U.S. Department
of Justice
1st Defendant Charged in Connection with Federal Escapees is Sentenced
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – An Indictment from earlier this year in the Western District of Missouri Federal Court charging individuals with escaping confinement and other individuals with assisting them, resulted in an incarceration sentence of 40 months for one of those charged.
Trevor Scott Sparks, 33, Kansas City, MO, and Sergio Perez Martinez, 43, Panorama City, CA, were charged in a two-count Indictment with escape from confinement and aiding or assisting each other in escape from confinement. Another individual, Steven Lydell Williams, Sr., 64, Kansas City, MO, was also charged in the Indictment with a single count of aiding or assisting in the escape.
As of the drafting of this release, Perez Martinez remain at large, although Sparks was re-arrested December 30th, 2022. Williams, Sr., who has been in custody pending resolution of his charges since shortly after the escape, was sentenced for his role in that escape. The Court sentenced him to 40 months in custody, consecutive to any sentence he may receive in two pending state cases that resulted from Missouri moving to revoke his parole from prior state felony convictions.
After arrests on federal felony warrants, and because of jury trial convictions and guilty pleas to various felony charges contained within several Western District of Missouri (WDMO) Federal Grand Jury indictments and various orders of WDMO Federal District Court Judge D. Greg Kays, Trevor Scott Sparks and Sergio Perez Martinez were confined in the Cass County, Missouri, Jail on multiple federal felonies.
Federal, state, and local law enforcement began investigating the escape of Sparks and Martinez from the Cass County Jail on or about December 5, 2022. On December 6, 2022, the United States Marshals Service was notified by Cass County, Missouri, that Sparks escaped from confinement and was seen leaving the facility at 10:22 p.m. on December 5, 2022. It was later determined that Sparks and Martinez, another inmate in the Cass County facility, escaped through subterfuge and damage to the facility from the Cass County Jail and fled east outside the jail into the surrounding rural community. From there, Defendant Williams picked them up in his vehicle and transported them to his apartment in Kansas City, Missouri, where they obtained clothes and food. Williams then transported them into the Northeast area of the Kansas City metropolitan area, where Williams dropped them off. Sparks and his mother, Dawn Branstietter, were subsequently arrested in this same general area on December 30th. Branstietter’s husband, John Baxter, was also later arrested on the same charges. These three defendants are scheduled for sentencing later this month and in early September.
This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Bruce Rhoades and Robert Smith. It is being investigated by the United States Marshal Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Kansas City Police Department, and the Cass County Sheriff’s Department with other law enforcement agencies also assisting.