Woman says man with violent history ran her off road
Martinez was acquitted in high-profile 1993 case but convicted of other crimes
A Santa Fe man with a history of violence toward women was arrested again last week after police say he followed a woman from Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center onto Interstate 25 and ran her off the road before he was detained by law enforcement officers.
Daniel J. Martinez, 54, who was acquitted in a high-profile rape and murder case in 1993 but has been convicted of various other crimes, spent the weekend in jail before a Sandoval County magistrate released him Monday on a $500 bond, court records show.
An incarceration record provided by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s office Friday indicates Martinez, who has served time for kidnapping, assault and drug dealing, had just been released from prison in January.
Martinez faces charges of aggravated assault, reckless driving and possession of a concealed weapon in connection with his July 19 arrest by a Sandoval County sheriff ’s deputy, who wrote in an arrest statement that he had responded to a 911 call from a Santa Fe woman in her late 20s who said a man was chasing her down the highway in his pickup.
The woman said she had just walked out of the Santa Fe hospital when she saw the man sitting in a red Chevy truck and that he honked at her and waved his arms as if calling her over, but she “was scared and continued to her vehicle,”
according to the statement by Deputy Flavio Ortega.
The woman said she was headed south on I-25 when looked up to see the red truck following her, the document says.
The woman “explained the Chevy truck started driving very aggressive trying to catch up next to her,” according to the statement, “and when he did the driver rolled down his window to get her attention and [was] honking at her. … She did not recognize him and continued drive faster to get away from him and called police.”
The woman said the man then ran her off the road, almost making her crash on the right shoulder of 1-25, the statement says.
The deputy wrote that when he arrived at the scene, Bureau of Indian Affairs Special Agent Craig Janis had pulled over both vehicles. Janis told him he’d seen the woman’s white Jeep go off the road and try to get back on the road, the deputy wrote, but the red Chevy pickup was not allowing the Jeep back on the road so Janis decided to stop both vehicles.
“Dispatch also advised the male in the Chevy truck was being aggressive towards BIA officers,” Ortega wrote in his statement.
The deputy reported that when he checked Martinez for weapons, he found brass knuckles in Martinez’s back pocket.
Martinez told the deputy he had been waiting in the hospital parking lot for his “ex-girlfriend’s friend” according to the statement, “stating they had broken into his house and he wanted his things back and that’s why he followed [the woman].” Martinez told the investigator he didn’t know the woman’s name but knew she was related to his ex-girlfriend, according to the statement.
The woman said she had never seen or met Martinez, according the deputy’s statement.
The woman’s brother said Friday his sister had no connection to Martinez or any ex-girlfriend of Martinez. But he said the siblings had heard of Martinez because his sister had been in school with Martinez’s daughter years ago, and their father told them about Martinez’s past and warned them never to go to his home.
Martinez gained widespread notoriety in 1992 after he was charged with rape and murder. Police accused Martinez of dragging a woman into an arroyo off Rodeo Road and beating and raping her with a mop handle. The woman told investigators she had driven off the road to avoid hitting a motorcycle stopped in the middle of the road, after which Martinez reached through her window, grabbed her by the hair and dragged her out of her vehicle.
A Santa Fe County sheriff ’s deputy who arrived on the scene said Martinez wrested away his gun and fired a shot that killed a bystander, pharmacist Chester Radecki, who had come from his nearby home to investigate after hearing the woman’s screams. Police said Martinez fled in the deputy’s patrol car and later was arrested in California.
At his trial, Martinez gave a different account, denying that he raped the woman and saying the deputy fired the fatal shot.
A jury acquitted Martinez of the rape and murder charges in 1993 after a controversial trial during which his attorney, Gary Mitchell, convinced jurors Martinez was the victim of a police conspiracy.
Records indicate Martinez earlier had been convicted of aggravated assault in a 1988 case in which he had followed a woman before firing a sawed-off shotgun into her car, injuring her in the face.
In 1994, he was convicted of cocaine trafficking after a trial held in Albuquerque due to his notoriety in Santa Fe. He served 13 years of a 26-year sentence before being released on parole in 2008. Martinez began picking up new charges after his release. In 2010, after a DWI arrest, Martinez picked the lock on his handcuffs and escaped from state police custody. He was accused of kidnapping a Santa Fe woman immediately afterward and raping her in Albuquerque before having her drop him off a family member’s home.
Martinez’s lawyer in that case said Martinez and the woman knew each other and that the sex had been consensual. The lawyer speculated that the woman may have made up the rape story to cover her tracks when she realized that Martinez had been on the run from police at the time of their encounter.
The rape charge was reduced to attempted kidnapping as part of a plea agreement that called for Martinez to receive a 10-year prison sentence, all but one year of which was suspended at his initial sentencing in favor of probation, according to court records.
In 2013, while on probation in that case, Martinez was charged with battery on a household member after being accused of breaking into an ex-girlfriend’s home and injuring her, according to court records.
He pleaded no contest and was sentenced to another year in prison.
Court records show that a violation of his probation in the kidnapping case prompted the state to revoke his probation in 2014, sending him back to prison until his realease in January.
Sandoval County spokeswoman Melissa Perez said Friday, a week after Martinez’s latest arrest, the initial incident report was not available.
It was not clear Friday what information Sandoval County Magistrate Delilah Montano-Baca reviewed before deciding to release Martinez on a $500 bond. The magistrate did not return a call seeking comment.
District Attorney Lemuel Martinez, whose district includes Sandoval County, said as of Friday his office had not received any paperwork on the case.
According to online court records, an Albuquerque attorney who contracts with the statewide Law Offices of the Public Defender has been assigned to represent Martinez. She could not be reached Friday.
A man who identified himself as Martinez’s father answered the phone at Martinez’s home Friday and said he would get Martinez. The man could be heard telling someone a newspaper reporter wanted to talk to them, to which the person replied, “I ain’t got nothing to say.”