The parents of the 8-month-old Broward County girl who was the subject of an Amber Alert Wednesday have been on the radar of police, prosecutors and the courts for nearly two years.
Arys Maria Martinez and Jacob Alexander Howard, both 34 years old, met in January 2021 and were married on Valentine's Day in 2022, according to court records.
It wasn’t long before domestic violence hit the public record.
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In April 2022, Howard was arrested on a domestic battery charge after Martinez told deputies he choked her during an argument to the point she blacked out. The fight continued off and on for hours, she said, and at one point she hit him with a plate to defend herself. Deputies were called after Martinez sent a photo of her bleeding face and swollen eye to her lawyer, the report states.
The next day, Martinez sought an injunction for protection against domestic violence against Howard, saying he kicked in a door to the room where she sought refuge after confronting him about “using drugs again.” When she tried to leave, Howard took her keys “threw me back into the room and strangled me,” she wrote in the petition.
“I begged him to stop, he grabbed the glass, threw me on the floor … (and) slashed my face with the glass,” she said.
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While a temporary injunction was granted, Martinez failed to appear at an Aug. 9, 2022 hearing where a permanent injunction could’ve been ordered – so the temporary injunction was dismissed.
By then, though, Howard had pleaded no contest to two felonies stemming from the incident: aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and domestic battery. On June 23, 2022, a judge withheld adjudication of guilt and placed him on three years’ probation, during which he was to get a mental health evaluation, continue counseling and enter a batters’ intervention program.
It appears from the public record he succeeded in staying out of trouble for the next year and their daughter, Amelia Rose Martinez, was born on June 8, 2023.
But on July 18, 2023, deputies were called again to their home and Martinez told them Howard “was overdosing in the bedroom,” states the report, which bears a stamp identifying Howard as a “POSSIBLE VIOLENT OFFENDER OF SPECIAL CONCERN.”
Howard declined medical care.
Martinez then told the deputy Howard had been physically abusing her several times in recent months and she was afraid to report him.
She showed the deputy a video of Howard striking her while she was holding their baby.
She also recounted an incident in May when, she said Howard grabbed her gun, pointed it toward her and then to his head and said, the still-unborn “baby will be better off without the both of us.”
In all, she described several incidents that led to Howard being charged with false imprisonment, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and three counts of domestic battery.
Martinez sought another restraining order, saying Howard needed treatment and therapy for drug use and she feared for the safety of their daughter until “he is clean again.”
As with the previous injunction, this one was dismissed when she failed to appear at a hearing to make it permanent.
The arrest led to Howard’s probation being violated, but at an August 11 hearing, the state stipulated he was not a danger to the community, and a judge agreed, according to court records. Citing Howard’s community ties, mental condition, and efforts in recovery, the judge allowed him to continue on probation.
And on August 28, the state declined to prosecute Howard on the criminal charges stemming from the 2023 arrest.
