By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Angela Corey has become a minor legal celebrity for her tough-minded prosecution of the Trayvon Martin murder case. Her toughness has also drawn the ire of U.S. House member Corrine Brown in a racially charged case in Jacksonville. The case involves Marissa Alexander who was charged under Florida’s “10-20-life” law which mandates progressively tough penalties for violent felonies when firearms are involved.
Saying he had no choice, Judge James Daniel sentenced the mother of an 11-year-old to 20 years in prison after a jury convicted her of aggravated assault for firing a warning shot to discourage her estranged husband from choking her. In a cruel irony another judge had rejected Alexander’s invocation of Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law, ruling she wasn’t in fear for her safety when she returned to her house to get the car keys she had forgotten after she ran into her garage in an attempt to escape.
The prosecutor was singled out for failing to exercise discretion in the case. “There is no justification for 20 years,” Brown told Corey, “All the community was asking for was mercy and justice.”
Corey had offered Alexander a plea deal which carried a three year sentence. Alexander bet on the good sense of the jury, and crapped out. Judge Daniel seemed frustrated by the case:
“Under the state’s 10-20-life law, a conviction for aggravated assault where a firearm has been discharged carries a minimum and maximum sentence of 20 years without regarding to any extenuating or mitigating circumstances that may be present, such as those in this case.”
Rep. Brown was not so diplomatic saying, “She was overcharged by the prosecutor. Period. She never should have been charged.” Brown, the Jacksonville congresswoman, told reporters that the case was a product of “institutional racism.” Corey said the case deserved to be prosecuted because Alexander fired in the direction of a room where two children were standing.
Mandatory minimum sentences ignore mitigating factors and punish under a “bright-line” test. They are the darling of the “law and order” crowd who see the world in stark shades of black and white and who eschew any discretion for “lily-livered” judges who have the disturbing habit of mixing compassion and justice in sentencing decisions.
Proponents of the 1999 “10-20-life” law point to the fact that violent gun crime rates have dropped 30 percent statewide since the law was enacted. Is 20 years fair for a woman trying to defend herself? Should the prosecutor have heeded Rep. Brown’s suggestion and backed off the charges altogether? Can a law be just in the face of a result that flies in the face of “natural justice”?
Source: CNN
`Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Dean FOx. Well I bet the jury did NOT hear that this same husband put her in the hospital in a previous vicious attack.
I don’t understand why Zimmerman/Martin is being rehashed again here. So let me introduce something new: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/us/clicking-like-on-facebook-is-not-protected-speech-judge-rules.html?_r=1
an excerpt:
“While public employees are allowed to speak as citizens on matters of public concern, Judge Raymond A. Jackson of Federal District Court ruled that clicking the “like” button did not amount to expressive speech. In other words, it was not the same as actually writing out a message and posting it on the site. “
I think Mike Spindell’s point is the main point. If we can all be moved comfortably back into the stupid position of being afraid of Trayvon Martin after the fact, we can sympathize with poor George Zimmerman who had to kill him, and then we can become easy to manipulate any time our corporatocracy wants to pass some law or impose some injustice that we should all oppose with our last ounce of strength. We simply won’t have the intestinal fortitude to fight against real repression and organized theft in this country if we spend our days and nights fearing the depredations of kids in hoodies with candies.
It is a well run game of “Let’s you and him fight.” The George Zimmermans confound their own minds with wacko fears of the Trayvon Martins of the world while the Trayvon Martins of the world really DO have to worry about what can happen to them at any moment because of the George Zimmermans, and bingo, neither George Zimmerman nor Trayvon Martin has any time or energy (or, in one case, life) left to deal with the real problems of their world. WHO SET UP THIS FIGHT? Zimmerman should have had nothing against Martin. Martin should have never met Zimmerman. The event itself was staged by FEAR and the fear itself was staged by more than 250 years of wrongheadedness that is now so institutionalized we can’t even ferret it out.
Top Shot, It isn’t just about what happened 200 years ago. We had well over 250 years in this country of enslaving Blacks and Native Americans before, 200 years ago, Southern states attempted to secede to protect their laws of enslavement and we fought a bloody war to change those laws. Then they were replaced by Jim Crow laws which continued inequities. Although the Jim Crow laws were replaced about 60 years ago, today’s laws are too frequently enforced as if Jim Crow were alive and well.
“A modicum of pride” is exactly what we are trying to establish. It’s very easy to say we should just forget what happened 200 years ago — but that can only be done if the problems that were created 200 years ago and 199 and 198 and 197 and 196 years ago and last year and on 2/26/2012 can also be forgotten, which they unfortunately cannot. There are enormous problems that have not only been caused, but that have been exacerbated, by people who want to pretend they do not exist. In fact, the pretense that there ARE no issues is exactly what makes those problems persist. SouthernBelle argued that Blacks (whom she could not remember what to CALL) made her racist by throwing racism in her face. Why don’t they simply FORGET about it and act nice?
The problems ARE here. We need to address them because we live with them. Denial won’t make them go away.
Top Shot,
Thank you. BTW I’m a left winger that supports the Second Amendment. As for Jackson and Sharpton they are not my favorites, but hardly the demons they are made out to be. The real problem here is that laws are applied unequally and draconian mandatory punishments don’t serve justice, just politicians making points with frightened people. Being human has always been a frightening proposition and the truth is that with time we have less to fear from the criminal element compared to days past. However, people have found there is political gain in keeping people frightened for their lives. Media has found that “if it bleeds, it leads” boosts ratings.
As a “for instance” when I was getting my Social Work Masters, I was assigned to work in the South Bronx area of NYC, known everywhere as
“Fort Apache”. Supposedly (and a movie was made) this was the most dangerous area in NYC. Police refused to patrol alone, so frightened were they supposed to be. I made my rounds, day and night, on foot, through streets of burned out and abandoned apartment buildings, catering to cases of people with schizophrenia who were un-hospitalized. My only defensive weapon was a ball point pen. I walked past street gangs, walked through heroin “shooting galleries” in abandoned buildings basements and never felt or was threatened in this area where police feared to go. I spent more than fifteen years doing fieldwork alone in the most notorious sections of NYC and was never threatened by anyone. My friends, not in the same field, thought I was suicidal. What I learned was how the media distorts the fears of the citizens for profit, just as politicians do to get elected. BTW I’m far from being a physically brave person and at first I was fearful until I learned from experience.
It is fear that makes these draconian punishments popular with a public inculcated with distortions of being terrorized by people of color. In truth most homicides are committed by people who know the victim well, but that gets overlooked when people can make hay by encouraging the public’s fears.
centuries ago. its got noting to do with a woman being scared of an abusive partner. peopple of all class, white slaves, black slaves, servants, black, white yellow have all been mistreated throughout history. at one time or another. let’s hope we are more civilized and less ignorant in this day and age to blame everything on something that happened almost 200 yrs. ago. people of all race, religion etc.. were badly mistreated, dehumanized centuries ago. for Gods sake, can’t we move on and have a modicum of pride.i’m done here, sos
One wonders what made the jury decide she was guilty. At the end of the day the jury decides.
to mike spindell
Thank you. It is so refreshing to hear the truth. I’m not a ‘legal’ professional in any way. I only follow cases that I find interesting. The thought that I might be arrested, which I never have been, scares me somewhat, the reason being what you stated above. Throw ppl like J. Jackson and Sharpton into the mix and it’s a disaster.
idealist707 1, May 12, 2012 at 8:24 am
Dredd,
How lucky for us that you can. Can you put up a list so we know what areas to avoid domociling ourselves, or even passing through????
Meant in jest of course, ‘cuz we’re buddies.
===================================
The weirdo magnet of Florida runs off a software random generator which randomly injects latitude and longitude figures into the variables that signal the location of the next official weirdo pulse.
That is why these bizarre events happen “randomly” in Florida.
One day a guy stabs a would be thief to death, after following him a mile, but all charges are dismissed.
The next day a guy shoots down a teen and is not charged until Occupy Weird gets all mavericky and rogue about it.
But on the day a woman defends herself, in the same state with the same law, injuring no one, she is given 20 years.
Like I say, it is candid weirdness camera, apt to happen when you least expect it.
“That is why these bizarre events happen “randomly” in Florida.”
Dredd,
You’ve got it right and I’m a resident unfortunately.
just another injustice where the gun is blamed. it is not against the law to carry a gun so why should there be charges for that? keeping guns out of the hands of a responsible, law abiding citizen goes against our own constitution. It is my thought that the obvious over charging of George Zimmerman was in part due to the fact that he even carried a gun. Meaning, whether someone was shot and killed or not, she would have still over charged because he was in possession of a firearm. My father, his father, and myself have always carried a gun. Not once in all those years was it used in a confrontation against another human being. Which just probes that it’s not the gun that kills, it’s the idiot that pulls the trigger. Not even when you can protect me from the not so law abiding citizens that carry guns illegally will I give up my gun. Because I can gaurantee you a criminal will always have one.
The shame in this case is that no one can step in and reduce the charges. Charges that should have never been leveled against this woman, Coreys acts are in my book themselves criminal. Another prosecutor should be assigned and her charges dismissed. And getting a new trial is impossible, almost as impossible as the prosecution admitting to a mistake.
That this is on the surface ridiculous overcharging is obvious on many levels. Looking beyond the injustice for a second though it brings to mind many of the things that depress me about our criminal justice system.
1. It is not uniform based on the locality that the case is policed, prosecuted and tried.
2. The noble idea of a prosecutor/judges insuring justice for all fails because these positions have become political steppingstones.
3. There is an inequity of treatment based on wealth, class, race, ethnicity, sex and religion.
4. The judicial system is inordinately crowded and understaffed, leading to delayed justice.
5. LEO’s have become a law unto themselves and often make up evidence to ensure a guilty verdict.
6. The media’s influence on trial outcomes is enormous and the police and prosecution tend to leak their side of the story to the press.
Since there are many lawyers and others with legal knowledge here I needn’t go on, they can certainly go far beyond my meager list. The point is that our criminal justice system is broken and there seems little movement towards fixing it.
In this instance we see the old “plea bargain” game which works badly to serve defendants, victims and justice. People are severely overcharged with the aim of saving trial time and costs, by threatening them to plead guilty or else. If defendants refuse the petulance of the prosecution forces them to go through with the trial based on their overcharging and it is my guess that due to the imbalance of resources the odds of winning favor the prosecutor. God help the innocent defendant, who foolishly believes the truth will always out.
Generally, a woman trying to defend herself from a domestic partner (or even someone who would like to be her domestic partner for an hour or two) is at a disadvantage in the courts. (Why didn’t she simply SPEAK to him and let him know she wasn’t interested? Why DID she scream at him, “leave me alone!”?) Strangely, that disadvantage is the same one that Trayvon Martin was under in the public area of a gated community on 2/26/2012. (“He didn’t have to go apeshit just because someone wanted to know what he was doing there!”) I don’t really think it has to do with the location of the power struggle OR the real ownership of the “castle” or whose “ground” is being stood. I think it goes all the way back to chattel personhood.
In times past, you had “droit du seigneur” which basically meant that bosses could avail themselves of even the PERSON of their servants, for their own use. It’s based on slavery, indentured servitude, and feudalism I think. The idea goes: “These people are YOURS so you can do what you want with and to them; they should be compliant and grateful.” If, however, the people you regard as “yours” suddenly arm themselves, appear to be overly defensive, perhaps fight back, and if frightened, even fight back a little too fast a little too hard, there is a sort of “THIS CANNOT BE” reaction that is almost impossible to tease out of the mix of anger, indignation, defensiveness, victim blaming, self-righteousness, bluster, bullying, chest-beating, pouting and good old-fashioned three-year-old-temper-tantrum throwing. We have all seen it.
It is the shadow of those ideas that falls on women in all kinds of situations that are considered “domestic” even here, even today.
It is the shadow of those ideas that falls on African Americans in America, even here, even today.
The fact that many white people — if not MOST white people — did not even THINK of the possibility that Trayvon Martin, seeing the approach of George Zimmerman, might think “danger of kidnapping” rather than “authority approaching” means that even when we try to think of things in our news, in our everyday experience, in our lives, we are inevitably infected with the shadows that continue to fall on us from prior centuries and from the culture we are unremovable parts of [grammar police!].
Professor Turley has gone on record saying he believes George Zimmerman was overcharged with that Second Degree Murder charge. But the real evidence in the case (no, not the “he said” evidence about what he thought and what he feared and WHY he shot) has not yet been revealed, although we know that Angela Corey had it before her. She had REAL transcripts of the 911 calls and analyses that put the various seconds into order so there was some record of events contemporaneous with “Zimmerman’s version.” She had a real autopsy report. She had real measurements indicating travel over time. She had a real interview with the girl on the telephone with Trayvon Martin. She might even have had real testimony from the EMT on the scene and others on the scene after the event.
None of these things would have been necessary for her to previously over-charge Ms. Alexander. She could have routinely overcharged HER for all the wrong reasons. In fact, Corey may routinely overcharge lots of defendants — especially female and/or minority defendants — and possibly she may be guilty of lots of prosecutorial misconduct (it certainly is rampant in Florida). But that would not mean that George Zimmerman was over-charged, which is, I think, a piece of the implication here.
The differences between the Alexander case and the Zimmerman case are legion. There is, in fact, no comparison. It’s like comparing the Rodney King case to the Nicole Brown Simpson case — and this is what makes for bad law and bad everything else.
Dredd,
How lucky for us that you can. Can you put up a list so we know what areas to avoid domociling ourselves, or even passing through????
Meant in jest of course, ‘cuz we’re buddies.
“Is 20 years fair for a woman trying to defend herself? “
On a quick reading, she brought a gun into a situation where she was well aware she might end up using it.
In a sane world outside of the Wild West, that should carry some penalty, regardless of whether or not she had a licence for the gun.
In a crazy world, lawmakers enact stupid laws like ’10-20-life’ that tie the hands of law-enforcement and courts. That sort of law denies that anyone can look at a situation and decide on a degree of fault.
It generates an environment in which a right-thinking law enforcement function would not bring a charge because they know that the mandatory minimum punishment is OTT for the circumstances – or a court would try to find not guilty in a case where there is a degree of guilt.
I don’t know what the nature of the plea-bargain offered was. Was it something that would be appropriately covered by a lesser charge? If that were so, then why not simply bring the lesser charge?
On the other hand, over-charging could be done to pressure the defendant into accepting a penalty appropriate to a lesser charge.
This has the law-enforcement taking the place of judge and jury.
This has justice (or injustice) being served behind closed doors – while keeping up the appearance of legality/justice.
Then you could have a case where overcharging is done, not to enact DIY justice but simply as an administrative convenience to avoid the hassle of proving a case.
The correct question is “What is fair for a woman using a gun to even the balance of force in all of the circumstances? ”
Neither 10-2-life or plea-bargaining really answer that question.
Let me bypass reading of OS et al so as to not be eventually infected by their ideas.
Let me only say, SYG is trumped by “castle doctrine”.
That the assaiant who exposes you to violence or here death by strangulation in this case, is a spouse or housemate is not an exception to the spirit of castle doctrine.
Cohabitation should not set out of consideration your right to be secure in your own homes. I would wish to see this implemented in all cases of domestice violence where cohabitation is a co-factor, thus violence can be lifelong and/or result in death, particularly of the famale part (or surrogate).
That Corey overcharged is quite evident. Using lack of
consideration of firing direction is assuming the defendant had a choice, which with max 10 seconds to unconsciousness available to those being strangled. Most deaths by strangulation occur due to blockage of the sinus caroticus arteries supplying the brain, not by asphyxiation.
In view of the facts presented here, the defendant never should have been brought to trial due to either castle or SYG. Why, in this case, is only speculation. Some assistant DA to Corey trying to keep the record up, and satisfy cries from “peacekeepers”. Who knows.
Florida has an idiot magnet, located somewhere near Tallahassee, that draws weird officials.
We had a drag race tragedy here a few years ago. Two teenage girls were killed when a couple of guys with fast cars and an overload of testosterone decided to drag race on a deserted main thoroughfare at two o’clock AM. The local prosecutor charged them with first degree murder.
Their lawyers raised a holy stink, and even those who thought the guys were idiots filled local media with outraged letters. The prosecutor lost the next election in a landslide and the incoming prosecutor reduced the charge to manslaughter, which is what it should have been in the first place.
OS,
You are so right……
Brown, the defendant under these circumstances was clearly over charged…. The case should have never proceeded to trial….. The judge should have tossed it…..
DYWB, (defending yourself while black) seems to be the exception to the Florida Stand Your Ground law. I suppose this is what ALEC had in mind when the law was passed. Prosecutors have a tradition of overcharging defendants in order to extort a plea from them. This time it backfired. I am wondering if top-end pro bono legal help will be forthcoming to help Marissa Alexander with her appeal.