Kentucky sheriff’s deputies were supposed to transport William Martin to jail on a public intoxication charge and release him eight hours later.
Instead, they ended up killing him on the side of the road by tasering, pepper spraying and kneeling on his neck for almost two minutes.
“You’re going to kill me!” Martin pleaded before he stopped breathing, according to body camera footage released earlier this month.
But a grand jury last year chose not to indict the Marion County sheriff’s deputies and the Lebanon police officer involved in his death. And a lawsuit filed last year remains pending but has also remained under the national radar.
Now Martin’s family is demanding a federal investigation into his death, according to The Courier Journal.
“He died lonely on the side of a dark country road in the cold, without any support, without any witnesses, without anyone,” Martin’s father, Bobby McDougale, told the Louisville newspaper.
“It was him and them.”
The medical examiner who conducted the autopsy on Martin’s body ruled his death a homicide, saying he died from “multimodal asphyxia,” a result of the body being deprived of oxygen.
Dr. Darius Arabadjief, who conducted the autopsy, also determined Martin had no alcohol or drugs in his system that would have affected his actions – despite his arrest for public intoxication.
The medical examiner did find trace amounts of methamphetamine in his system, which were likely ingested days before his arrest, but the drug was “not circulating in his body at the time that he died,” according to a deposition.
When asked how he died, the medical examiner said, “I would say strangled, compressed his torso and smothered,” WDRB reported.
“The toxicology report proves that the arrest for public intoxication was false,” Martin’s father told the Courier Journal.
“What led to this man’s death — our son’s death — was a bogus arrest to begin with.”
But none of the law enforcement officers involved in his death have been disciplined, much less charged in his death. Martin’s family hopes a federal investigation will change that.
“I think justice needs to be served for him,” his wife, Amanda Martin, told the Courier-Journal. “He did not deserve to die.”
The Arrest
Marion County sheriff’s deputies Tristan Hayden, Chris Nelson and John Purdom responded to a call from Martin’s niece at 11:10 p.m. on December 16, 2022, accusing him of waving a gun in the air and threatening to shoot both her aunt and mom.
But when deputies arrived, they did not have enough evidence to charge him for domestic abuse or possession of a gun by a felon (he had priors), so they decided to arrest him for public intoxication. His wife told Kentucky State Police that he had consumed only one beer that night and was never given a breathalyzer test.
“When he left, he told us he would be back in eight hours,” she told the state law enforcement agency. “He wasn’t yelling. He wasn’t resisting. When he left the scene, he was fine.”
Deputies cuffed his hands in front of his body instead of behind him because he was being cooperative with their orders, she said.
He was placed in the back of Deputy Hayden’s patrol car and was on his way to jail when the back side window shattered, which is what led to the confrontation that ended up killing him.
Hayden claimed Martin had kicked out the window, but one of the attorneys representing his family, Greg Simms, said Martin was having a panic attack and needed air, so he pulled on the window, which was slightly open, causing it to shatter.
Hayden pulled his patrol car over and ordered Martin out.
“I’m not being uncooperative!” Martin told Hayden. ”I didn’t kick the window out!”
Hayden called the other deputies for help, who showed up with Lebanon police officer Knopp, who all attempted to cuff his hands behind his back.
The video shows the officers forcing his face into the ground while ordering him to place his hands behind his back, but it also shows Martin struggling to comply with their orders because his hands appeared to be caught on a hoodie he was wearing.
The video shows Hayden placing his knee on Martin’s neck as they tasered and pepper sprayed him. An investigation by Kentucky State Police determined deputies had put pressure on Martin’s neck for one minute and 46 seconds.
“You’re going to kill me,” Martin said before his body went limp.
“Hey, bud. Wake up. Wake up! Come on, bud. Hey, hey, wake up. Come on!” a deputy trying to revive him said, but it was too late. He was pronounced dead at a local hospital.
“These deputies reacted to a mental health issue, a panic attack, with violence,” said Simms, the attorney representing Martin’s family, according to WDRB.
“They crossed a lot of lines. They know they are not supposed to use these neck restraints, and they did it anyway.”
A grand jury declined to indict the officers in July 2023, and last week, Knopp, the Lebanon police officer, settled with the family for an undisclosed amount of money, leaving the three Marion County sheriff’s deputies remaining as defendants in the still-pending lawsuit.
But Martin’s family and attorney are seeking criminal charges against the officers.
“I want to see the officers responsible to be held accountable criminally,” Simms said. “And I want to see the Marion County Sheriff’s Office and the Lebanon Police Department held accountable for their complete lack of transparency and lack of training.”
