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Santa Rosa Man Sentenced to 35 Years for 3 Violent Crimes

A Sonoma County Superior Court judge sentenced a Santa Rosa man Monday to 35 years in prison for three violent crimes he committed in less than two years.

Bernabe Ramirez Martinez, 28, was convicted of misdemeanor reckless driving while intoxicated, felony child endangerment and felony attempting to remove a police officer's firearm.

He crashed a vehicle containing his girlfriend and six-month-old daughter into a light pole on Brookwood Drive in Santa Rosa on June 2, 2017.

When police tried to contact him, he physically resisted and twice reached for the officer's holstered firearm, the District Attorney's Office said.

He was in the Sonoma County Jail in February 2018 waiting to be sentenced for those offenses when he stabbed another inmate in the neck and face at least 10 times with a weapon he fashioned from a hairbrush. He was convicted of attempted murder inflicting great bodily injury.

In November 2018 days before being sentenced again, Martinez locked himself into a common area of the jail and started a fire using paper, his clothing and a power outlet.

The fire caused significant damage, and correctional deputies and inmates were taken to a hospital for treatment of smoke inhalation, the District Attorney's Office said. Martinez was convicted of felony arson of an inhabited structure.

The 35 years and four months sentence by Judge Peter Ottenweller was based on Martinez's previous strike offenses, the District Attorney's Office said.

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