MONROE — Attorneys for the now-adult woman abused by former Monroe police officer Carlos Martinez have petitioned for her trial to be re-opened, saying the opposing side did not produce a key audio interview police made with a state Department of Children Youth and Families (DCYF) worker who held suspicions Martinez was sexually abusing the underage girl, and this denial affected how the victim’s attorneys could prepare for the case and may have altered how they tried their case.
In November, a jury determined DCYF must pay $3 million to the victim. DCYF has appealed to the state Division I Court of Appeals.
The recorded interview from 2013 by the Washington State Patrol was prominently used in the trial.
The victim’s attorneys obtained the recording on their own after the deadline for the discovery phase of the trial had passed.
DCYF’s appeal says because it was post-discovery, this recording wasn’t admissible evidence, according to the victim’s attorneys.
In late February, the attorneys filed to Snohomish County Superior Court to have November’s judgment vacated and order a new trial, and to have the court file sanctions of fraud on DCYF for not providing it under discovery.
The state attorney general’s office replied to the February filing that it was “alarmed” by the accusation its client DCYF withheld material, in part because DCYF wasn’t involved in seeking records for the case. The AG’s office was.
Lead attorneys in the AG’s torts office didn’t know someone on their own team filed a records request to the Patrol for material, and it doesn’t have evidence showing that this team member downloaded the computer file of the audio interview made available in May 2023 by the Patrol in the records request, a senior attorney within the attorney general’s office wrote in its defense filing to court.
“Neither DCYF nor the AGO ever had a copy of the audio file” of the Patrol’s interview “prior to Plaintiffs counsel having produced a copy in conjunction with the filing of Plaintiffs first motion for sanctions,” the senior attorney wrote.
Snippets of court transcripts from October corroborate statements the same attorney gave in court that the AG’s office didn’t have it. He said in court they didn’t make a records request for it.
DCYF’s reply said the judge should throw the case out.
The attorneys for the woman uncovered the state received the audio interview from making records requests to the Patrol asking for records that were given.
A hearing in Snohomish County Superior Court was Feb. 29.
In 2015, Martinez was convicted to 14 months in prison for having pictures of a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
State DCYF to pay $3M to Martinez’s victim
