STATE OF IOWA, Plaintiff - Appellee, vs. PATRICIA JEAN CLIFTON , Defendant - Appellant.
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA
No. 8-771 / 07-2073
Filed October 15, 2008
STATE OF IOWA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
vs.
PATRICIA JEAN CLIFTON,
Defendant-Appellant.
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Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Black Hawk County, Jon Fister,
Judge.
Defendant appeals from the judgment and sentence entered upon her
conviction of possession of marijuana with intent to deliver. AFFIRMED.
Mark C. Smith, State Appellate Defender, and Dennis Hendrickson,
Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Jean Pettinger, Assistant Attorney
General, Thomas J. Ferguson, County Attorney, and Brad Walz, Assistant
County Attorney, for appellee.
Considered by Huitink, P.J., and Vogel and Eisenhauer, JJ.
2
HUITINK, P.J.
Following a bench trial, Patricia Clifton was convicted of possession of
marijuana with intent to deliver. On direct appeal Clifton claims she was denied
effective assistance of counsel, citing counsel’s failure to challenge the
admissibility of inculpatory statements she made following her arrest. Clifton
accordingly requests her conviction be reversed and that we remand for a new
trial. Because we find the record is insufficient to resolve Clifton’s ineffective
assistance of counsel claims, we affirm her conviction and preserve her
ineffective assistance of counsel claims for possible postconviction proceedings.
See State v. Biddle, 652 N.W.2d 191, 203 (Iowa 2002) (“We preserve such
claims for postconviction relief proceedings where an adequate record of the
claim can be developed and the attorney charged with ineffective assistance may
have an opportunity to respond to defendant’s claim.”).
AFFIRMED.
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