A former New Mexico sheriff’s deputy was sentenced Thursday to nine years in prison and three additional years of supervised release for kidnapping and sexually assaulting a woman he arrested last year while working in the line of duty at the Doña Ana Sheriff’s Office, authorities said.
Michael MartinezThe U.S. Attorney General announced that the 34-year-old will also have to register as a sex offender under the federal Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. He was convicted and sentenced for violating the woman’s civil rights and obstructing justice.
Martinez pleaded guilty to both counts in April, the Justice Department said. The charges stem from his sexual assault of the arrested woman inside his patrol car in April 2023, and his subsequent attempt to destroy the car’s camera system that had recorded footage of the assault.
“Sexual assault by police officers is a heinous crime and a shameful assault on the public’s trust in law enforcement,” Kristen Clarke, an assistant attorney in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement. “This defendant’s misconduct — exploiting the power of his badge, using his authority as a weapon as a police officer, and sexually assaulting a victim who was handcuffed in the back of his patrol vehicle — violated the victim’s fundamental civil rights and basic standards of decency.”
A criminal complaint filed last year and reviewed by CBS News describes the crimes for which Martinez later admitted responsibility. According to the complaint, Martinez went to the scene of a car accident on April 30, where a vehicle had struck a tree, and arrested one of two women at the scene for drunken driving and reckless driving. He first transported the woman to the sheriff’s office, where tests revealed her blood-alcohol level was half the legal limit, and a second sample was found to be “insufficient,” the document said.
Martinez then took the woman, still handcuffed, to a medical center to get her clearance. Authorities say Martinez then handcuffed her again and took her back to his patrol car, where he sexually assaulted her. He then drove the woman to the Doña Ana Detention Center and arrested her.
Hours later, Martinez allegedly attempted to destroy the WatchGuard DVR system inside his car. On May 2, he reported a criminal damage to property complaint to the sheriff’s office, claiming his vehicle had been broken into and his DVR system damaged or destroyed along with other technology, according to the criminal complaint. An investigation into that complaint revealed footage of the assault and his attempt to destroy the recording system. He was fired from the sheriff’s office shortly afterward.
Kerry Breen contributed to this report.
