Given the numerous revelations that have occurred in not just the ethnic community but the country as a whole, it is not surprising that the plight of Marissa Alexander had dropped from the mainstream media into obscurity. Marissa Alexander of Jacksonville, Florida, was accused of firing a warning shot at her husband and two of his children during a domestic dispute in 2010. She was charged with three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, convicted, and sentenced under Florida’s mandatory minimum guidelines. Ms. Alexander’s legal team unsuccessfully tried to use the ?stand your ground? law as part of her legal defense. She was charged with the three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, convicted, and sentenced under Florida’s mandatory minimum guidelines. Ms. Alexander’s case prompted accusations of racial disparity in the application of stand your ground.
At the time of the incident, the Alexander case gained national attention because it occurred in the wake of the Trayvon Martin case where George Zimmerman was acquitted. In both cases, Ms. Alexander and Mr. Zimmerman were claiming they used force in self- defense. Another Florida man, Michael Dunn was recently sentenced to life without parole for fatally shooting Jordan Davis in an argument over loud music in his vehicle.
Since that time, Ms. Alexander has served nearly two years in prison before an appeals court vacated her conviction. The Associated Press (AP) says the judge found that the previous ruling wrongly placed the burden on Ms. Alexander to prove that she was abused by her husband. The plea deal came soon after the judge in the Alexander case allowed evidence that the husband, Rico Gray had abused women in the past. One of Marissa Alexander’s lawyers, Bruce Zimet, says the plea deal was her means of getting the case behind her. She will have to wear a monitoring device for two years following her release. Had she been found guilty on all counts in a second trial that was set for December 1, she would have faced up to 60 years in prison.
It appears that on the one hand what has occurred in these three cases is being oversimplified. In no way am I implying any form of ?man-hating?. Still this issue hinges on gender. On the one hand, George Zimmerman is a free man and is not wearing a monitoring device, while Ms. Alexander is said to be better off wearing a monitoring device for two years versus taking her chances with a second trial. Yes, Michael Dunn was sentenced and imprisoned; the disparity here is George Zimmerman was not held to the same standard and is not wearing a monitoring device. Mr. Zimmerman was not under any pressure to ?get his case behind him?.
Angela Davis, an icon of the black liberation movement, in an interview with the Nation magazine suggests that during the black liberation movement, black women were asked to choose if the black movement or the women’s movement was of the most importance. Ms. Davis correctly pointed out that the intersections and interconnections between the two movements need to be understood ?and this challenge, the challenge of understanding the complex ways that race, class, gender, sexuality, nation, and ability are intertwined. Today in the 21st century, we still do not understand how to go about moving beyond these categories to understand the interrelationships of these ideas and processes that seem to be separate and unrelated.
Marissa Alexander is still caught up in the prison system wearing a monitoring device. Yes, it is a fair argument to say that racial stereotyping could permeate subjective decision-making. The question is has racial stereotyping occurred yet again in the Marissa Alexander case?
Michelle Alexander, in her book entitled The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, suggests that incarceration is a comprehensive and well-disguised system of racialized social control that functions in a manner strikingly similar to Jim Crow. She further suggests that when people who have been incarcerated have been released, they often have no voting rights, therefore no voice and are relegated to a racially segregated and subordinated existence. People who are released from incarceration are next subjected to a web of laws, regulations and informal rules, reinforced by social stigma. They do not have the ability to get a job, housing, or public benefits.
So exactly, what has Marissa Alexander put behind her?
Source
Sanders, S., Florida Woman in ?Stand Your Ground ? Case Accepts Plea Deal. Retrieved December 7, 2014 from:
http://www.npr.org
Barat, F., A Q & A With Angela Davis on Black Power, Feminism and the Prison-Industrial Complex. Retrieved December 7, 2014 from: http://www.thenation.com
Alexander, M., Book Excerpt: Understanding the New Jim Crow. Retrieved December 7, 2014 from: http://billmoyers.com
