Biography
Steve Martinez is an activist who refused to testify before a secret federal grand jury seeking to charge organizers involved with the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. Martinez was called to testify as a witness to events late on the night of November 20, 2016 when he drove a seriously injured water protector named Sophia Wilansky to the hospital. Wilansky’s severe injury to her arm is believed to have been caused by explosive police munitions thrown directly at her body. However, North Dakota police and the federal prosecutors behind the grand jury have sought to blame Wilanksy and #NoDAPL protesters for her injury.
As a grand jury resistor, he had previously been jailed for most of February 2021 for refusing to testify, but was briefly released after a judge found the magistrate who ordered him detained did not have the authority to do so. He was released on April 12, 2021 after serving over 60 in days in federal detention.
