The 2002 police report that details a threatening voicemail left by Watsonville City Councilman and 4th District Supervisor candidate Emilio Martinez reads like a scene out of Goodfellas. Using a grand total of 15 F-bombs deftly placed among 12 sentences, Martinez makes it clear that one Joe Norris, a former colleague at Indian Motorcycles in Gilroy, ought to tender his resignation.
“You don’t quit or they don’t fu**in’ fire you(r) fat, motherfu**ckin Nazi motherfu**ckin fat ass, I’m going to shoot you,” reads a partial transcript of the voicemail, filed by Gilroy Police Officer D. Marrazzo. “I’m gonna blow that motherfu**in place up. You got a bullet hole through your heart already.”
The phone message led to Martinez being charged with “false report of planting bomb” and “threats to commit a crime resulting in death or great bodily injury,” both misdemeanors. Martinez, however, never answered to a judge. The incident came to light late last month when the Santa Cruz Sentinel uncovered an arrest warrant issued in 2002 by the Superior Court of Santa Clara County but never served by the Gilroy police. Martinez will be arraigned on the charges and the warrant June 29 at the courthouse in Morgan Hill.
Meanwhile, his campaign for county supe, which sees him in a threeway race with Watsonville Councilman Greg Caput against longtime incumbent Tony Campos, is struggling to shrug off the scandal. Martinez maintains that the phone call—news of which he says was leaked to the Sentinel by the Campos campaign—was all in jest. “It was a prank. We used to do this to each other all the time,” says Martinez, who writes on his blog that the president of Indian Motorcycle still calls him up and leaves similar prank messages on a regular basis.
Martinez also claims he was “tricked” by the Sentinel into coming in for an endorsement meeting, then confronted about the warrant (a claim reporter Donna Jones confirms, although she says he was not tricked and that it was in fact a “legitimate endorsement meeting.”) Martinez continues: “The issue here is: was there was a warrant for my arrest? Yes. Did I know it? No. I wasn’t aware of it. Had I been aware of it I would have taken care it. It’s unethical to write that article just before absentee ballots go out. It’s a smear campaign by Campos.”
At the Campos camp, the accusations were brushed off. “It didn’t come from me. I had nothing to do with it,” says Campos. “The first I heard of it was in the paper. Actions speak for themselves and he should be held accountable. I run a good campaign.”
Despite the controversy, Martinez says he remains very confident about the election. “I guarantee I’ll win,” he says.
