Message of Thanks From Marissa Alexander

I would like to whole heartedly express my sincerest and immense gratitude for each and every person who has supported me in any form available to you.  I can tell you all that my conscience is clear and I can look in the mirror and love what I see and who I am because I have maintained my innocence and more importantly I am a daughter of the most high.  Moving forward, as facts come out and discussions happen and certain aspects spark dialogue, I ask that you try and place yourself in my situation, or perhaps, your daughter, sister, mother or friend.  This could have been anyone and it truly has been anyone and countless others that have been, can be or will be affected with issues similar to mine on one scale or another because my story is multi-dimensional.  So I leave you with this thought, please continue to do everything you are doing to support this and more.  Be cautious of the games of those that oppose, and that is to have everyone running around with fire extinguishers when there really is a flood.  Again, thank you for your support. 
                                                            -Marissa Alexander

WIS TV.com Marissa Alexander's Father and Step Mother - Interview

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - A mother of three is looking at spending at least the next 20 years in prison for what she describes as "standing her ground."

DOCUMENTS

Click here to read the deposition in the Marissa Alexander case.

It's a case that's just starting to make national news -- given the similarities to the Trayvon Martin case.

How are the two cases similar? Marissa Alexander's family claims that she was protecting and defending herself on her own property.

Alexander, 31, who is a licensed weapons holder, says she took a stand against her abusive husband at their home 2 years ago and now she's being punished.

Her father, Raoul Jenkins, who lives in Columbia, says he didn't know half of what was going on with his oldest daughter in Jacksonville, Florida until she went on trial for her life.

"She told me why she did not tell me or her brother, which is my oldest son here in Columbia, because we would have went down there," Jenkins said.

According to court documents, Alexander's husband, Rico Gray, had a history of domestic violence toward her and other women. They were married in mid-May. Jenkins says he went down in June to get her to move out.

"I told her at that time, 'Marissa, if I'm coming down there, this is it, you make sure you press charges because he has no business -- no man should hit a woman. Make sure you press charges because I'm not going to run back and forth to Jacksonville because you're going back to him. I don't want that to happen,'" Jenkins said.

Unbeknownst to him, Alexander says the abuse continued. In August 2010, another incident happened. This time, fearing for her life, she got her gun from her glove compartment and fired a warning shot in her ceiling. No one was hurt, but she was arrested and charged with aggravated assault.

"When you're the abuser and you turn around and make the victim the bad guy and when the system allows that to happen, that's a sad story," Jenkins said.

Alexander's stepmother, Karen Jenkins, says she doesn't know why stand your ground is not a valid defense.

"If [George] Zimmerman, who killed someone -– an unarmed innocent child -– and was given that right, why couldn't someone that had documented in the system, been abused, said she was fearful of her life, why was she denied that right?" Karen said.

A judge said Alexander had other options and could have escaped out of a window or front door and she did not have to fire that shot.

"The whole family was devastated," Karen said. 

Alexander had a protection order out against her husband that was active at the time of incident. She was supposed to be sentenced Monday for the aggravated assault charges, but the judge delayed it since her attorney has filed motions for a new trial.

Alexander Case Shows Need to Reform 10-20-Life Law

d to form 10-20-Life Law

For Immediate Release
Date: April 24, 2012
Contact: Monica Pratt Raffanel, media@famm.org


WASHINGTON, D.C. -- FAMM (Families Against Mandatory Minimums) President Julie Stewart today called on Florida lawmakers to repeal the state’s “10-20-Life” automatic prison sentence for assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill. The call comes as Marissa Alexander, a 31-year-old mother of three, prepares to be sentenced for a 2010 incident in which she fired a gun into the ceiling of her house to persuade her abusive husband to leave.

“A lot of attention has been paid to Florida’s ‘Stand Your Ground’ law and far too little to the state’s extreme, one-size-fits-all sentencing laws,” Ms. Stewart said. “Less than three years ago, Orville Lee Wollard, a lawful gun owner, fired a warning shot in his home to chase off a young man who had been abusing his teenage daughter. After Wollard rejected a plea deal and a jury rejected Wollard’s self-defense claim, a Florida judge was forced by the state’s mandatory minimum sentencing law for assault to send Wollard to prison for 20 years. Mr. Wollard’s judge stated that he thought the sentence was excessive, but said his hands were tied.

“In the coming weeks, Marissa Alexander, who was also found guilty of assault with a deadly weapon, will likely be sentenced to the same 20-year mandatory minimum prison term. While reasonable people can disagree on whether Mr. Wollard or Ms. Alexander deserve any prison time for their conduct, no one can honestly believe that these were the types of cases the legislature had in mind when it passed the 10-20-Life automatic gun sentence,” Stewart said.
According to press reports and court records, Ms. Alexander’s husband, Rico Gray, abused her on more than one occasion before the incident that led to her conviction. Mr. Gray described one incident of abuse in a deposition, saying, “And the third incident (with Alexander) we was staying together and I pushed her back and she fell in the bathtub and hit her head and I-- you know, by the time I ran downstairs and got in my car to leave, you know, that's the time I went to jail, the police picked me up down the street.”

In that same deposition, Mr. Gray admitted that he threatened his wife’s safety on the day she fired the gun into the ceiling. He also admitted that Ms. Alexander never aimed her gun at him (or his two children who were also present). According to Mr. Gray, after she told him to leave her house and he refused, she discharged the gun into the ceiling and no one was hurt. He later called the police and told them what had happened. Ms. Alexander was arrested and charged with three counts of aggravated assault (one count related to her husband, and two more for her stepsons). Ms. Alexander strongly maintains her innocence.

Greg Newburn, director of FAMM’s Florida project, said, “Based on everything we have heard to this point, we believe that sending Marissa Alexander to prison for 20 years would be a tremendous injustice and a colossal waste of Florida taxpayers’ hard-earned money.
“This is not an issue about race – it’s about individualized justice. Ms. Alexander is black, but Orville Lee Wollard is white. Rather, this is another, powerful example of how inflexible sentencing laws prevent courts from considering highly relevant circumstances, such as whether the offender is a hardened criminal or a first-time offender and whether someone was motivated by malice or genuine fear,” said Newburn.

For more information on Marissa Alexander’s case, see news articles in the Florida Times-Union, International Business Times, and Loop 21.

For more information on Orville Lee Wollard’s case, see his profile and an op-ed by Ms. Stewart that appeared in The Washington Times. For another case involving an excessive sentence imposed under the 10-20-life mandatory gun law, see FAMM’s profile of Erik Weyant.