Road-rage shooter gets 27-50 years in prison

The Marion Township man who shot to death a father of two during a road-rage incident in September was described Friday as "the worst kind of danger" for a community.

Judge Miriam Cavanaugh told Martin Edward Zale that he has shown no remorse or emotion of any kind for the Sept. 2 fatal shooting of Derek Flemming, who confronted Zale, 69, on Grand River Avenue at the Chilson Road intersection in Genoa Township following a road-rage incident.

"What I also find very tragic about this situation, Mr. Zale, is your disregard for human life," the judge said. "You went about your day almost looking for conflict, not trying to avoid it, but provoking it and after sitting here and listening to the testimony, I left this bench with the firm conviction that you were a shooting waiting to happen.

"If it hadn't been Mr. Flemming, it would have been someone else," Cavanaugh said as Zale subtly shook his head no. "You don't have to agree with me. I don't expect you to and I do find based on the evidence ... this killing is in no way justified. ... There is no legal or moral justification for your actions. I do find that you pose the worst kind of danger to our community. Not the kind of danger or fear that people have of something happening in the middle of the night or the darkness, but one no one sees coming."

Cavanaugh sentenced Zale to 25-50 years for second-degree murder and 32 months to four years in prison for discharing a firearm from a vehicle. The judge also sentenced Zale to serve a two-year sentence for related felony firearms convictions, which runs consecutive to the murder charge for a minimum total of 27 years.

Cavanaugh also ordered that he pay $4,160 in restitution for funeral services for the victim.

Zale declined to comment prior to sentencing on the advice of his attorney, Marcus Wilcox, who asked the judge for leniency. The Howell defense attorney declined to comment about the sentence after court, but he confirmed that Zale's appeal "is already started."

Prosecutor William Vailliencourt called the sentence "appropriate."

"Nothing can undo the horrible pain the defendant inflicted on the Flemming family by taking away a husband, son, and father," he said. "For a man of the defendant's age, this is essentially a life sentence, as it should be."

Zale testified at his trial in May that he intended to kill Flemming, who stood at the driver's-side window of Zale's Dodge Ram pickup while it was stopped at the red light, but he said it was in self-defense because Flemming hit him in the face, threatened to harm him and reached into his cab as if to carry out the threat. No witnesses reported seeing Flemming throw a punch at Zale.

Assistant Prosecutor Daniel Rose said the case is not one of self-defense, or "stand your ground," because that law "still reflects the value of human life" and Zale did not. Deadly force, he said, may be used only to protect against the threat of imminent death or great bodily harm and that did not exist in this case.

"The defendant rolled down his window and shot an unarmed man in the face from the safety of a 4,000 pound truck," he said. "A very thorough jury spent three days examining his claim of self defense and concluded it was just not true. ... Your sentence serves as a reminder of the responsibility that goes with the right every citizen has to bear arms. That responsibility is to know the law and how it applies. ...

"No just punishment in this case means no justice in this case," Rose added. "... All of us look to this court for justice for the senseless and horrifying loss of a son, a brother, a husband and a dad to that family and a member of this community. When he took his gun and pointed it at Derek Flemming and pulled the trigger, Martin Zale unleashed a timeless hardship on this family."

Flemming's family also addressed the court, expressing a deep grief for their loss. His father, Marvin Flemming, called it the "worst day of his life," and emotions filled his voice as he described how he picked up his grandchildren from their first day of school and then the children learning about their father's murder.

His mother, Elaine Flemming, described her only son as a husband who adored his wife and children. She said he was a patient man and he was robbed of the opportunity to walk his daughter down the aisle.

"I called you a monster the day after it happened and my opinion has not changed," she told Zale. "A new word comes to mind: Evil. You have no compassion for others or remorse for what you did. You took from me my only son. ... You better hope God can forgive you, because I can't."

Derek Flemming's widow, Amy Flemming, said she was a "broken woman with broken children" as the result of their loss. She said the family's pain has been amplified by the negative comments strangers wrote on websites of news stories.

Amy Flemming said her only concern that day was for her husband, whose "beating heart was still pumping his blood out onto Grand River Avenue" and that she saw "no remorse, no fear, no anger" as she looked into the face of the man who had killed her husband.

"I saw my husband's life end right there on the street," she said. "I saw him very much alive and then dead in an instant. Despite all the people who surrounded us, I felt utterly all alone. My other half is gone. How is that possible?"

Contact Livingston Daily justice reporter Lisa Roose-Church at 517-552-2846 or lrchurch@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @LisaRooseChurch.