Man charged with hiring hit man released

A county judge yesterday ordered the release of a Charles County man who police said hired a hit man to kill his pregnant girlfriend in Crofton.

The decision came just three weeks after another judge ruled he was too dangerous to await his trial at home.

Attorneys for Charles Brandon Martin - 31, married and a father of four - successfully argued before Circuit Court Judge Michele D. Jaklitsch in Annapolis that Judge William C. Mulford II was wrong April 22 to revoke the man's $500,000 bond.

Martin was released yesterday afternoon from the Jennifer Road Detention Center in Parole pending his July 28 trial on attempted murder charges.

The extended legal odyssey regarding Martin's bail - one that has now seen him incarcerated and released twice - is not over, however.

Prosecutors, who argued in court their witnesses would be in "grave danger" if Martin was released, appealed Jaklitsch's decision to the chief administrative judge of county Circuit Court. They asked Judge Nancy Davis-Loomis to empanel a group of county judges to review the matter and determine which judge was correct under the law.

Police arrested Martin on March 30 and charged him with attempted first-degree murder in the Oct. 27 shooting of Jodi L. Torok, a 27-year-old hairstylist living in Crofton.

He was the second person charged in the shooting. Police in January charged Jerold Raymond Burks, 22, of Waldorf, with the same crime. Detectives said they believe Martin hired Burks to kill Torok.

Assistant State's Attorney Crighton Chase said Torok was pregnant with Martin's child and that Martin was angry she didn't want to have an abortion. Torok, who was one of at least three girlfriends Martin had on the side, had told her friends she was afraid to be alone with Martin, prosecutors said.

Chase also said Burks shot Torok in the head at close range in the foyer of her Crofton townhouse to clear a drug debt he had with Martin.

According to court documents and prosecutors, detectives linked Burks to the shooting with the help of a tipster who said Burks confessed to him that he pulled the trigger. Later, detectives connected Martin to the crime after finding a hair stuck to a piece of tape used to construct a homemade silencer left at the scene. DNA tests revealed that the hair came from Martin, police said.

Chase told Mulford on April 22 that Martin was a "manipulative and calculating person," and witnesses were reluctant to speak up while he was out of jail. He alleged that during the initial police investigation - before Martin's arrest - Martin threatened a girlfriend he would send naked pictures of her to her employer if she continued to ask him about the police.

Leonard Stamm, Martin's defense attorney, told the court yesterday that prosecutors had not yet given him that woman's name, but he suspected any such threats were made to keep her from sending naked pictures of his client to his client's wife.

"If something like that did occur, we strongly suspect it had nothing to do with this case," the attorney said.

Mulford agreed with the state in April, saying he believed Martin posed too much of a threat to the victim and other witnesses.

"I'm not convinced that any bond will reasonably protect the victim," Mulford had said.

Jaklitsch said there was no evidence Martin became any more dangerous after his March 30 arrest and that there was therefore no reason to revoke his bond.

"There must be at least a change in circumstances," Jaklitsch said yesterday, according to a recording obtained by The Capital. "While the charges are clearly serious and clearly pose a public safety (threat), that fact was known to both the judge who set the bond, as well as Judge Mulford."

Jaklitsch then reinstated Martin's original $500,000 bond, which was set March 31 by District Court Judge Jonas D. Legum and which was paid April 8 with the help of his family and a bail bondsman.

Stamm noted yesterday that Martin's family stood to loose $45,000 they paid a bondsman if Mulford's decision was allowed to stand, since the bondsman does not have to refund the money if the bond is revoked. He added after the hearing that Jaklitsch's decision reaffirms the state's bail-bond system, that prosecutors can't just ask a judge to set a new bond if a defendant is able to post the original one.

"The state has to show he has done something since his release to justify revoking his bond," he said.

Pam Torok, the victim's mother, could not be reached for comment.

Last month, she told The Capital her daughter was doing well, but still had not fully recovered. She was in outpatient rehabilitation and talking, but could not walk.

Chase said that because of the shooting, Torok miscarried and is in a wheelchair. He said it is unknown if she will walk again.