Ex-cop sues NFL legend Steve Smith Sr. over alleged affair with wife

An ex-cop in Maryland is suing Steve Smith Sr. over a months-long affair the former Carolina Panthers and Baltimore Ravens star allegedly had with the man’s wife, a member of the Ravens’ marching band.

Antonio Martinez, who previously was a member of the San Antonio, Texas Police Department, filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina Superior Court. Smith, a Mecklenburg resident, was served the suit on Friday, according to court documents.

Martinez brought the complaint under North Carolina’s so-called homewrecker law, formally known as the “alienation of affection” law, which lets an aggrieved spouse sue the party they blame for damaging their marriage, his attorney Christopher Adkins told The Independent.

He said North Carolina is one of only a handful of states with such a law, and that he files “a number of” similar cases annually.

Adkins described Martinez as “super heartbroken” upon discovering the alleged affair. Martinez, who is also a U.S. Army veteran, already suffered from PTSD-related issues, and the affair “just devastated him,” according to Adkins.

“This isn’t some kind of money grab; he really was put in a bad spot, emotionally,” he said. “He’s trying to figure out where to go from here.”

Smith’s lawyer, Jonathan Feit, did not respond to a request for comment.

The Charlotte Observer was first to report on the lawsuit.

Earlier this year, Martinez exposed the relationship between his wife and Smith by posting screenshots on social media of incriminating messages the two had reportedly sent each other.

The complaint says Martinez discovered the alleged affair on February 22, “right after [he] and [his] wife had just engaged in sexual intercourse,” and that she immediately confessed that she had indeed been sleeping with Smith.

“He rolled over and looked and her phone is blowing up with Steve Smith’s number, sending texts late at night,” Adkins told The Independent.

Martinez then called Smith and confronted him, saying, “Hey, yo Steve… Yeah, you've been f***ing my wife, bro. Whatcha gotta say for yourself?”

Smith, a legendary trash-talker who is now an analyst for the NFL Network, replied, “I’m sorry,” according to Martinez’s complaint.

Martinez and his wife, Nicole, split up the same day, the complaint states. It says the two met on Tinder in June 2000, and married in September of the following year. They have one child together and share five others from previous relationships.

Prior to Martinez’s discovery of the alleged affair, he and his wife “were happily married with no intentions to separate,” the complaint asserts.

“This love is definitely one for the story books,” reads their wedding page on The Knot.

In September 2024, Smith met Nicole Martinez while filming an episode of The NFL's Most Interesting Jobs with Steve Smith, in which he joined the band for gameday, according to the complaint. Smith then had a network staffer slip her his phone number, the complaint continues.

Smith and Nicole Martinez subsequently began talking and exchanging text messages, which were “often sexual in nature and included the exchange of photographs and videos,” the complaint states. These included photos of Smith’s genitalia and videos of him masturbating, according to the complaint.

It alleges the pair continued to send messages back and forth for the next six months, which focused on various subjects such as their illicit relationship, their “secret plans to meet each other,” and assorted “sexual fantasies.”

In one, Smith texted, “Ur beautiful by the way,” according to the complaint.

“Thank you!” Nicole Martinez replied. “You’re so sweet. That means a lot.”

In another, the devoutly religious Smith responded to a photo Nicole Martinez sent of herself by texting, “U hiding a lot of sexiest [sic] underneath those clothes damn,” the complaint says.

To that, she responded with an emoji and wrote, “...and some tattoos.”

A third message cited in the complaint says Smith sent Nicole Martinez an explicit video of himself and asked, “Did u wake up to me this morning,” to which she wrote back, “I haven’t gotten to enjoy you yet... was already at work when you sent it.”

Nicole Martinez also told Smith that she enjoyed it when he looked at her, and said she “hadn’t felt that spark in years.”

The complaint says Smith and Martinez’s wife had sex as recently as January 10, 2025, when Smith was in Baltimore to cover a Ravens game.

A little more than six weeks later, Martinez found out about the alleged affair, according to the complaint. After Smith apologized to him, Martinez lit into him, a transcript of their phone conversation shows.

“You’re sorry? You f***ing knew she was married,” Martinez told Smith on the call, which the complaint says Martinez recorded. “... You're not a f***ing man, bro. All that s**t you do on TV. All that s**t talking you do to other people. Now someone’s got you on the f***ing phone and you can't even f***ing man up?”

Smith, who has the eighth-most NFL receiving yards of all time, was among 15 finalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2025 but ended up getting passed over. He has been called “the Fred Astaire of the touchdown dance,” and famously scored in a touchdown in 2009 while nursing a broken arm.

Martinez is asking for a minimum of $100,000 in damages.