1. Introduction

Pagliai addresses a recurring plea-bargaining practice: resolving charges by dismissing some counts or cases in exchange for the defendant’s agreement to pay court costs in the dismissed matters. Ronald Pagliai faced four separate criminal cases: three theft (third degree, enhanced) shoplifting prosecutions and one interference with official acts charge. Under a single global plea agreement, he pleaded guilty in two theft cases; the State dismissed the other two cases on the condition that Pagliai pay costs in those dismissed cases.

The district court implemented the deal—sentencing on the two convictions, dismissing the other two cases, and assessing costs in the dismissals (noted in the record as including indigent defense fund recoupment and filing fees). Pagliai sought discretionary review, challenging whether a court may impose costs in a dismissed criminal case when no statute authorizes such an assessment—even if the parties negotiated for it.

The decision frames the dispute as a separation-of-powers and statutory-authority problem: in Iowa, “matters of crime and punishment are creatures of statute,” and the judiciary must act within the dispositional tools the legislature has authorized.

2. Summary of the Opinion

Majority (McDonald, J.)

• No statute authorizes costs in dismissed cases. Neither Iowa Code chapter 815 (indigent defense recoupment) nor chapter 910 (restitution, including “court costs” and attorney fees) permits assessing such costs where charges are dismissed and no judgment of conviction enters.
• Jurisdiction vs. authority. The district court had subject matter jurisdiction over the criminal cases, but lacked statutory authority to dispose of dismissed cases by taxing costs against the defendant.
• Plea agreement cannot confer authority. The parties cannot, “by contract, waiver, estoppel, or detrimental reliance,” empower a court to issue a statutorily unauthorized criminal disposition.
• Distinguishes multicount-cost cases. The State’s reliance on State v. Petrie and State v. McMurry fails because those cases involved costs in a multicount information where a judgment of conviction existed and a statute authorized costs in the case.
• Conditional vacatur and prosecutor election remedy. Because the unlawful cost term was part of the bargain, the court conditionally vacated and remanded, allowing the State to elect between (1) striking only the cost assessments, or (2) vacating the plea deal and resulting convictions/sentences and proceeding anew.

Concurrence in the judgment (McDermott, J.)

The concurrence would ground the defect not merely in statutory limits but in constitutional due process and the presumption of innocence: imposing “monetary exactions” on a person “adjudged guilty of no crime” is framed as unconstitutional, drawing from Coffin v. United States, Nelson v. Colorado, and Giaccio v. Pennsylvania.

Dissent (Waterman, J., joined by Christensen, C.J.)

The dissent would affirm, emphasizing longstanding plea practice and waiver: where the court has jurisdiction, alleged defects in authority can be waived by agreement or failure to object, relying on State v. Emery, State v. Mandicino, and Jasper v. State. The dissent views the majority’s distinction from Petrie/McMurry (single-file vs. multiple case numbers under a global deal) as formalistic.

3. Analysis

3.1. Precedents Cited

A. Statutory primacy in criminal punishment and costs

• State v. Fuhrmann and State v. Jepsen: The majority begins with the principle that defining crimes and punishments is a legislative function. This frames costs not as an inherent judicial incident but as part of the criminal-law consequence structure the legislature controls.
• State v. Campbell and State v. McGrew: These older cases are invoked to underscore that Iowa has no common-law crimes and that courts must follow statutory “manner” of prosecution and punishment—supporting the broader proposition that courts also need statutory permission to impose costs.
• City of Ottumwa v. Taylor and Woodbury County v. Anderson: These anchor the “costs are purely statutory” rule: costs “are now taxable only to the extent provided by statute,” and were “unknown at common law.”

B. Jurisdiction versus authority

• State v. Rutherford: Supplies the conceptual distinction: subject matter jurisdiction (power to hear the case) differs from authority (power to take a particular action within a case). This distinction is critical because it determines whether the defect is jurisdictional (void ab initio and nonwaivable) or an authority problem (potentially waivable in other contexts, as the dissent stresses).
• State v. Mandicino: Cited by the majority for the general framework of jurisdiction/authority; cited by the dissent for the proposition that authority impediments can be obviated by “consent, waiver or estoppel” where jurisdiction exists. Pagliai effectively limits that waiver principle when the challenged action is a statutorily unauthorized criminal disposition imposed as part of a plea bargain.
• State v. T.J.W. (and quoting State v. Olsen): Used to show when jurisdiction can be lost after final judgment/dismissal. The majority distinguishes T.J.W. because the orders in Pagliai were entered while the cases were still pending—so the problem is not jurisdictional timing, but lack of statutory authority for the particular disposition.

C. Unauthorized dispositions cannot be validated by plea agreement

• State v. Howell: The “leading case” for the proposition that an unauthorized bargain cannot “reshape the parameters of allowable punishment.” The majority imports Howell’s separation-of-powers concern into the cost-assessment context: if parties could bargain for statutorily unauthorized dispositions, they would “make their own law.”
• State v. Ohnmacht (quoting State v. Iowa Dist. Ct.): Reinforces Howell and emphasizes that when courts depart from legislatively mandated punishment, the result is “a nullity.” The majority treats costs in dismissal orders as analogous to unauthorized sentencing terms: the same policy against party-made criminal law applies to “any dispositional order.”
• State v. Louisell, State v. Copenhaver, State v. Iowa Dist. Ct., State v. Woody, State v. Austin, State v. Draper, State v. Peterson, State v. Strable (abrogated on other grounds by State v. White), Noble v. Iowa Dist. Ct., State v. Fix, and State v. Hallock: These collectively supply the “illegal sentence” doctrine: sentences not authorized by statute are void and not saved by waiver or agreement. The majority acknowledges the present case is not technically an “illegal sentence” under Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.24(5) because dismissal orders are “dispositional” rather than “sentencing,” but it applies the same rationale to unauthorized dismissals with cost assessments.
• Overton v. State and State v. Ryan: Used to show Howell/Ohnmacht reasoning extends beyond sentencing labels to other unauthorized sanctions and decisions: courts must act only under statutory authority “despite personal beliefs or good intentions.”
• State v. Rasmussen: A close analog: a no-contact order in a dismissed case was held void because an unauthorized disposition “cannot be affirmed on the basis of contract, waiver, estoppel, or detrimental reliance.” Pagliai extends and applies that principle specifically to costs.

D. Prior Iowa cost cases: the majority’s limitation

• State v. Petrie and State v. McMurry: The State argued these cases allow bargaining for costs connected to dismissed charges. The majority narrows them: both involved a multicount prosecution where at least one conviction produced a judgment and statutes authorized costs in the case. They do not authorize cost taxation in a wholly dismissed case with no judgment of conviction.
• State v. Headley: Quoted to clarify the reach of McMurry: paying costs tied to dismissed charges is permissible only insofar as they would have been incurred prosecuting the charges that were not dismissed—again, in the judgment-of-conviction context.

E. “Costs in dismissed cases are void” authorities

• State v. Brown: The majority cites Brown for directly vacating a cost assessment tied to a dismissed charge, describing such assessment as “illegal” and requiring vacatur.
• State v. Vogel and State v. Landis: Iowa Court of Appeals decisions vacating costs assessed on dismissed matters.
• Thomas v. State (Arkansas) and State v. Richey (Missouri) (quoting State ex rel. Merrell v. Carter and Cramer v. Smith): Persuasive out-of-state support for the proposition that costs require express statutory authorization and are void when assessed upon dismissal.

F. Remedy precedents

• State v. Woody: Poses the remedial dilemma when a plea agreement contains an illegal term—whether to enforce the remainder or unwind the bargain.
• State v. Ceretti (quoting State v. Walker and State v. Allen): Provides the remedial framework and the concern about defendants “quietly” taking favorable deals, appealing, and converting them into even better bargains. Also supplies the rule allowing reinstatement of dismissed charges when the plea bargain is vacated.
• Noble v. Iowa Dist. Ct.: Supports the prosecutor-election approach on remand, recognizing pragmatic prosecutorial considerations (staleness, evidence degradation) in deciding whether to unwind the entire plea.
• Est. of Kuhns v. Marco: Cited for the real-world litigation impact of time on proof (loss of evidence, faded memories), justifying leaving the election to the prosecutor.

3.2. Legal Reasoning

A. The statutory “closed world” of criminal dispositions

The majority’s reasoning is structural: because the legislature defines not only crimes and punishments but also the financial incidents of criminal dispositions, courts may impose costs only when a statute says they may. This is not presented as a matter of equitable discretion; it is framed as an institutional boundary.

Applying that boundary, the court reads the relevant statutes as authorizing costs/fees only in conviction (and in some contexts acquittal) scenarios, and restitution only “upon which a judgment of conviction is rendered.” A dismissed case falls into neither category. The majority also highlights the 2012 legislative repeal of language that had previously allowed indigent defense cost recoupment upon dismissal—treating that repeal as a deliberate legislative choice that courts and parties may not “veto” through plea bargaining.

B. Jurisdiction is present; authority is missing

The court carefully avoids converting the dispute into a jurisdictional defect. The district court had constitutional and statutory subject matter jurisdiction over the pending criminal cases. The error was the lack of power to enter a particular kind of order (cost assessment) in a dismissed case. This move matters because it clarifies doctrinal categories: the case is not about a court acting after jurisdiction ended, but about a court acting beyond statutory authorization while jurisdiction still existed.

C. Plea bargaining cannot “make law”

The crux is the extension of Howell/Ohnmacht’s anti-“party-made law” principle from sentencing to dismissal dispositions. Even though a dismissal order is not a “sentence,” it is still a dispositive act in a criminal case—an act whose permissible content is set by statute. The majority treats the plea agreement’s cost term as an attempt to create a new category of disposition: dismissal-plus-costs, where the legislature has not authorized it.

D. Distinguishing Petrie/McMurry: the “judgment of conviction” line

The majority draws a bright line at the existence of a judgment of conviction in the specific case in which costs are imposed. In multicount cases (Petrie/McMurry), the statutes authorize costs in the case upon conviction, and courts can apportion costs tied to dismissed counts within that case. In a wholly dismissed case, there is no statutory hook—so there is no apportionment power to bargain over.

E. Remedy: conditional vacatur with prosecutor election

Recognizing that the unlawful term was part of the bargain’s “object,” the court refuses to automatically enforce the rest of the deal. Instead, it selects a conditional vacatur and remand that gives the State the strategic election: either accept the bargain without the illegal cost term (vacate costs only) or unwind the entire deal (vacate convictions/sentences and allow reinstatement of charges). This is an explicit attempt to prevent appellate “one-way ratchets” that would reward unlawful bargains while still acknowledging that restarting prosecution may be impractical or unfairly costly to the State.

3.3. Impact

A. Immediate practical effect on plea bargaining

The decision directly targets “dismissal at defendant’s cost” when the costs are assessed in a separate dismissed case with no conviction. Prosecutors and defense counsel can no longer rely on global pleas that require defendants to pay filing fees, indigent defense recoupment, or other “court costs” in cases that end only in dismissal—absent new legislation.

The dissent predicts a substantial disruption because the practice has been widespread; the majority’s opinion suggests that widespread use cannot supply legal authority and warns against using bargaining to override the legislature’s repeal choices.

B. Doctrinal effect: extending “illegal sentence” policy to “dispositional” orders

Even while insisting this is not an “illegal sentence” challenge under Iowa R. Crim. P. 2.24(5), the majority extends the same nonwaivability logic to any unauthorized disposition. This can influence future disputes over plea-negotiated, non-sentencing terms (e.g., no-contact orders, fees, conditions attached to dismissals) whenever statutory authorization is absent.

C. Incentives and appellate strategy

By adopting the prosecutor-election remedy, the court shapes incentives on both sides:

• Defendants face a credible risk that challenging an unlawful cost term may unwind the entire deal and revive dismissed charges.
• The State can decide whether the value of costs warrants reopening prosecution, considering evidence staleness and resource constraints.

D. Legislative response pathway

The dissent explicitly invites legislative repair (reenacting authority similar to the former Iowa Code § 815.9(4) (2012)). The majority’s statutory framing makes the decision particularly “legislature-addressable”: if the General Assembly wishes to authorize costs on dismissal by statute (with limits), it can do so, subject to any constitutional constraints flagged by the concurrence.

E. Constitutional shadow (from the concurrence)

Although the majority does not reach constitutional issues, the concurrence lays groundwork for future litigants to argue that imposing monetary obligations in non-conviction dispositions violates due process and the presumption of innocence. That argument—if adopted in a later case—could constrain even a legislative attempt to authorize costs on dismissal, at least where the defendant is “adjudged guilty of no crime.”

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

Statutory authority (and “ultra vires”)

Statutory authority means the legislature has given courts power to do a thing. If a court acts without that permission, it acts ultra vires—beyond its power—making the order invalid even if everyone agreed to it.

Subject matter jurisdiction vs. authority

Jurisdiction is the court’s power to hear a type of case (criminal cases, civil cases). Authority is whether, inside a case the court can hear, the court can take a specific action (like ordering costs on a dismissal). In Pagliai, the district court had jurisdiction over the criminal matters but lacked authority to assess costs in the dismissed cases.

“Sentence” vs. “dispositional order”

A sentence is the punishment imposed after a conviction. A dispositional order is how the court concludes a case (including dismissal). The majority says the challenged cost orders were dispositional, not sentencing, yet still void because disposition powers are also statutory.

Restitution and costs under Iowa Code chapter 910

Iowa’s restitution statute authorizes restitution (including certain “court costs”) only when there is a guilty plea/verdict “upon which a judgment of conviction is rendered.” If a case is dismissed, there is no such judgment—so the restitution statute does not authorize costs in that dismissed case.

Why the remedy is “conditional”

Because the illegal cost term was part of the bargain, simply striking it might unfairly improve the defendant’s deal after the fact. The conditional remand lets the prosecutor decide whether to keep the plea deal without the illegal term or undo the deal entirely and start over.

5. Conclusion

State v. Pagliai establishes (and operationalizes) a clear rule: no statute, no costs in dismissed criminal cases, and plea agreements cannot supply missing statutory authority for dismissal dispositions. The majority treats unauthorized cost assessments in dismissals as ultra vires and invalid, extending Howell/Ohnmacht’s separation-of-powers logic beyond sentencing labels to the broader universe of criminal dispositions.

The decision’s second major contribution is remedial: when an unlawful disposition term is part of a plea bargain, the proper response is not automatically to excise it, but to remand with a prosecutor election between enforcing the remainder or vacating the whole bargain and reinstating charges. That remedial structure will likely shape Iowa plea practice, appellate strategy, and—depending on legislative reaction—the future statutory architecture governing criminal costs.