(Joshua D. Huntress)
Press release
Joshua D. Huntress, age 29, of Mayville, Chautauqua County was sentenced today by the Hon. Michael M. Mohun to the agreed upon sentence of 7 ½ to 15 years on the Aggravated Vehicular Homicide, a class B non-violent felony, and 5 years each on three separate counts of Assault in the Second Degree, a class D violent felony, plus 5 years each of post release supervision. By law these sentences must be run concurrent in spite of the fact that there were 4 separate and distinct victims. The defendant was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $400,110.63 which will be reduced to a civil judgment.
- As part of the plea in December of 2017, the defendant admitted that while engaged in Reckless Driving as defined in VTL 1212 and while committing the crime of Vehicular Manslaughter in the 2nd degree (which includes him admitting the he drove his motor vehicle while his ability was impaired by a combination of drugs under VTL 1192-4a) he caused the death of Tomasa Martinez and caused serious physical injury to at least one other person which in this case was George McGann, David Stefanski, Minerva Stefanski.
July 9, 2017 Tomasa Martinez
(David and Minerva Stefanski) Tonya Colon(daughter of Tomasa Martinez) with George McGann
This tragedy was preventable not just because of acts of the defendant who chose to drive while high on multiple drugs. This tragedy could have also been prevented had the system not failed. Mr. Huntress should have never had a license, should have never been in Wyoming County and should have been in jail well before July 9, 2017.
As was stated in court during sentencing, on the date of this tragedy, July 9, 2017, Mr. Huntress had the following legal history and had 3 pending cases in other states:
11/15/09 a warrant was issued out of Larimer, Wyoming for DUI Alcohol – this warrant is still active because Wyoming refused to extradite
8/28/2012 – a warrant was issued out of Worthington, MN for Driving While Impaired – warrant still active because MN refused to extradite
2/2/14 – Mr. Huntress was returned on another warrant that was issued out of Erie County, NY
12/30/14 – Mr. Huntress was convicted of two crimes in PA – a felony for Receiving stolen property (this is the charge that Judge Mohun ruled that can be considered a felony in NY and thus treat him as a second felony offender on this case) as well as the crime of Access Device Fraud – His sentence was Probation
-the outstanding warrants remained – nothing was done
In the US, as codified in Federal Law, there is an interstate compact that binds all of the states as to the rules and regulations of how people are transferred from state to state when they are on probation or parole. Each state has an advisory council which ironically I have been a member of the NYS Council for approximately 2 years.
1/2015 – Pennsylvania sends a request to the Chautauqua Co. Probation Department requesting to transfer probation supervision for Mr. Huntress.
Note: This transfer is only courtesy supervision and the supervising agency has no authority to arrest or detain. They can only report back to the sending state and the sending state (in this case PA) has to act by filing documents to retake the individual.
2/6/15 – Request for transfer to Chautauqua Co. Probation Department was denied by Chautauqua County for the following reasons:
- There were 2 outstanding warrants for his arrest in MN and WY – they wanted them resolved
- He had a past weapons theft arrest
- There were firearms in the home he was going to be living in
- He wanted to live in NY and work in PA
- They didn’t have the probation conditions
2/12/15 – PA responds to the denial with the following
MN and WY don’t want to extradite
- Firearms will be locked up
- Defendant is unemployed
Note: Due to the compact rules Chautauqua County was forced to take Mr. Huntress as under the rules even though he had two pending warrants PA declared him to be in “substantial compliance” therefore because he lived in NY the compact allows for the forced transfer. So his probation was transferred.
Also pending at the time of transfer was an unresolved arrest in NY.
2/2015 – Chautauqua Co. Probation Supervision begins
6/14/15 – Huntress is convicted of Poss. Forged Instrument 3rd
During 2016 Mr. Huntress for the most part remained complaint with probation
In April of 2017 this is where things really take a turn and the system collapses.
4/24/17 – Huntress was arrested for DWAI by Drugs in T/Ellery, Chautauqua Co. New York – Upon information and belief bail was either never set or not set high enough with 2 pending warrants and being on felony probation supervision. His driver’s license never suspended at any point. To date this case is still pending and nothing has been done. He is presume innocent of these charges.
NO REPORT WAS EVER SENT TO PA TO INFORM THEM OF THE ARREST THEREFORE NO REQUEST FOR RETAKING WAS EVER POSSIBLE
4/28/17 – Mr. Huntress overdoses and has to be dealt with for MH issues – NO REPORT MADE TO PA
4/28/17 – DV incident – a Domestic Incident Report is filed – Mr. Huntress’s girlfriend doesn’t want him arrested – NO REPORT MADE TO PA
6/4/17 – Mr. Huntress arrested for alleged Possession of Cocaine, switched license plates, no insurance – DEFENDANT IS NOT BROUGHT BEFORE A JUDGE – given an appearance ticket to appear on 7/11/17 – even though arrested on 6/4/17 – his arrest does not hit the system until 6/24/17 – NO REPORT MADE TO PA
-Note: Since the defendant was given an appearance ticket, he was not brought before a judge therefore no bail was set and neither a Judge nor a DA was given an opportunity to review his criminal history and make an argument for bail.
-Had that been done it was highly likely that defendant would have been held on enough bail to hold him on any of the pending charges as well as allowing PA to request a warrant for their case. He most likely would have been in a jail on July 9, 2017 (the date of the incident in Wyoming Co)
6/30/17 – Mr. Huntress had another overdose – Narcan used to revive him as he was not breathing. – PA not notified.
7/9/17 – the date of his crimes here in Wyoming County
7/11/17 – a Progress Report was made to PA regarding his arrests in Ellery and Pomfret by the Chautauqua Co. Probation Department.
7/12/17 – another Progress Report was made to PA regarding the Wyoming County charges
It should also be mentioned that retaking was unlikely by PA because Mr. Huntress now had unresolved criminal cases in NY and they defer to the local courts to determine whether he should be held. They falsely assume that these courts are run by judges with specialized legal training. The use of lay people as local judges is unique to NY which is a very foreign idea to many other states.
This is just yet another example of why New York needs to move to District Courts with judges who have law degrees.
Another way to say it is that the compact allows one state to transfer a defendant to another state while a person has a pending arrest warrant but it won’t allow for retaking of that same person if they have pending cases without warrants. This is what we need to change.
This case is also a great example of why BAIL MATTERS regardless of whether it’s a misdemeanor, felony (violent or non-violent). Bail is important and it must remain at the discretion of the prosecutor, defendant and the judge on a case by case basis. The proposal by the liberal democrats, including the Governor, and even members of my own DAs association is wrong and just simply anti-victim, pro-criminal and quite frankly pandering for votes.
This case also highlights the absurdity of treating vehicular homicides as non-violent homicides. Look at the devastation of what he did to these four families. Tomasa Martinez has been lost forever and the lives of Dave and Minerva Stefanski and George McGann are forever destroyed. They went from living a full and productive lives to living in pain and drowning in debt due to loss of work and medical bills. These are people who we are re-victimizing when we throw bail out the window and when we call these kinds of crimes non-violent.
I am calling for the following:
- Throw out the idea of this ridiculous bail reform idea. The current bail system is not broken. The real stats don’t lie. Let’s start focusing on victims again and worrying about their lives instead of the ones who commit the crimes.
- Begin the process of seriously moving toward a District Court system that allows for revenue sharing with the local municipalities. (i.e. have lawyer judges handling criminal cases and local judges handling traffic tickets and small claims actions)
- Change the compact to allow for receiving states to reject cases where defendants have outstanding warrant. Make defendants take care of these cases. I have asked for this case to be reviewed by the NYS Council with hopes of them making recommendations to the national rules committee.
“It is important to note that these events occurred not because of a bad person or bad organization. They occurred because we need to get the court system into the 21st century and because we need to modify the compact system so that a person like Joshua Huntress, after multiple arrests, overdoses and DWI arrests and convictions, isn’t allowed to continue to be a threat to public safety. It would be a separate tragedy if we did not learn from this case. The victims in this case should have never been put in the cross hairs of Joshua Huntress,” said Wyoming District Attorney Donald O’Geen .