Kriti Mehrotra
When Jason Corbett was found dead in the master bedroom of his 160 Panther Creek Court home in Meadowlands, North Carolina, it left his friends and family members shaken to their core. It didn’t take long for it to come to light that the Irish father of two had died as the result of a heinous physical assault by his second wife, Molly Martens, and his father-in-law, Tom Martens. However, as profiled in Netflix’s ‘A Deadly American Marriage,’ even his mother-in-law, Sharon Martens, played a crucial role in this ordeal as officials tried figuring out precisely who instigated the assault.
Sharon Martens Believed Jason Corbett Was a Danger to His Family
Although a native of Tallahassee, Florida, who eventually settled down in Knoxville, Tennessee, as a family woman and math teacher, Sharon Martens admittedly has great gut instincts. There is her maternal intuition, and she reportedly also gained a lot of knowledge about people and situation-reading from her long-time husband, Tom, who served in the FBI for nearly three decades. Therefore, when she got to know her only daughter’s husband as well as his two kids from a previous union after they had tied the knot in June 2011, she gradually came to the conclusion that he was possibly abusive.
According to Sharon’s own accounts, she had witnessed Molly and Jason get into quite a few arguments almost from the day they decided to spend the rest of their lives together. Then, she claimed to learn through her daughter that he was not only verbally but also physically abusive, the latter of which his two kids allegedly witnessed in the form of grabs and pushes, too. Thus, worried for the safety of Molly and the youngsters her family had come to love as their own, the educator set up a code system for the latter to use in the event of any physical violence.
As per court records, Sharon told the children that if their parents ever got into a big fight, they should immediately call her on the number she wrote for them at the bottom of a toy. She reportedly kept this toy under a nightstand in the guest room to ensure Jason would never mistakenly find it before telling 9/10-year-old Jack that his code word was “Galaxy,” whereas 7/8-year-old Sarah’s was “Peacock.” The idea was that if they ever used this word in conversation with her, she would instantly contact the police, which is something the kids and the evidence corroborated.
Sharon Martens’ Accounts of the Fateful Night Were Claimed to be Implausible
It was on August 1, 2015, when Sharon and Tom decided to make the 5-hour drive from their home in Tennessee to their daughter’s in North Carolina despite already having some plans. They allegedly canceled everything at the last minute for the visit, claiming to have missed her and their grandkids, even with the family’s patriarch scheduled to be at work at 9 am on August 3. The couple reportedly arrived at 160 Panther Creek Court around 8:30 pm. Alleging that their son-in-law was “drunk” yet friendly, they had a meal together before settling in for the night.
As per Sharon’s accounts, it was her fear for Molly and the kids that led them to make this trip, which is also why phone records showed numerous calls between them as they drove down. However, the matriarch then asserted that while she awoke in the early hours of August 2 (2 am) to dogs barking and her daughter’s screams, she fell asleep again after her husband went to check on them. She recalled seeing Tom grab a baseball bat, yet she said she fell back asleep once the voices fizzled out, which some officials have always found hard to believe, considering all her previous worries.
Sharon Martens Prefers to Lead a Quiet Life Today
Sharon had relayed every bit of these events to authorities within hours of Jason’s tragic demise, and her narrative never once changed, even as the days, weeks, months, and years passed by. Yet, there was still the hypothesis that Molly and Tom killed him long before contacting the police, and asked the matriarch to lie about being asleep so she didn’t have to match their story. Nevertheless, in the end, only the father-daughter duo faced charges in connection with the 39-year-old Irish native’s demise, with prosecutors arguing they killed him with malice. Molly and Tom were both found guilty of second-degree murder in 2017, leaving Sharon no choice but to spend her time still working in her late 60s/early 70s or visiting two prisons 3½ hours apart to see her husband and daughter.
After their appeal finally resulted in their conviction being overturned in lieu of a retrial, Sharon decided it was time for her to share her side of the story for the first time. It was when Molly and Tom pleaded no contest and guilty to the charge of voluntary manslaughter, respectively, on October 30, 2023, that she testified to her recollections of the time leading up to and the incident itself. Molly and Tom were subsequently sentenced to between 51 and 74 months in prison with credit for time served, resulting in them being released for good on June 6, 2024. Since then, now in her mid-70s, Sharon has chosen to live her life well away from the limelight, focusing on just her husband, daughter, three sons, and their respective families while residing in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Read More: Where Are Tom and Molly Martens Now? Update on Jason Corbett’s Killers
