NEW ROCHELLE, NY — From time to time, Talk of the Sound likes to check up on Jose Martinez.
As long-time readers know, we broke the story that led to his being placed on the State Registry for sexual predators.
Martinez repeatedly raped a student in his office at Isaac E. Young Middle School. The sexual assaults went on for months despite repeated complaints from District employees to Administrators of “red flag” behavior that should have resulted in a referral to Child Protective Services. Complaints were made to Schools Superintendent Richard Organisciak, School Board Member Chrisanne Petrone, Principal Anthony Bongo and Assistant Principal Towanda Robinson, sources say.
Martinez was arrested in March 2011, plead guilty that July and was sentenced to time served plus 10 years sex offender probation on October 11, 2011.
A long promised investigation and report authorized by the school board never materialized despite promises by then-President Chrisanne Petrone. Petrone has denied that anyone contacted her with concerns about Martinez’ behavior with young boys.
Now it appears like Jose Martinez has gone missing.
If the information contained on the New York State Sex Offender Registry web site is accurate (and there is no reason to think it is not), then Martinez has not been notifying probation authorities of his whereabouts.
The web site lists an address for Martinez in Brooklyn.
A certified letter sent to the listed address requesting an interview was not returned and he has not been seen at that location for the past 6 months, sources say.
The web site lists three primary addresses for employment of Martinez.
Using online tools like reverse phone number lookups, Google Maps and deep web searches, Talk of the Sound identified the three locations.
110 East 40th Street in Manhattan is listed as a Medical Condominium, partially filled, with some connection to NYU Medical and a dentists office. We were unable to locate Martinez at that location.
183 7th Avenue in Manhattan is listed as a hair salon in the Chelsea neighborhood. A woman answering the phone said Martinez had worked there in the past but not for the past six to eight months.
468 Suffolk Avenue in Brentwood on Long Island is a medical office. A woman answering the phone at the listed number said no such person worked there, that she could not recall such a person ever working there but that she was aware that the phone number for the medical office was listed on the New York State sex offender registry web site.
The Supervising Agency for Martinez was the Westchester County Department of Probation initially but transferred 18 months ago to New York City.
“Martinez was under Westchester County supervision until December 24, 2012 when he was transferred to Kings County (Brooklyn),” said Westchester County spokesperson Philip Oliva.
Talk of the Sound has reached out to Ana Bermudez, Commissioner of the Department of Probation in Kings County but has yet to hear back.