Timothy Jason Martinez, was just a week ago working a $160,000 a year job as the former deputy superintendent of Albuquerque Public Schools. That is over as he now faces multiple felony charges, including child sexual assault. What is astonishing is that Albuquerque appeared clueless about prior arrests in hiring Martinez as the second in command of the large school system.
Prosecutors in Colorado were a bit curious how Martinez could accept a job in New Mexico when he is not supposed to leave the state due to prior arrests in two cases in Colorado.
One of the cases involves four counts of child sexual assault of victims ages 8 and 13. The other reportedly involves a felony domestic incident this year involving a man described in court records as Martinez’s boyfriend.
Those charges could add up to 20 years in prison.
The problem with getting a high-profile job is that it is high profile. A Denver prosecutor read the same stories and pulled out his $50,000 bail bail agreement from in each case — including the bar on out-of-state travel without approval.
It now appears that Martinez never completed his his background test including the fingerprinting component. It is really astonishing that Martinez thought this was possible given his trial scheduled for 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 9 on the child sex abuse charges involving an 8-year-old and a 13-year-old victim. His domestic case reportedly involving his boyfriend from 2015 is also pending with travel limitations. He is accused of using his car as a deadly weapon in that assault. A second person was also reportedly injured in that incident. That man, aged 55, says that Martinez also struck him with his fist. The alleged boyfriend, 26, was hit at least once and kicked in what the second man described as a jealous rage.
With all of these alleged events, it is astonishing that not one of those cases was found by the school district before hiring Martinez.
Martinez is now out of job and in jail.
Pedophiles will always be attracted to jobs that give them access to children. Sad.
The administrator who hired him was recently interviewed. He was told 5 times that Martinez was dodging fingerprinting and a background check. He was confident that he would not be fired or forced to resign.
I am also curious if Martinez will be fired, or pressured to resign with benefits. Hopefully he was still in a probationary period. Otherwise, taxpayers will pay for his retirement after he gets out of jail.
He also attacked his 26 year old boyfriend with his car in a jealous rage. We should ban all cars.
There was no assault. All of these men and boys were his plural husbands, and he was exercising his religious freedom (“spare the rod, spoil the child”).
For the last five years or more, anybody remotely involved with children has a background check by a commercial agency and required to be of the congregation for at least a yr. Episcopal Diocese of Olympia (Seattle, WA)
There’s one set of rules for the below-six-figures crowd, and another for the six-figures-and-up crowd.
This is a scurrilous attack on gays.
By definition, this cannot have occurred.
Only BadWhiteHeteroMales commit pedophilia.
Gays are all teddy bears, the peak of civilization (right next to Lesbians PBUT), like on Will&Grace and Ellen.
I mean, it’s not like they ever go all postal or anything.
It’s not just Albuquerque that dropped the ball. The Colorado legal system, which was responsible for his cases, let someone with multiple felony charges—MULTIPLE–slip out of its hands by even granting him the opportunity to post bond on such severe charges. The prosecutor, instead of spending time reading about this guy and his new job, should’ve spent some of that time and energy convincing the judge to increase the bond amount or to deny it completely. There are failures all around–not just in the Albuquerque school district.
There is an old saw which rings true here: Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t teach, teach teachers.
BarkinDog – those that can do, those that can’t teach, those that can’t teach P.E.
Well, a lot of kids just dodged this bullet. Bullet, I believe that is the appropriate metaphor.
When I was checked out for a teaching position in Florida, not too long ago, my finger prints from having being pitched out of Montana for hitchhiking showed up. 1968, fingerprints for ‘hitchhiking in a border state’, and removed to Canada, and this guy gets that job. Whoa!!!!
I hope whoever hired dude gets a week buried to the neck in Vulture Gully with a gallon of honey poured on his or her skull. The parents of kids in that district deserve no less retribution.
stevegroen – actually, at his level he does not have much interaction with the children.
Paul writes, “stevegroen – actually, at his level he does not have much interaction with the children.” That may or may not be true of the position of deputy superintendent, but anyone who’d hire him – this guy just didn’t flow through the cracks with current interstate law enforcement communications technology, may be as messed up in the mind as he is.
Hell, I could have discovered his pending charges in Colorado in a five-minute online search with one of the subscription investigative sites.
stevegroen – it appears that he did not complete the background forms and fingerprint card. Nothing bad came bad, so they may have guessed that it was ‘all good.’ Or, at his level, it was just a formality.
Good enough for government work.
“Martinez is now out of a job and in jail.”
Well, it is about time. The whole justice system is getting way too soft with criminals of this sort. And with just about every other sort, especially the deliberate, dangerous sorts, like burglary, armed robbery, and murder. Way too soft.
This story is shocking to say the least. The bureaucrats in the Albuquerque Public Schools are definitely not doing a good job of vetting their employees. The person who approved hiring this guy should lose their job as well.
Every place I ever taught required a fingerprint card and background check. And those were updated every 5 years,