DENVER (CBS4/AP) – Jury selection began on Tuesday in the trial of a former Denver Public Schools principal and former New Mexico school administrator who has been charged with child sexual abuse and assault cases in Colorado.
Timothy Jason Martinez was arrested on the charges in 2013. Neither victim has any connection to his employment with DPS.
Martinez worked for DPS from 2002 to 2012.
Martinez was hired by Albuquerque Public Schools in June but resigned after the charges came to light. He was re-arrested after Colorado officials learned he left the state to take the Albuquerque job, a violation of his bond.
Martinez attended all his court hearings and Colorado authorities didn’t realize he had left.
In opening arguments Tuesday, a prosecutor said the two victims came from families that have been weakened by drug abuse, poverty and incarceration, and that made them the “perfect targets.”
The defense argued the evidence included lies, including from the boys’ parents.
Martinez, a former Denver schools employee, adopted the father of one of the alleged victims when he was abandoned as a boy and was a longtime friend of the victims’ families.
One of the alleged victims, a 6-year-old from Wyoming and the son of the man Martinez adopted, visited Martinez for about a month in May 2013 and later told his mother that Martinez had abused him in the bathroom. After he made the accusation, the other Wyoming boy on the trip with him also accused Martinez of abuse.
Defense attorney Leonard Martinez said his client had confronted the 6-year-old’s mother about the filthy living conditions in her home before the trip and alleged that she coaxed her son to lie about the abuse to keep her from getting in trouble with social services. Her husband, Martinez’s adopted son, was in a halfway house at the time.
“Yes the children are victims. They’re victims of their own families,” he said.
Assistant District Attorney Courtney Johnston said that Martinez preyed on the boys’ vulnerable families by offering to give them a break and taking care of them.
“These children have been perfect targets,” she said.
The trial could last through next week.
What a great bunch of people! This is what drugs can do to you - you end up in jail, or living in squalor, and not being able to look after your children. Good grief!
Timothy Jason Martinez was arrested on the charges in 2013. Neither victim has any connection to his employment with DPS.
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| Timothy Martinez |
Martinez was hired by Albuquerque Public Schools in June but resigned after the charges came to light. He was re-arrested after Colorado officials learned he left the state to take the Albuquerque job, a violation of his bond.
Martinez attended all his court hearings and Colorado authorities didn’t realize he had left.
In opening arguments Tuesday, a prosecutor said the two victims came from families that have been weakened by drug abuse, poverty and incarceration, and that made them the “perfect targets.”
The defense argued the evidence included lies, including from the boys’ parents.
Martinez, a former Denver schools employee, adopted the father of one of the alleged victims when he was abandoned as a boy and was a longtime friend of the victims’ families.
One of the alleged victims, a 6-year-old from Wyoming and the son of the man Martinez adopted, visited Martinez for about a month in May 2013 and later told his mother that Martinez had abused him in the bathroom. After he made the accusation, the other Wyoming boy on the trip with him also accused Martinez of abuse.
Defense attorney Leonard Martinez said his client had confronted the 6-year-old’s mother about the filthy living conditions in her home before the trip and alleged that she coaxed her son to lie about the abuse to keep her from getting in trouble with social services. Her husband, Martinez’s adopted son, was in a halfway house at the time.
“Yes the children are victims. They’re victims of their own families,” he said.
Assistant District Attorney Courtney Johnston said that Martinez preyed on the boys’ vulnerable families by offering to give them a break and taking care of them.
“These children have been perfect targets,” she said.
The trial could last through next week.
What a great bunch of people! This is what drugs can do to you - you end up in jail, or living in squalor, and not being able to look after your children. Good grief!
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