Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — A Salt Lake man accused of robbing a Carbon County grocery store at gunpoint has pleaded guilty to a federal weapons charge.
Dominic Mathew Martinez was scheduled to go on trial Monday in U.S. District Court. Instead, he pleaded guilty to brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence and agreed to pay nearly $2,200 in restitution to Smith's Food and Drug.
U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball — at the request of federal prosecutors — agreed to dismiss one count of Hobbs Act robbery and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm in exchange for Martinez's plea.
Martinez, 28, walked into the Smith's store at 1075 E. Main in Price on Nov. 26, showed a clerk at the service desk a handgun and gave her a note demanding money, according to charging documents.
The clerk handed over the money and Martinez left the store but forgot to take the demand note with him, Price police investigators said. Officers collected the forgotten scrap of paper and sent it to the state crime lab where technicians matched three fingerprints on the note to Martinez, the charges state.
As part of their investigation, police also interviewed Martinez's friends and acquaintances, including Jennifer Meradee Tryon. Detectives said Tryon, 43, admitted that she drove Martinez to the store, waited outside for him and then drove him away after the robbery.
A federal grand jury indicted Tryon in March on one count of Hobbs Act robbery and one count of brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence. Her five-day jury trial was also set to begin Monday in federal court but is now slated to start Dec. 15.
Martinez is scheduled to be sentenced Nov 24. He faces a possible term of up to life in prison with a minimum mandatory sentence of seven years behind bars.
