By Jakob Rodgers
The Reporter
OAKLAND, Calif. — The parents of former NFL player Doug Martin filed a lawsuit Tuesday claiming the retired All-Pro running back died at the hands of several Oakland police officers and a slow-responding paramedic crew.
Martin’s mother and father claimed in the filing that their son died of “restraint asphyxia” after being pinned to the ground by the officers. The federal wrongful death lawsuit — which relied on the initial findings of an independent autopsy commissioned by the family — also faulted a Falck paramedic crew’s “failure to provide timely medical care” after Martin stopped breathing.
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The legal salvo adds a fresh level of scrutiny to Martin’s death in the predawn hours of Oct. 18, when police received to multiple calls about him suffering from a mental episode and breaking into a neighbor’s house on the 11000 block of Ettrick Street in the Oakland Hills.
The family’s attorney, John Burris, complained that local agencies “haven’t been forthcoming” about the incident. Oakland police have only released a highly-produced video compilation in which officers could be seen holding Martin on the ground, then questioning if he was “playing possum” by laying motionless. But they have not released the complete, unedited recording.
Burris also has yet to receive a copy of Alameda County’s autopsy findings.
“There’s a lot of work to do, and this is the first step,” Burris said. He added that Martin’s parents, Leslie and Douglas, “want to know whether their son’s death happened naturally, or as a result of some activity of police” or something else.
Oakland police initially said a “brief struggle” ensued when officers contacted him inside a neighbor’s house and tried to detain him. The agency said Doug Martin then became unresponsive after being taken into custody.
A department spokesperson declined to comment on the suit Wednesday.
The lawsuit filed this week claimed Doug Martin was “placed face down while one or more officers pressed on his back.” Afterward, “Martin was unresponsive seemingly unconscious; however, the defendant officers initially believed he was sleeping or pretending” to be asleep, according to the lawsuit.
At some point, officers called for medical attention. Yet Martin’s parents claimed “Falck paramedics arrived over 15 minutes after the call for service and, and when they arrived, did not promptly provide medical care.”
The lawsuit specifically named Oakland police officers Riryon Machado, Justin Bermudez, Bradley Potts and Anderson Kitts as defendants, along with a sergeant, identified in the filing only as M. Smith . Also listed as defendants were the city of Oakland and Falck Northern California, along with its parent company Falck USA.
Messages sent Wednesday by this news outlet seeking comment from spokespeople for city of Oakland, as well as Falck, were not immediately returned.
So far, the only public window afforded by Oakland police into the encounter exists in a series of video snippets released in March.
The highly-stylized compilation included a seconds-long excerpt of one 911 call, where a woman reported that Martin “takes sleeping pills and he hasn’t slept for three days.” It also included doorbell camera footage from one house, where Martin could be seen approaching and yelling “I see you in there, this is Doug Martin,” adding “help me.”
An officer who later confronted Martin inside the house said “We’re going to help you,” as at least two officers grabbed Martin and took him to the floor a few feet away, the footage showed. At least one officer who appeared to be positioned on Martin’s back.
“Keep his legs down,” one officer said, while another could be heard yelling at Martin six times to “stop,” as well as to “calm down.” At first, Martin could be heard moaning or yelling, but he appeared to grow nearly completely silent and still as officers handcuffed him.
About eight minutes later, an officer asked others in the room: “You think he’s playing possum?” Another officer suggested he may “just be tired,” at which point an officer checked Martin’s neck for a pulse and a noise resembling snoring could be heard on the video footage.
About 14 minutes after officers handcuffed Martin, officers could be seen carrying Martin out of the house, because, police said, the paramedics’ gurney could not make it inside the home. Outside, someone notified a paramedic that Martin may have been using sleeping pills, after which the paramedic responded, “OK, well, I guess that’ll make it easier.”
At that moment, someone could be heard on the footage asking whether Martin is breathing, and a paramedic checked Martin’s pulse. It remains unclear exactly when Martin stopped breathing; authorities have previously said he was declared dead at a hospital.
Doug Martin’s family had previously issued a statement saying they “were actively seeking medical assistance for him and had contacted local authorities for support” before his pre-dawn encounter with police. They added that Doug Martin “battled mental health challenges that profoundly impacted his personal and professional life,” and that he fled his home that night after “feeling overwhelmed and disoriented.”
Neurologists were expected to examine whether Doug Martin suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, which is a degenerative brain disease found in a growing number of professional athletes. It remained unclear Wednesday whether that testing had been completed.
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