to disavow the principles established in Beeman. We again do so here. The issue presented is entirely one of statutory interpretation. A settled construction of a statute, coupled with the passage of time, invokes the principle that issues of statutory interpretation settled by the courts and not disturbed by the legislature have become tacitly accepted by the legislative branch. See Lockray v. State, 495 N.W.2d 754, 755 (Iowa 1993).