It is with a heavy heart that the AFSCME Local 3661 Executive Board has to share this news of our fallen brother. Local 3661 continues to send prayers to the family, friends, and union brothers and sisters who are all impacted by this tragedy.

It is our hope that while we all continue trying to digest this senseless act, we cherish the moments we had with Agent Martinez and the contributions he made to public safety. Agent Martinez was known to many. He was kind hearted and always willing to help others. He was a beloved colleague, and his loss will leave a forever scar on the hearts of community correction workers across the state of Maryland.

In the days to come please take a moment to check on your fellow colleagues. This tragedy has impacted us all in ways we won't be able to explain and only our colleagues can even begin to understand.

Our Executive Board shares the anger and frustration felt by our community corrections members regarding our agency’s lack of concern and long-term neglect of the health and safety and well-being of our agents, monitors, and office professionals. This tragedy could have been prevented had the agency listened to our many attempts to discuss health and safety and caseload issues. We alerted Secretary Scruggs to these issues on April 27, 2023, when we held our first Community Corrections Labor Management Committee Meeting. We begged her to intervene and help us keep our members safe. We provided her with two booklets that contained all the emails, grievances, and documentation we had regarding the sheer negligence of Director Danner & Executive Deputy Director Nolley.

On September 18, 2023, we were scheduled to meet with Secretary Scruggs to discuss the ongoing concerns we had for our safety. Without any notification, the Secretary failed to attend our meeting. She sent her former Deputy Secretary of Administration Christina Lentz who, with the help of Director Danner, Executive Director Nolley, and former Executive Director of Administration Tia Brunson, continued to dismiss our concerns.

On January 8, 2024, we held another Labor Management Committee Meeting. During that meeting, we begged for safety protocols and discussed the dangers associated with district reporting. During that meeting, Executive Deputy Director Nolley was dismissive of our concerns, stating “We’ve been doing this for 10 years and nothing has happened yet.”

On February 27, 2024, we were scheduled to meet with Secretary Scruggs who, without notification, failed to attend. During this meeting, we were only able to discuss our concerns with Chief of Staff Gaskins.

On March 4, 2024, we asked management to provide us with an update on the implementation status of the Employee Threat Notification. Our union worked tirelessly alongside lower-level management to enhance the definition of “employee threat” to include a “perceived” threat. We worked hard to develop a policy that laid out guidelines for required responses to employees' safety concerns. The agency’s Executive Team responded that they were “too busy”, and the policy was not one of their priorities.

On April 1, 2024, we tried to meet again, and our attempts fell on deaf ears. During one meeting, Director Danner and Executive Deputy Director Nolley were completely disengaged and showed no empathy and/or interest in our health and safety concerns. When we addressed the completely unprofessional behavior of their Executive Team, who were playing on their cell phones and demonstrating a complete disregard for our health and safety, Director Danner put her phone down, showing no empathy and instead started doodling random shapes on her notepad. At that moment, we felt utterly depleted.

On May 31, 2024, our cries and concerns became our reality.

As a local, we are attempting to establish contact with the family to offer our support. On Saturday morning, we immediately started working with AFSCME leadership to DEMAND the immediate suspension of home visits. We received notice that Director Danner canceled our meeting originally scheduled for Monday, June 3 at 10AM. The Executive Board had an emergency meeting with AFSCME President, Patrick Moran, and Field Director Joe Cox, where we were able to discuss our demands and path forward.

We are going to provide the family with emotional and financial assistance as they navigate through this preventable calamity.

We are going to advocate on behalf of Agent Martinez, so he can be a recipient of the benefits established by the newly passed legislation, Senate Bill 850, that goes into effect July 1, 2024.

We need to be equipped with the tools, trainings, and proper safety protocols that will allow us to safely avoid and/or remove ourselves from dangerous environments.

We need to have clear and robust emergency procedures in place to rapidly address crisis situations.

We need the agency to immediately stop converting agent pins into office professional positions, so that we have enough staff to conduct home visits in pairs.

We need access to mental health services that can assist us with processing the ongoing dangers we face as agents.

We have established contact with some of the union leaders from the Department of Corrections and they have offered their support. Together, we will advocate for the thing we need most - the ability to safely and effectively do our jobs.

We need an administration that is going to stand strong behind their staff and develop policies, procedures, and practices that keep us SAFE.