A Circuit Court judge Wednesday sentenced the former Department of Public Safety’s once top-ranking training officer to a year of probation and a suspended 30-day jail sentence to run concurrently for falsifying her academic transcripts.

J. Marte Martinez was initially charged April 6, 2022, on 14 charges, but accepted a plea deal from the state, which dismissed 10 charges, including felony perjury.

She pleaded guilty Oct. 17 to two counts of tampering with a government record and two counts of unsworn falsification to authorities, all misdemeanors, but could have received up to a year in prison and a $2,000 fine for each of the charges.

Her lawyer, Birney Bervar, told the court she was on administrative leave for seven months from the department, but recently lost her job.

The Department of Public Safety was changed Jan. 1 to Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. All law enforcement including the Sheriff Division and Narco­tics Enforcement Division transitioned to Department of Law Enforcement.

When asked if and when Martinez will be terminated, DCR said in a written statement, “She remains employed with DCR at this time.”

DCR Director Tommy Johnson said of her sentence: “This type of criminal behavior is unacceptable by any employee of our department.” He said the department “holds all employees to the highest standard of integrity.”

Deputy Attorney General Cheuk Fu Lui had asked the court to sentence Martinez to four months in jail in addition to probation, but Circuit Court Judge Fa’auuga To’oto’o denied the request, saying he had reviewed the state’s and defense’s sentencing memoranda and the pre-sentencing report.

Lui was prepared to present testimony of an investigator and additional evidence that she lied to the court by claiming she attended all the classes that the false transcripts showed.

The DAG’s investigator would have testified he requested a diploma and records and received false documents from the same company Martinez did for the University of Northern Virginia (NOVA), one of two schools she claimed to have attended, and it included the identical classes she claimed to have taken on her fake transcript.

Even after Martinez admitted to submitting false documents, “the contention she went to those classes, got those grades,” she was “continuing to lie to the court,” Lui said.

He said although she wrote how remorseful she was, she turned it around and described how she was harassed by co-workers, how she was a victim.

Lui noted Martinez was a high-ranking public official and deserves to go to jail.

“To lie and to continue to lie to this court while being sentenced for dishonesty is inexcusable,” he said.

Bervar stipulated the documents were incorrect, but said the reason they were nearly identical to the ones received by the investigator was because Martinez sent in her transcripts, and the company used them to send out fake transcripts to others requesting transcripts from NOVA.

“I can’t state enough how sorry I am,” Martinez said. “I let people down who trusted me,” including her staff and family, and that she did it for expediency’s sake because then-Public Safety Director Nolan Espinda gave her two weeks to get the certified transcripts or she would be fired.

Lui told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser his office was not privy to internal matters.

Espinda took his own life May 19, 2022, so he could not dispute that claim.

Because NOVA is no longer in business, Martinez went through an online business selling replica transcripts, which simply certified her transcripts.

Martinez said she is the sole breadwinner, cares for her disabled husband and cannot afford to pay someone to watch him if she is incarcerated. She said her husband was suicidal and she underwent a double mastectomy.

The judge said he reviewed letters of support from two DPS workers, letters from Martinez and her husband, and the pre-­sentencing report describing the hostile work environment, the jealousy and name-calling.

Before sentencing her to probation, he noted that she bathes her husband and gets him in and out of bed.

The state’s sentencing memorandum shows Martinez was initially hired as a firearms training technician in 2014 and rose through the ranks, being promoted four times, until her promotion in 2018 to public safety training officer, an executive-level managerial position.

On Jan. 8, 2019, Martinez was subpoenaed to testify before the state Labor Relations Board as an expert witness during an administrative hearing during which her education and qualifications were called into question, which prompted an internal investigation, the state’s sentencing memorandum said. She had to provide transcripts and certificates from schools, but instead provided fake transcripts.

Martinez’s crimes are far more serious than misdemeanors, in the opinion of many of her colleagues and some in the Legislature, who found they are not victimless crimes.

In April 2019, then-Sen. Clarence Nishihara, chair of the Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, presented findings against the reappointment of Espinda, and Martinez was part of the many problems under his leadership, including the unprecedented number of fatal shootings by Public Safety officers.

Deputy Sheriff Lt. Shawn Tsuha, commander at First Circuit Court, and former State Sheriff deputy director, said of the sentence: “On a personal level, it’s not the perfect outcome given the magnitude (of what Martinez did). The court didn’t see the totality of her actions, but the judge has to go with the pre-sentencing report.”

He noted the fatal shootings that took place during her tenure, but said “I don’t think you can make a direct correlation.”

The department “will have to look at the curriculum,” he said. “I would do a review.”

Tsuha said Martinez falsely accused him of being the whistleblower, and retaliated by making false allegations against him. Espinda opened an investigation against him.

He said he forgives Martinez, but many of his colleagues are upset at the plea deal and sentence.