Jairon Gonzales Martinez, left, alleged MS-13 gang member, during a hearing Wednesday on a motion to overturn a 2013 murder conviction before Suffolk Supreme Court Justice Anthony S. Senft, Jr. Jairon Gonzales-Martinez had been convicted of second-degree murder for committing an alleged MS-13 gang beating that left Rumaldo Bethancourt Lopez, 29, dead outside a pool hall. Photo Credit: John Roca
An alleged MS-13 gang member from Brentwood convicted of taking part in a fatal gang beating outside a pool hall should get a new trial because a disgraced former Suffolk County homicide prosecutor hid evidence that could have resulted in his acquittal, the defendant’s lawyers argued before a judge Wednesday.
But prosecutors, who concede the evidence wasn’t shared with the defense before the trial — as is legally required — argued in Suffolk County Court that the second-degree murder conviction of Jairon Gonzales Martinez, 34, should stand because the disclosures wouldn’t have affected the jury verdict as the evidence against him was “overwhelming.”
Wednesday’s oral argument on the defense’s motion for the conviction to be set aside was the latest turn in the saga of disgraced former Suffolk prosecutor Glenn Kurtzrock, who was forced to resign in 2017 after he was caught withholding evidence from the defense in another case.
Kurtzrock’s law license was suspended after an appellate court found he “committed serious misconduct that undermines the public’s trust in the justice system” in a murder case that fell apart mid-trial when his actions were discovered. In 2021, the district attorney’s office released a report, following an investigation by its Conviction Integrity Bureau, alleging Kurtzrock failed to turn over required documents in at least 16 cases, including more than a dozen murder trials, as part of a pattern of “serious misconduct.”
Defense attorney Danielle Coysh, who is asking acting Supreme Court Justice Anthony S. Senft Jr. to set aside the verdict, along with Gonzales Martinez’s criminal trial attorney Michael J. Brown, said Wednesday that Kurtzrock acted “intentionally and deliberately” in the case “in order to control the narrative of Mr. Gonzales Martinez’s trial and procure a conviction.”
“Jairon Gonzales Martinez did not receive a fair trial,” said Coysh, who added that the proceeding was “replete with fraud and prosecutorial misconduct.”
Coysh said there was a “reasonable possibility” that if the jury had heard the details of the materials withheld from the defense, at least one juror would have not voted guilty.
Gonzalez Martinez, who was found guilty in 2014 and sentenced to 31 years to life in prison in the gang beating of victim Rumaldo Bethancourt Lopez, 29, outside a Brentwood pool hall, listened to the arguments through a Spanish language interpreter in court in Riverhead Wednesday.
Prosecutor Thomas Costello, the deputy chief of the DA’s appeals bureau, said while he was not attempting to excuse Kurtzrock’s conduct, the excluded evidence would not have changed the verdict.
Costello conceded that it could have impacted the sentences on multiple charges including second-degree murder, gang assault and attempted murder, which the trial judge imposed consecutively. Costello said if the court chooses any remedy, it could “adjust the sentences to run concurrent.”
Costello said Gonzales Martinez was seen carrying an object believed to be the murder weapon from the scene and the victim’s blood was on his pants with splatters indicating that he was in proximity to the victim.”He was not merely a bystander,” said Costello.
In 2017, the DA’s office provided Gonzales Martinez’s lawyers with 167 pages of documents that should have been disclosed pretrial under the Brady rule, which requires prosecutors to disclose evidence that could possibly help in their defense. Those documents included a police photo array of suspects showing that the prosecution’s lone eyewitness to the killing — who testified at trial that Gonzales Martinez beat the victim to death with a pipe — initially identified another man as the perpetrator when presented with a photo array of suspects by police.
It’s unclear why the eyewitness, a bouncer at the pool hall, made apparently conflicting statements, but Brown argued that Kurtzrock’s actions denied him the ability to cross-examine the witness about the apparent inconsistency.
And a month after the defense attorneys filed a motion for post-trial relief in July 2021, the district attorney’s office provided the defense with more previously undisclosed information in the case — that another defendant, Alcides Armando Gomez, had been indicted and later convicted of taking part in the fatal beating.
“Kurtzrock hides him from us,” said Brown, who said Gomez was indicted before his client’s trial began. Kurtzrock “redacted all references to him in the materials turned over.”
Kurtzrock could not be reached for comment and his attorney did not respond to a message seeking comment.
Brown, who said there was a “tremendous amount of blood at the crime scene,” said his client was “present, but not part of the actual beating.”
“If he was in such proximity, common sense would dictate, he would have a lot more blood on him,” Brown said. “He’s looking forward to being exonerated.”
By Nicole Fuller
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Nicole Fuller is Newsday’s senior criminal justice reporter. She began working at Newsday in 2012 and previously covered local government.
