Page County Sheriff Lyle Palmer says a joint investigation between the Page County Sheriff’s Office and Shenandoah Police, resulted in search warrant executed at 108 N. Center Street in Shenandoah, Wednesday afternoon. In the process, 37-year old Jamie Valrema Vanatta, of Shenandoah, was arrested on a Page County Warrant for Accessory to a felony.  Vanatta was unable to post a $2000 cash only bond, and was booked into the Page County Jail while awaiting further court proceedings.

Jamie Valrema Vanatta

The Mills County Sheriff’s Office reports 39-year old Mara Kae Hunt, of Glenwood, was arrested this (Wednesday) afternoon, on a warrant for Violation of Probation. Hunt was being held in the Mills County Jail on $10,000 bond.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports 25-year old Christine Whitney McGlade, of Red Oak, was arrested today (Wednesday), on an Adams County warrant for Operating a motor vehicle While Intoxicated. McGlade was being held for Adams County in the Montgomery County Jail, on $1,000 bond.

The Iowa Court of Appeals has upheld a sentence of Life in Prison for a man convicted of first degree murder in Pottawattamie County. In it’s decision, the Court rejected the appeal of Dan Dorris, who was convicted of 1^st Degree Murder and Willful Injury, for the May 12, 1998 shooting of Timothy Osbourne, in Council Bluffs. The Willful Injury charge was merged into his Life sentence.

Dorris appealed the district court decision denying his request for postconviction relief from his conviction for first-degree murder. In its decision, the Appeals Court said the district court did not act improperly by failing to record a postconviction hearing, by not having sufficiently specific findings of fact and conclusions of law in its decision, or by denying Dorris’s request to file a pro se supplemental brief.

The Appeals Court said Dorris has also not shown he received ineffective assistance of counsel.

The Iowa Court of Appeals has upheld two, first degree murder convictions for a Lake City man. In May, 2015, Thomas Guy Henderson was found guilty of the murders of 48-year old Tami DeVore and her son, 30-year old Karl DeVore. The pair were found dead May 18, 2014 at Tami DeVore’s home in Glidden. They died from blunt force trauma and, in the case of Karl DeVore, also of stabbing. Henderson was sentenced to Life in Prison for their deaths.

In his appeal, Henderson claimed ineffective counsel, that the trial court improperly admitted a hearsay statement, and the court abused its discretion in denying his motion for mistrial.

The Appeals Court said Henderson failed to show he was prejudiced, and therefore cannot maintain his ineffective-assistance claim. Additionally, they find the admitted statement was not a hearsay statement, and the court’s denial of his motion for mistrial was a proper exercise of the court’s discretion.

The Iowa Court of Appeals has upheld the first degree murder conviction of a man charged in a Fremont County case. In Feb., 2015, Brian Heath Davis was sentenced to life in prison for the July 2009 murder of Holly Ray Durben, from rural Shenandoah. He had appealed his conviction based on what he claimed was insufficient evidence, improper evidentiary rulings concerning expert-opinion testimony and prior-bad-acts evidence, improper denial of his motion for new trial, and ineffective assistance of counsel concerning the recall of a witness, expert-opinion testimony, and prosecutorial error.

In it’s ruling the Appeals Court found substantial evidence in the record to support the elements of murder in the first degree, and they rejected Davis’s call for acquittal. The court also rejected his two other assertions, and concluded Davis’s trial counsel did not breach an essential duty by failing to object to the State’s recall of a witness or to the prosecutors’ statements during closing arguments. However, the Court said “because further development of the record is necessary to assess Davis’s ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim related to the medical examiner’s opinion testimony regarding the location of Durben’s shotgun wound,” they preserved it for possible postconviction-relief proceedings.