The wife of reputed Orange County Mexican Mafia chief Johnny Martinez was sentenced Thursday to 57 months in federal prison for her role in a sprawling racketeering case against the Orange County chapter of the gang.
Brenda Vanessa Campos Martinez pleaded guilty April 24 to conspiracy to distribute and possess heroin and methamphetamine. U.S. District Judge Fred W. Slaughter set a May 15 self-surrender date for Campos Martinez and ordered five years of supervised release when she finishes her prison time.
Campos Martinez tearfully apologized for her time serving as a “secretary” for her husband, the reputed mob boss.
“Your honor, I wish I could take back time, but I can’t,” Campos Martinez said. “I am sorry for my actions.”
She was so overcome with emotion she could not continue.
Campos Martinez’s attorney, Meghan Blanco, said her client has been “a law-abiding citizen most of her life.”
Martinez “took advantage” of his wife’s “niceness,” Blanco argued.
“She has a history of struggling with low self-esteem,” the defense attorney said.
Campos Martinez’s prime motivation was pleasing her husband, not personally enriching herself, Blanco argued.
In 2019, when she was first approached by law enforcement investigating the Mexican Mafia she decided to walk away from her relationship with Martinez, Blanco said.
“Unlike every other defendant in this case she extricated herself entirely,” Blanco said. “She moved, she cut off her phone and stopped communicating with everyone.”
Campos Martinez is “very remorseful,” said Blanco, who also argued her client played a “minimal role” in the Mexican Mafia.
Blanco also argued that anticipated changes in sentencing guidelines as of May would qualify Campos Martinez for probation in the case.
Blanco argued for a year and a day of prison, a year of home confinement, 300 hours of community service, mental health counseling and five years of supervised release for her client.
The defense attorney also argued her client may not have understood that what she was doing was illegal and that she was “married to a very manipulative person.”
Campos Martinez has been too afraid to get a divorce from Martinez, her attorney said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Staples recommended 71 months in federal prison.
“All I’m hearing is it’s not my fault, my husband made me do it,” Staples said. “She deliberately decided not to realize what was patently obvious … It’s difficult to accept she is truly remorseful when she points a finger at everyone but herself.”
A search of Campos Martinez’s residence in 2019 is what prompted her to distance herself from the Mexican Mafia, Staples said.
She was doing work for the Mexican Mafia for a few years, “which included bookkeeping for the Meixcan Mafia.” That work involved keeping track of who was under the umbrella of the Mexican Mafia, collecting money from extortion, passing along messages to gang members and managing the books, Staples said.
There are about 200 members of the Mexican Mafia nationwide so her role in the organization was more significant than her attorney argued, Staples said.
“To say that her role was minimal does not equate to what her status was,” Staples said.
Campos Martinez “attempted to extort $800” from a confidential informant she believed was a drug dealer in return for protection from the Mexican Mafia,” Staples said in a sentencing brief. She extorted $400 another time from the informant, he added.
Campos Martinez also collected a “$900 drug debt” in September 2017, Staples said.
She even had “calendar planners” with detailed “ledgers of extortion collections, payment receipts to jail accounts and lists outlining which Hispanic street gangs fell under which OC Mexican Mafia members,” Staples said in the sentencing brief.
When law enforcement served a warrant at her home, she was in possession of $12,748 in cash, Staples said.
Slaughter ordered that amount forfeited to the government in the case.