Lawyer Vows to Fight Jail Term for Former Teamster Official Convicted in 1973

Saying his client “is in a state of complete shock,” an attorney for former Teamsters official Frank Martinez said Friday he will seek every legal means possible to keep Martinez from going to prison on a conviction that is 15 years old.

On Thursday, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a court order requiring Martinez to begin a four-year term for his 1973 conviction for threatening a businessman to prevent testimony in a grand jury hearing.

In a bizarre legal snafu, Martinez was convicted but never sent to prison.

Error Found in 1983

The FBI discovered the error in 1983 after receiving information that Martinez’s name was left off a prison order issued by the U.S. District Court clerk in 1976 shortly after Martinez had exhausted his appeals.

When the mistake came to light, Martinez was incarcerated at the Terminal Island federal prison for a short time. However, his attorney, Allan A. Sigel, appealed the sentence on the grounds that Martinez’s right to a speedy trial, including imposition of his sentence, had been violated.

Sigel said that for the last 15 years, Martinez and his family have lived in a state of limbo “never knowing if he would end up in prison or remain free. For his wife and children, this latest news is as though they’ve suffered a death in their family.”

He said Martinez never attempted to hide but operated a butcher shop, raised his family and more recently worked as a trucker. Martinez could not be reached for comment Friday.

“He’s not even the same person anymore; his life has completely changed,” Sigel said.

Sigel said that when the six other defendants in the case were sentenced to prison in 1976 and Martinez remained free, he was suspected by the others of being a government informant “and was ostracized by all his former colleagues. He was shut out of his former life.”

When Martinez realized that the justice system had forgotten about him, “he, for better or worse, never contacted the courts,” Sigel said. “He basically said, ‘Why rock the boat?’ ”

Sigel said he supported Martinez, advising him to remain quiet about the mix-up.

“The court was critical of me for not bringing him in, but frankly I view my job as an attorney as keeping people out of jail, not putting them in,” Sigel said. “It’s just too bad that they remembered him.”

Next week, Sigel said he will ask the court to grant Martinez a stay in the execution of his sentence to give them time to seek an administrative solution from prison officials. Sigel said a prison committee could decide to grant Martinez credit for time that has already elapsed.

Barring that, Sigel said he will seek a review of the case by the U.S. Supreme Court.