Galveston’s Grand-Jury Double Standard

The case of Randy Martin is not an abstraction.

Martin, a 47-year-old Black man, was shot and killed by Galveston Police Officer Joshua Nino de Guzman during a traffic stop on May 18, 2026. Civil-rights attorney Adalberto Ruiz, who represents Martin’s family, has said Martin was unarmed. Galveston Police Chief Doug Balli has publicly confirmed that de Guzman had been involved in two previous police shootings and that he was cleared of wrongdoing in both.

Newly Released Video Changes the Evidentiary Picture

Since this article was first published, additional video and investigative material have become public. We The People News reviewed the body-camera file provided to us and then cross-checked it frame by frame against the longer dash-camera recording, which contains a synchronized body-camera inset.

The dash-camera overlay identifies the officer as Joshua Nino de Guzman. The encounter begins as a traffic stop and continues for several minutes before Martin gets out of the black Lincoln. At approximately 3:52:41 p.m., Martin is outside the vehicle. The two men continue interacting beside the open driver’s door.

By roughly 3:53:14 p.m., the encounter has become a physical struggle. The dash camera shows de Guzman attempting to control Martin beside the driver’s side of the car while Martin twists and pulls away. At the same time, the body-camera view is repeatedly blocked by Martin’s shirt, the officer’s arms and the close proximity of both men to the vehicle.

That obstruction is significant because the Texas Rangers’ investigative account says de Guzman told investigators that Martin grabbed at his holstered service weapon and later raised an object that de Guzman believed was a firearm. The public video clearly documents a struggle, but the body-camera angle does not provide a continuous, unobstructed view of both of Martin’s hands during every critical second. From the publicly released footage alone, WTP News cannot independently verify precisely what Martin touched or held during the most obstructed portion of that struggle.

At approximately 3:54:07 p.m., the men separate. Within about a second, de Guzman backs away and draws his handgun.

At approximately 3:54:08 p.m., both camera angles become particularly important. The dash camera shows de Guzman in a two-handed shooting stance with his handgun aimed toward Martin at the open driver’s door. In the synchronized body-camera inset, Martin is crouched or kneeling beside the car. One of Martin’s arms is extended outward, and the visible hand appears open. No firearm is visible in that hand. His other hand and portions of the vehicle interior are not continuously visible, so the footage does not establish everything occurring outside the cameras’ line of sight.

The officer then fires a rapid series of shots. The Texas Rangers’ investigation determined that de Guzman fired eight rounds. KPRC 2, reviewing the released footage independently, likewise reported that at least eight gunshots can be heard. The same reporting noted that Martin can be seen with one hand raised in front of his face as the shots are fired.

The Rangers’ report, as summarized in local reporting, states that no firearm belonging to Martin was listed among the evidence recovered from the scene. An autopsy determined that Martin sustained seven gunshot wounds: five to the upper-right portion of his back, one to his left arm and one to the left side of his chest. The medical examiner classified the death as a homicide.

Those facts do not, by themselves, resolve whether the shooting was legally justified. They do make the complete evidentiary record crucial.

De Guzman told investigators that he believed Martin was reaching for a firearm and that he feared for his life. The Rangers’ account says investigators reviewing video believed Martin had reached toward de Guzman’s waistband and service weapon during the struggle. Martin’s passenger, Ashley Nicole Parks, gave investigators an account that Martin fought with de Guzman and attempted to return toward the vehicle while handling drugs, according to reporting on the Rangers’ file. Martin’s family and attorney have disputed the police account and maintained that Martin was unarmed.

The public footage leaves a critical distinction unresolved: it documents the struggle and the shooting, but portions of the physical confrontation are obstructed, and the released angles do not continuously show both of Martin’s hands immediately before every shot. What the video does clearly show is de Guzman creating distance, drawing his weapon and firing while Martin is positioned beside the open driver’s door.

That is precisely why the evidence presented to the grand jury matters.

The Grand Jury Saw Evidence the Public Did Not

The Galveston County District Attorney’s Office presented the case to a grand jury on September 8, 2026. The grand jury reviewed the Texas Rangers investigation, including video of the incident, and declined to indict de Guzman.

The public did not receive the dash-camera footage until later in September. Martin’s relatives had publicly said they wanted to see the evidence for themselves after the no-bill decision.

That sequence raises a basic transparency question: the grand jury reached its decision behind closed doors using evidence that Martin’s family and the public had not yet been allowed to evaluate for themselves.

The issue is not that every police shooting should result in an indictment. Nor is it that the existence of disturbing video, by itself, proves a crime occurred. The issue is whether the same level of scrutiny follows the evidence regardless of who is being investigated.

That question becomes especially difficult to ignore when compared with what happened to me in the same county justice system.

My Grand Jury Indicted Me After a 0.00% Alcohol Result

In my case, Galveston County obtained a felony DWI indictment after the government’s own laboratory reported that my blood contained 0.00% alcohol. I then remained incarcerated for approximately eleven months before the prosecution was ultimately dismissed.

The two cases are obviously different, and they were considered by different grand juries at different times. But both proceedings were conducted under the same system of grand-jury secrecy.

When an ordinary citizen can be subjected to a felony prosecution despite objective laboratory evidence directly contradicting an officer’s claim that he smelled alcohol, while an officer who fired eight rounds during a fatal encounter receives a no-bill, the public has legitimate reason to ask how those decisions were reached and what evidence each grand jury was actually shown.

I do not know precisely what evidence was presented in either proceeding. I do not know how prosecutors characterized that evidence, which witnesses testified, what questions jurors asked, or what information may have been emphasized, minimized or omitted.

And that is precisely why transparency matters.

Randy Martin’s family deserves access to the evidence surrounding his death to the fullest extent the law permits. They deserve to understand what happened during the encounter that ended his life and how the decision not to prosecute was reached.

The public deserves confidence that a fatal use of police force—particularly when the officer involved had already been involved in two previous police shootings—receives searching, independent scrutiny.

And I deserve to know how a felony DWI indictment was obtained after the government’s own laboratory found no alcohol in my blood.

These are not demands for predetermined outcomes.

They are demands for a justice system capable of demonstrating that the badge does not change the standard.

A grand jury should neither function as a rubber stamp for prosecution nor as a shield against accountability. Its legitimacy depends on evidence being treated consistently, regardless of whether the person under scrutiny is a journalist in handcuffs or a police officer carrying a gun.

Not simply why one man was indicted and another was not—but whether the same commitment to truth, scrutiny and accountability was applied to both.

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Sources reviewed for this update: the body-camera file provided to We The People News; the publicly released synchronized dash/body-camera recording; reporting on the Texas Rangers investigation by KGTX 7; KPRC 2’s review of the released dash-camera footage; FOX 26 Houston reporting on the grand-jury decision and subsequent release of the video.