Police release video of police officer shooting Santa Cruz County murder suspect

WATSONVILLE — The Watsonville Police Department released video footage Friday showing one of its officers shooting and injuring a man who has been charged with the murder of a 25-year-old woman.

The release to the agency’s social media page comes while attorneys for defendant Joshua Gonzalez-Martinez, 25, of Watsonville, are seeking to have bail set for their client as he awaits arraignment.

The compiled video footage, along with closed captions and a voice-over, reveals new information from the Aug. 3 encounter, including 911 audio of Gonzalez-Martinez speaking with a dispatcher, whom he called after 9 p.m. from in front of the Watsonville Police Department.

“I have a child right here, she’s with me. I’m in the parking lot of the police station. She’s in danger. I have a knife,” a voice authorities said was Gonzalez-Martinez is heard saying.

With the sound of a young child’s voice in the background, the dispatcher confirmed what Gonzalez-Martinez said and asked why the child was in danger and if the man was trying to hurt her. Gonzalez-Martinez confirmed his intentions and said the 3-year-old girl, his stepdaughter, was inside the vehicle while he stood nearby.

While Gonzalez-Martinez and the dispatcher continued speaking, an officer drove into the parking lot and stopped behind the vehicle.

Footage from department surveillance and the shooting officer’s body cam appears to show a man sprinting directly at an officer, identified in court filings as Robert Strong, immediately after the officer orders the man to drop his knife. The officer stumbles backward as the man charges. The apparent assailant slides to the ground after being shot.

Police later found the 3-year-old girl unrestrained and uninjured in the back of a parked car, according to officials and a case court filing.

Some 12 hours after the incident, a hiker found the body of Lizbeth Arceo Sedano, a Watsonville woman and sometimes companion of Gonzalez-Martinez, fatally stabbed 12 times on a wooded trail near Corralitos, according to court filings. An empty baby stroller was located nearby. The Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office is investigating Arceo-Sedano’s death, but charges of murder, attempted murder of an officer, assault with a deadly weapon on an officer, child endangerment and obstructing an officer have been consolidated into one criminal filing.

Earlier this month, Santa Cruz County Assistant District Attorney Michael Mahan filed an opposition to the setting of bail for Gonzalez-Martinez, who remained held Friday without bail in the Santa Cruz County Jail.

In an Aug. 13 filing detailing his objections to bail setting, Mahan wrote that Gonzalez-Martinez, the 3-year-old child and Arceo-Sedano had attended the Watsonville Strawberry Festival earlier on the day of the shooting. The couple, according to the filing, lived separately due to an alleged history of domestic abuse but sometimes met to allow Gonzalez-Martinez time with the child.

Surveillance camera footage showed a car borrowed from Arceo-Sedano’s brother passing the Corralitos Market headed in one direction around 7:45 p.m. and then in the other direction around 8:50 p.m., according to the filing.

“There is no greater example of the miscarriage of justice in the money bail system then (sic) the Defendant being released after killing another human being, attempting to kill a police officer, and threatening to harm his own 3-year-old daughter,” Mahan wrote in his filing.

Gonzalez-Martinez is scheduled to return to court for arraignment Wednesday morning. The Watsonville Police Department compilation is available at facebook.com/watsonvillepd.