A Lutherville man facing a 13-year prison sentence for sexually abusing a child and harassing witnesses has been charged with soliciting the murder of a Baltimore County prosecutor.
Once president of his community association, 45-year-old Michael B. Martin is accused of asking a fellow inmate at the Baltimore County Detention Center to kill Assistant State?s Attorney Jason League, who prosecuted the 2005 sex offense case against Martin.
According to charging documents, Martin also wanted the inmate to castrate prosecutor John Cox, who had taken over for League.
“I recognize … in doing this job that my own well-being may be compromised,” League said, adding, however, that the new claims have frightened his family. “The police have been wonderful about it,” increasing patrols in his neighborhood, he said.
Defense attorney Gerald Ruter said the inmate?s accusations are based on nothing more than “idle chatter.”
The charges mark the third round of allegations against Martin in a case that began with the sex offense against a neighborhood child.
Days before a January 2006 court hearing in that case, Chris Kollmann, a civilian forensics technician for the police, cracked into Martin?s computer and discovered photos that supported the girl?s claims. Martin pleaded guilty to a fourth-degree sex offense.
It was around then, Ruter said, that Martin lashed out as his life unraveled. Kollmann received phone calls and messages, particularly threatening toward his sister.
An elderly friend of the victim?s mother found a note on her newspaper saying, “now you mess up big … poor Sterling babies” ? an apparent reference to her grandchildren who were living in Sterling, Va.
Martin was arrested in February. Police found in his car a shotgun and directions to Kollmann?s home.
They discovered directions to League?s house during a search of Martin?s home.
At Martin?s sentencing Thursday on the harassment charges and the sex offense, Ruter said his client had the directions because he?s an “extraordinarily inquisitive” man who lost himself for several weeks, but never intended to harm or kill anyone.
But Cox said the new allegations show Martin?s behavior wasn?t isolated. Martin was sentenced to the maximum 13 years in prison.
“Is it the most common thing we see? No, but it’s something that happens from time to time,” League said of threats to prosecutors. More and more, he said, defendants “will do everything they can” to escape punishment.
