Doug Martin's family sues Oakland police, alleging restraint asphyxia in death

On October 18th, Leslie Martin made a call that was meant to save her son's life. Her boy, Doug Martin, was in the grip of a mental health crisis at their Oakland home. She dialed for paramedics. What happened next—across the next fifteen minutes and in a neighbor's basement two doors away—would end with her 36-year-old son dead, and a lawsuit filed this week in federal court alleging that the people she called for help bore responsibility for his death.

Doug Martin had been a first-round draft pick in 2012, a running back who spent six seasons with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and finished his career with the Raiders in 2018. He accumulated more than 5,300 rushing yards and made two Pro Bowls. He was an Oakland native. But on that October afternoon, none of that mattered. What mattered was that he was struggling, and his mother reached out.

After Leslie's call, Doug fled the house and hid in the basement of a neighbor's home. Oakland police found him there. According to the lawsuit filed by his parents, Leslie and Douglas, officers physically restrained their son and held him face-down while pressing on his back. When they turned him onto his side, he was unresponsive. The officers, the suit alleges, believed he was either sleeping or faking sleep. At some point, at least one officer called for medical assistance.

Paramedics from Falck Northern California arrived roughly fifteen minutes after the initial call. The lawsuit contends they did not provide prompt medical care when they arrived. By then, it was too late. Doug Martin was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead. The family's legal team, led by attorney John Burris, retained an independent pathologist who concluded that restraint asphyxia—death caused by pressure on the body during physical restraint—was likely the cause.

Burris framed the tragedy in stark terms: a mother calling for help, not a death sentence. "When you call for help and the police come, it's not a death warrant," he said. "You don't expect the person to die." The family is suing the city of Oakland, its police department, and the ambulance company, seeking damages for wrongful death, medical expenses, funeral costs, and loss of familial relationship.

There is another thread in this story. Leslie Martin sent her son's brain to the Boston University CTE Center to determine whether he had developed chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain condition common in former football players that can only be diagnosed after death. Burris acknowledged that even if CTE is found, it would have no bearing on the official cause of death. But the family wanted answers about what was happening inside their son's mind—whether the game he played for so long had left invisible damage that contributed to the crisis that day.

The Oakland Police Department declined to comment, citing pending litigation. The city attorney's office offered no statement. Falck Northern California could not be reached. The case now sits in the federal system, waiting. It is one of a growing number of lawsuits that ask a difficult question: what happens when someone in crisis calls for help, and the help that arrives becomes the harm itself.