GALLATIN CO.—It was quite the anticlimactic finish to a two-and-a-half-year-long case originating out of Jackson County, but with its roots in Gallatin, on September 26.
That was when Tina Martin, 39, the ex-wife of former Gallatin County sheriff Raymond Martin, entered a plea of “guilty” following months of negotiations in Jackson County court.
The plea reduced four counts of Solicitation to Commit Murder for Hire, all Class X felonies, down to a single Class 2 felony charges of Harassment of a Witness.
Citizens of Gallatin County were by and large taken aback by the leniency shown Martin, especially considering the level of involvement that they learned she had in her former husband’s criminal ventures in Gallatin County between 2009-2010, most of which occurred when he was incarcerated in Jackson County (Murphysboro) in federal holding after multiple drug and weapons charges were leveled against him in May of 2009.
Dismayed Gallatin residents
To make matters even more startling to dismayed Gallatin residents, the sentence issued in Martin’s conviction was as much a slap in the face to those hoping justice would be served as it was a slap on the wrist to Kristina Martin herself: 48 months probation, 250 hours of public service, a $25,000 fine, and 180 days in jail.
With day-for-day good time credit, and 26 days spent in lockup following her January 2, 2010 arrest at the Jackson County Detention Center (where she was visiting her jailed then-husband), that sentence has been cut in less than half, and she’ll be getting out of the JCDC in plenty enough time to spend Christmas with her fam.
According to testimony given during Raymond Martin’s federal jury trial in September 2010, Tina Martin was the lynchpin in the effort to ruin the government’s case against him.
Raymond Martin was arrested May 18, 2009, after a man originally from Harrisburg, Jeremy Potts, who had been doing some small-time pot dealing for Martin in Gallatin County after Potts had moved to Shawneetown, decided he could no longer engage in that kind of activity, and went to the authorities for help in getting out.
Captured video and audio
Potts was convinced to participate in setting up and capturing video and audio images of Martin directing him to sell marijuana in sizable amounts. For several months, Potts wore a wire and captured footage of Martin handing him baggies of pot, which Martin had purchased from several others in Gallatin County who were either growing it in the rich soil there, or obtaining it from areas outside the southern part of the state, two of these referenced being Cook County, Illinois, and somewhere in Texas.
At one point during one of the marijuana deals, Martin positioned his service weapon in a threatening manner toward Potts, which was what prompted the weapons charge in the federal case that ultimately resulted in the two life sentences for Martin (Use of a Weapon in the Commission of a Drug Crime), one of the most oft-misstated aspects of the case, as other media outlets, most of whom didn’t attend the federal trial, seem unable to understand that these two convictions were what garnered Martin the life sentences, and no other convictions, of which there were 15 total.
(Incidentally, these sentences have been overturned by a federal appeals court, and Martin has yet to be scheduled for re-sentencing as directed by said court.)
Another source of the pot, David Woods, was instrumental in providing the feds with information on where Martin was getting his pot.
Learned from discovery; developed plan
So when Martin went to jail awaiting the federal trial, and discovery in his case showed who the two police informants were, he, as a two-decade law enforcement officer, knew how it worked: without the testimony of the two key witnesses, the government, even with their videotape, would be hard-pressed to get a jury to convict, as the defense couldn’t cross examine a videotape.
So he devised the plan to hire two men he was incarcerated with—both of them down-on-their-luck do-nothings with barely two dimes to rub together—to kill both Potts and Woods, each for a few thousand dollars.
Kristina Martin was the go-between for not only the money, but for contacting both men (Thomas “Sarge” Hayden and Kevin Brown) and attempting to arrange the “hits.” Between Tina and Cody Martin (Raymond’s son from a previous marriage), the two worked with Raymond to concoct cover stories as well as code for speaking on the phone at the jail, which they all knew was being recorded, but over which they spoke anyway.
There were a lot of calls, as Martin was still receiving his sheriff’s pay ($44,000-plus annually) while in jail, and he had a lot of money for phone calls as a result.
There was also, it was shown, plenty of money to be had for the “hits.” In order to pay Kevin Brown for his “hit,” Cody Martin was to leave earnest money with him at Murphysboro McDonald’s at one point.
Working with ‘Sarge’; never charged federally
When the situation didn’t work out with Brown, Tina had put enough money away to pay Sarge…who was calling on a phone that was wiretapped in order to get Tina to say incriminating things about the hits. She did, even if she sounded nervous and vague in most of her conversations with Sarge.
Nevertheless, when the arrests came down, thousands of dollars were found in envelopes with Tina’s name on them at her place of employment, Precision Mine, owned by Frank Sisk in Equality.
Tina nor Cody were ever charged on the federal level. The prosecution in Jackson County apparently believed that their charges, as severe as they were (Cody was charged with the same four Solicitation charges as Tina), were limited to the state level and remained in Jackson County.
Martin’s, however, were taken up by superseding indictment in the federal case, and Intimidation (the federal equivalent of the Solicitation charges) counts were added as a result…and as a result, Martin’s state charges were dismissed by Jackson County.
Ultimately, Tina Martin would receive the same favor, her four Solicitation counts amended to the single Harassment counts… “harassment” hardly a fitting term for the intricate planning and detail Tina Martin put into finding, communicating with, and funding the “hits” while her husband sat in jail, unable to do anything toward the crimes except come up with them in his mind.
TINA NAAS MARTIN
Crocodile tears
Tina Martin boohooed during her sentencing in September, even though, according to Gallatin County residents, for the past two and a half years, she’s been living it up, violating terms of her bond (from which her fines and fees came, meaning that such punishment meted out in the sentencing didn’t hurt her one bit financially) in various ways, divorcing her husband three months after his conviction, receiving public aid in several forms because she lost her house and had to rely on others to take her in and/or pay for her rent/utilities, and generally behaving as though she had done nothing wrong, even though hours upon hours of taped calls tell otherwise.
Ironically, one of the prosecutors in Raymond Martin’s federal case, Michael Carr, is running for the office of state’s attorney in Jackson County in just a few weeks. Carr is seeking to be selected to replace the prosecutor who entered into the plea agreement with Tina, Mike Wepseic, who never seemed very keen in following through with anything serious as it had to do with Tina, but instead seemed more interested in making sure he got the case off the docket in whatever way possible before his time was up in December, and the plea agreement, apparently, was a good way to go.
Dope still proliferant in Gallatin
In the meantime, those in Gallatin who know what’s really going on there are still disgusted that both Tina and Raymond Martin could very easily have rolled on some of the local drug distributors and pot growers—including, allegedly, some bigwig subsidy-sucking farmers, one of whom was named in the pot transportation from Texas evidence during Martin’s trial—and likely have gotten out of the larger part of their legal troubles. For whatever reason, they chose not to, and there have been no arrests made in the intervening three and a half years that the drama unfolded.
And those who are perpetuating the drug trade in and around the county—including those who have anhydrous tanks buried on their properties, and who are moving their “back pills” (Lortabs and somas) for big bucks—are doing so unhindered, because, it appears, even the feds have lost interest in what’s going on in Gallatin County, now that the Martin saga is almost over (‘almost’ because Cody Martin’s Jackson County case has yet to be closed, but had been scheduled for a “review” in early October; more on that as it becomes available.)