Photo: Courtesy Martinez Family
Wendy Martinezwas always happy and rarely — if ever — in a bad mood when she served as a six-week intern for Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart in Washington, D.C., in 2006.
“She worked as a right hand for me doing research and was always smiling and eager to learn. She never cussed and was bright and enthusiastic,” Franco says. “This is such a tragedy.”
Martinez, 35and newly engaged, wasfatally stabbed Tuesday nightwhile she jogged around D.C.’s Logan Circle neighborhood.
Police have arrestedAnthony Crawford, 23, in what they believe was an “unprovoked” murder. He remains in custody and it is unclear if he has retained an attorney who could comment on his behalf.
Martinez died in an area hospital after attempting to get help in a Chinese restaurant where customers tried to save her. Video from the restaurant shows Martinez bleeding and seriously injured after being attacked.
Fit and a longtime runner from West Palm Beach, Florida, she had gotten engaged last week to boyfriend Daniel Hincapie and was the happiest she has been in years, says Franco.
“I think that this is very unsettling for anyone who lives in this city,” he said. “This is a very isolated instance — you don’t see crimes like this very much, even in the course of my career.”
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Martinez “radiated love. She was full of energy. She was so excited,” said Hincapie, her fiancé,according to ABC News. “She’s the representation of a lot of things we want to be: kindness, helpfulness, how to be a friend, how to be a partner.”
“I think that’s her representation of who she was, her legacy and how she is living,” Hincapie continued. “She’s here with us.”
Franco remembers her as embodying “what the organization’s internship was about.”
“She was very ambitious, and when I saw her last May she was unbelievably happy in her job with FiscalNote, a privately held software and media company [where she worked as chief of staff]”, he says. “She told me that she had found her calling.”
Several years ago, Rep. Diaz-Balart’s staff honored Martinez for her success in her Washington endeavors because they were so proud of her.
“There is no way we will let Wendy’s memory fade,” Franco tells PEOPLE.
“A group of us will plan a scholarship or something comparable to keep her name alive. This is not the last time people will hear of Wendy Martinez.”
source: people.com
