Santa Clara County prosecutors have cleared two sheriff's deputies who fatally shot a 43-year-old San Jose man last October after he charged at them with a 9-inch knife during a two-hour standoff. The Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office concluded that deputies Jose Rios and Douglas Ulrich were legally justified in using deadly force against Jose Neftali Martinez-Nolasco, who prosecutors say deliberately engineered a scenario that left responding officers with no safe alternative.
The confrontation began around 7:30 PM on October 27, 2025, when a Santa Clara County sheriff's deputy stopped Martinez-Nolasco near Fruitdale and Leigh avenues for expired registration tags, according to KRON4. He barricaded himself inside his vehicle and refused to come out, then briefly drove away before stopping again. Deputies, San Jose police officers, and a mental health crisis team spent roughly two hours trying to persuade him to surrender.
According to the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office, deputies used three patrol vehicles to box in Martinez-Nolasco's car from the front, rear, and driver's side, forcing him toward the passenger side. They then used a chain ball to break a window and fired pepper-ball chemical agents inside the vehicle before he emerged through the passenger door carrying the knife.
A Two-Hour Standoff Ends in Gunfire
Martinez-Nolasco was struck by multiple less-lethal rounds but charged again while still holding the knife, the district attorney's report states. Rios and Ulrich opened fire, striking him six times and killing him. Deputies administered life-saving aid on scene until paramedics took over, per the same report, transporting him to Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 10:16 PM. During a news briefing the following day, Santa Clara County Sheriff Robert Jonsen said the two deputies had 24 years and nine years of law enforcement experience, respectively, and were both extensively trained in crisis negotiation, the station's report notes. Both were placed on routine administrative leave following the shooting. San Jose Police Department Assistant Chief Brian Shab confirmed that SJPD officers had prior law enforcement contacts with Martinez-Nolasco, though he did not disclose specifics.
Jonsen also said the standoff and shooting were extensively documented, with body-worn cameras activated on all responding deputies and an aerial law enforcement drone recording much of the encounter from overhead. That footage played a key role in the district attorney's legal review, which took roughly ten months to complete before the office released its written findings on Tuesday.
Prosecutors Point to a Deliberate Confrontation
The district attorney's office wrote that evidence overwhelmingly shows Martinez-Nolasco deliberately created a scenario designed to leave responding deputies with no safe alternative, pointing to a suicide-by-cop scenario. During the standoff, he reportedly said he wanted to die rather than return to jail and told responders he was struggling mentally and financially. Preliminary toxicology screening came back positive for methamphetamine and amphetamines.
Prosecutors determined that deputies reasonably believed they and others faced an imminent threat when Martinez-Nolasco charged them a second time with the knife still in hand. Under California Penal Code Section 835a, enacted through Assembly Bill 392 in 2020 and detailed by LegiScan, peace officers may use deadly force only when they reasonably believe it is necessary to defend against an imminent threat of death or serious injury — a standard that replaced California's older, looser 1872 rule.
Part of a Broader County Pattern
The Santa Clara County Police Chiefs' Association protocol requires the district attorney's office to independently review every fatal officer-involved incident in the county and publish its findings, a practice that began after former District Attorney Jeffrey Rosen eliminated secret grand jury reviews in favor of public reports. This case follows recent county precedent, including a July ruling clearing two San Jose police officers in the July 2025 fatal shooting of Mateusz Dzierbun, who charged at officers with a knife — a case Hoodline previously covered separately.
The findings also echo a wider regional pattern documented in a 2023 investigative report by KQED, the Bay Area News Group, and the California Reporting Project, which found that most individuals seriously injured or killed by police in San Jose were intoxicated or experiencing a mental health crisis. Hoodline first reported on the shooting itself in an earlier dispatch when the joint investigation was still underway, before the district attorney's office reached its conclusion this week.
