NYPD OFFICER INDICTED AND CHARGED WITH TAMPERING WITH EVIDENCE

Usanewsonline.com desk: Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced  that NYPD Police Officer Kevin Martin,  45, has been indicted by a Queens County grand jury and arraigned in Supreme Court on tampering with  evidence and other charges. The defendant failed to wear his body-worn camera during a March 2019 arrest  in which an illegal gun was recovered. In an effort to record the evidence afterwards, the defendant allegedly  re-enacted finding the firearm after attaching the required video recorder to his uniform.  

District Attorney Katz said, “The alleged misconduct by an officer sworn to serve and protect  undermines the mission of law enforcement. Public safety and accountability are not mutually exclusive –  they go hand in hand. It is more important now than ever to strengthen the people’s trust in the criminal  justice system by holding people accountable for their actions.”  

Martin, of Rockland County, New York, was arraigned today before Queens Supreme Court Justice  Toni Cimino on a two-count indictment. The defendant is charged with tampering with evidence and official  misconduct. Justice Cimino set the defendant’s return date for August 18, 2022. Martin, who is a16-year veteran of the NYPD, now faces up to four years in prison if convicted.  

District Attorney Katz said the defendant and his partner, who at the time were assigned to the 109th Precinct, were on patrol at approximately 4:20 p.m. when they arrested a driver for allegedly violating traffic  laws. The driver’s 2016 Jeep was seized and transported to an NYPD station house.  

Continuing, according to the charges, at approximately 4:50 p.m., the defendant conducted a search  of the seized vehicle that yielded no contraband. Later that evening, however, after approximately 11:30  p.m. as officers were retrieving property from the Jeep, pursuant to an inventory search the defendant told  his partner that he found a gun in a shoe that was inside the vehicle.  

According to the charges, Police Officer Martin went back inside the precinct and retrieved his body  worn camera, turned it on and then allegedly re-enacted finding the gun in the shoe inside the Jeep. The  evidence was later presented to the District Attorney’s office without disclosing that the body-worn camera  footage of the recovery of the gun was staged.  

The investigation was conducted by the New York City Police Department’s Internal Affairs Bureau,  Group 26.  

Senior Assistant District Attorney Phyllis Weiss, of the District Attorney’s Public Corruption Bureau  is prosecuting the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Khadijah Muhammad-Starling,  

Bureau Chief, and under the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations  Gerard A. Brave.  

Criminal complaints and indictments are accusations. A defendant is presumed innocent until proven  guilty.  Press Release