19 Oct Sentencing Phase Begins for Rogelio Martinez Jr. in Killing of San Benito Officer

Rogelio Martinez Jr., 21, now faces a jury that will decide his punishment after he was convicted of capital murder in the 2023 killing of San Benito police Lt. Milton Resendez, according to The Brownsville Herald. Opening arguments in the sentencing phase began Monday, Oct. 19, in Brownsville. Prosecutors want a death sentence, while the defense is asking for life without the possibility of parole.

The jury convicted Martinez Oct. 8 after roughly 3¼ hours of deliberations. Resendez, who had served 27 years with the San Benito Police Department, was shot Oct. 17, 2023, at the end of an hourslong chase that started on South Padre Island and passed through Brownsville before reaching San Benito. Martinez pleaded not guilty. His co-defendant, Rodrigo Axel Espinosa Valdez, 26, a Mexican national, earlier pleaded guilty to murder, a lesser charge.

Cameron County District Attorney Luis V. Saenz opened by noting that fewer than 48 hours earlier, the department’s chief, relatives, friends and townspeople had gathered to honor Resendez, marking three years since his death. Saenz told jurors Martinez had decided the officer would die and asked where Resendez’s due process was. He said Resendez attempted to dodge the defendants during the pursuit, and that they crossed several lanes toward him for the clearest shot.

Saenz said prosecutors will request a death sentence, and that jurors will see substantial evidence about Martinez’s criminal record as a juvenile and how he behaved in jail. He argued Martinez shows no remorse or empathy.

Rigo Flores, a defense attorney, told jurors the defense accepts and respects the verdict and offered its sympathies to the Resendez family, calling the shooting a tragedy that should never have occurred. He urged jurors to remember they are sentencing a person, not only the acts of that day, and asked them to weigh Martinez’s upbringing and circumstances, which he called terribly tragic. Flores said witnesses and experts will testify to enough mitigating circumstances to support life without parole.