Opinion ID: 2023562
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Evidence of Phone Calls.

Text: Defendant argues that the evidence that he made numerous phone calls and had a visitor at the police station after his arrest was irrelevant, and any probative value was substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice. Therefore, he contends that his conviction should be overturned. This court reviews the trial court's decision on the relevancy of evidence for an abuse of discretion. Duncan v. City of Cedar Rapids, 560 N.W.2d 320, 323 (Iowa 1997). An abuse of discretion is found only when the trial court exercises its discretion on grounds or for reasons clearly untenable or to an extent clearly unreasonable. State v. Privitt, 571 N.W.2d 484, 486 (Iowa 1997). Iowa Code section 321J.16 provides that proof of a defendant's refusal to submit to a chemical test is admissible in any action against that defendant arising out of section 321J.2. Relevant evidence is defined as evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence. Iowa Mut. Ins. Co. v. McCarthy, 572 N.W.2d 537, 544 (Iowa 1997). We find that the evidence regarding defendant's phone calls and visitor while at the police station was relevant to show the circumstances surrounding his refusal to submit to a breath test. Furthermore, there was little danger of unfair prejudice in the admission of this evidence. The identities of the recipients of the phone calls and defendant's visitor were not revealed until closing arguments at which time it was defendant's attorney who informed the jury that the visitor was his attorney. Therefore, we uphold defendant's conviction of first-offense OWI.