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Brittany Rachelle Martinez, a 24-year-old emergency medical technician with two children, allegedly wanted her husband, a Houston firefighter, dead.
According to court records, she gave a friend $1,000 to hire a hit man, provided her husband's work schedule and made sure the hit man had a photo of him.
She gave instructions that the would-be killer should park a block away from her beloved's southwest Houston firehouse. She said the hit man should kill him in the back parking lot to avoid security cameras across the street.
Court records charging Martinez with solicitation of capital murder allege that she did not care what kind of weapon was used, "she just wanted the job done."
So committed was Martinez to ending her husband's life, that she set in motion a meticulous plot that began months ago and ended Tuesday with her arrest, court records show. On Jan. 17, Martinez approached a friend who manages a north Houston restaurant and told him she was having marital problems. She asked him to kill her husband, according to court records.
Two weeks later, she returned to the restaurant with $500 and promised another $1,000 to $2,000 after Adrian Ray Martinez was killed.
The manager balked and said he would find someone else to commit the murder, according to an arrest warrant for Martinez. She said she did not want to meet or come in contact with the hit man.
On Sunday, Martinez contacted the manager to say she wanted her husband dead before he realized she had taken the money, records show. After she left, the manager called her and recorded the call. In that recording, court records show, Martinez gave instructions on how to avoid video cameras near her husband's work.
She told the manager not to contact her, that she would contact him after the slaying, records show. Martinez is now being held in the Harris County Jail without bail. She is expected to be in court Thursday.
Houston Fire Department officials confirmed that Adrian Martinez is a firefighter and referred questions about the allegations to law enforcement. This past year, Martinez touted her husband's profession and her experience as an EMT when she filed a lawsuit for custody of a family member's baby. Child Protective Services removed the child from his mother's home, and Martinez was working to gain custody instead of seeing the child be put in foster care.
If convicted, Martinez faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
