Livewire

Male
Sunnyshore City
Seen December 3rd, 2022
Posted August 2nd, 2019
14,091 posts
13.8 Years
I got five baby mammas, and I put my hands on every last one of them except for one,” Rico Gray confessed during a November 2010 deposition. “The way I was with women . . . they had to walk on eggshells around me.” He recalled punching women in the face, shoving them, choking them and tossing them out the door.

Yet somehow, after one of those women fired a warning shot into the ceiling of her Jacksonville, Fla., home to scare him away during yet another violent outburst, prosecutors managed to convince a jury that Gray was the victim. As a result, Marissa Alexander, a 31-year-old mother of three, faces 20 years in prison for standing her ground against an abusive husband.

Gray has been arrested twice for domestic battery, including an assault that sent Alexander to the hospital. In September 2009, Alexander obtained a protective order against Gray that was still in effect on Aug. 1, 2010, when he flew into a jealous rage after discovering, while poking through her cellphone, that she had sent pictures of their newborn daughter to her first husband.

Alexander was in the master bathroom at the time, and Gray tried to force his way in. When she came out, he screamed and cursed at her while preventing her from leaving the bedroom. “I was like forcing her back with my body,” said Gray, who is seven inches taller than Alexander and outweighs her by 100 pounds.

When Alexander managed to get by, she ran through the kitchen to the garage, where she says she realized she did not have the keys to her car, could not call for help because she had left her cellphone behind, and could not escape because the garage door was not working. Instead she grabbed her gun from her car and headed back through the kitchen, where Gray confronted her again.

In his deposition Gray admitted he “had told her if she ever cheated on me I would kill her” and during the fight said, “If I can’t have you, nobody can.”

He conceded he “was going towards her” when Alexander fired a single shot, high and to his right, that went through the kitchen wall and lodged in the living room ceiling. Finally he left, along with his two sons.

“The gun was never pointed at me,” Gray said. “She just didn’t want me to put my hands on her anymore, so she did what she feel like she have to do to make sure she wouldn’t get hurt.”

But at the July 2011 hearing where Alexander argued that the charges against her should be dismissed because she had acted in self-defense, Gray — who immediately after the fight portrayed her as the aggressor, then said in his deposition three months later that he had lied out of anger — changed his story again, saying he had lied in his deposition to protect her. Circuit Judge Elizabeth Senterfitt rejected Alexander’s motion to dismiss, saying she could have escaped through the front or back door instead of going to the garage.

Yet Florida’s self-defense law says “a person is justified in the use of deadly force and does not have a duty to retreat” if “he or she reasonably believes” it is necessary to prevent “imminent death or great bodily harm” or “the imminent commission of a forcible felony.”

In 1999, furthermore, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that a woman attacked by her husband in the home they share has no duty to flee.

On March 16, after deliberating for 12 minutes, a jury convicted Alexander on three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Although she injured no one, she faces a 20-year mandatory minimum sentence unless she can win a new trial.
http://www.suntimes.com/news/othervi...-20-years.html


tl;dr Florida lwa screws up yet again

Sydian

fake your death.

Age 30
they/them
Georgia
Seen May 22nd, 2022
Posted November 29th, 2021
33,354 posts
15.2 Years
a 31-year-old mother of three, faces 20 years in prison for standing her ground against an abusive husband.
Oh! You mean like the Stand Your Ground law which helped out George Zimmerman who is currently out of jail? That wonderful law?! Oh that's just wonderful, Florida!

I don't know what else to say. It's just...ridiculous. I'm too flustered to even make an appropriate comment on the whole subject.
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Alexander Nicholi

work hard, play hard

Age 25
Male
Research Triangle / Jakarta
Seen February 15th, 2023
Posted March 5th, 2021
5,498 posts
13.5 Years
Congratulations, the fuel of justice is now supplied with bull.

Or rather, whoever has the most money for a lawyer wins the case without an argument, because bureaucracy tolerance levels are so insanely high here in the good ol' US of A.
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Age 28
Male
Belgium
Seen February 17th, 2017
Posted June 13th, 2012
26 posts
12.3 Years
Only 12 minutes of deliberation?! That must mean they were already pretty sure of the end result in advance... this is depressing :/
Besides, if she had killed him and made a case for aggravated manslaughter it is possible that she would have gotten less years (unsure about this since I don't know exactly how the Florida system works, in some states the max for manslaughter is 15, others 20-25)

blue

gucci

Male
United Kingdom
Seen September 26th, 2021
Posted August 7th, 2019
21,056 posts
15.4 Years
What else was she supposed to do? It just shows how the system is today, it's pretty shameful.

Esper

California
Seen June 30th, 2018
Posted June 30th, 2018
I would bet that part of the problem here is that Florida doesn't have very good laws on the books where it comes to domestic violence that take into account the events and actions leading up to a confrontation like this. Shooting a gun to warn someone seems excessive if you've just had an argument, but when you take into account the order of protection and the injuries that she suffered at his hands it makes no sense that she should be charged with a crime unless, somehow, that wasn't allowed to be part of the argument when she was in court.

I don't even want to think about the possibility that with all this knowledge a jury all agreed that she was guilty, but given that this Gray guy exists and is not a rare example of people with his mindset I can't rule out that there were people who sympathized with him.

Kurui

Kageroza's Waifu

Female
In Kageroza's Arms
Seen January 28th, 2013
Posted January 23rd, 2013
285 posts
11 Years
Wow, really? o.o That's just terrible. I'm with the person who asks "What else was she supposed to do?". But hey, I've gotten screwed over by the so-called "justice system" too on a couple of occasions, so I can't say this is THAT surprising when it comes down to it. This is America.
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Mario The World Champion

Tepig!

Age 41
Male
Western Massachusetts
Seen April 17th, 2017
Posted March 15th, 2017
3,299 posts
18.4 Years
Is there something in Florida's water that makes people lose common sense when it comes to the law or are the lawyers down there THAT good at perverting the facts? Trayvon Martin, Casey Anthony and now this.

Kind of makes me glad I live up here in Massachusetts, although that's not saying much.
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Livewire

Male
Sunnyshore City
Seen December 3rd, 2022
Posted August 2nd, 2019
14,091 posts
13.8 Years
Is there something in Florida's water that makes people lose common sense when it comes to the law or are the lawyers down there THAT good at perverting the facts? Trayvon Martin, Casey Anthony and now this.

Kind of makes me glad I live up here in Massachusetts, although that's not saying much.

Either that or nobody in Florida attended law school properly. The recent string of injustices there is disgusting.

SchwarzRozen

Sugary Delight

Richmond, VA
Seen August 1st, 2013
Posted July 31st, 2013
134 posts
11 Years
Florida is one of those states where Prisons are ran privately, and judges are payed to bring in more Prisoners.

I would maybe be able to get a small fine for public noise or what not, even if this is something of ridiculous standerd. This is horrible.

Florida - Walk free with murder and go to prison if you defend yourself.
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bulbakush

Spends Time In Other Realms!!!

Male
Los Angeles
Seen September 17th, 2020
Posted June 5th, 2014
11 posts
11 Years
WOW!!!!!!!!! I grew up in SOUTH CENTRAL L.A and I guarantee she wouldn't be facing 20. Its pathetic that our country is just falling apart left and right. I believe there's times when the "system" shouldn't be applied and we should look at things as human beings, not like a computer program that just analyzes data and does whatever persuaded it better. If things keep going like this we might be looking at a civil war because I feel that everyone is waking up to the reality that things are unjust and have been unjust for a long time. It doesn't take a smart person to know what is right from wrong, only thing you need is courage to say something.

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Female Brass Musician

Female
Seen June 24th, 2012
Posted June 24th, 2012
33 posts
11.1 Years
"Assualt with a deadly weapon." A warning shot isn't "assualt." It's more like, "Get away from me before I defend myself." Absolutely ridiculous.

What happened to this woman is completely wrong, but good for her for standing up for herself without real "assualt," instead of letting the guy control her.
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igotpokeballz

x999 Thanks To Action Replay

Age 23
Male
california
Seen February 9th, 2013
Posted February 9th, 2013
119 posts
11 Years
Ok...yeah...WTF FLORIDA?! That is their WORST move!

XD Mabey thats how Voldemort got to invade Hogwarts without force. (Orlando,Florida)
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Age 30
Male
Lumios City
Seen August 18th, 2013
Posted August 17th, 2013
937 posts
13.7 Years
When reading the topic, I was expecting this to be in the UK..... with how messed up our laws really are. What I really don't understand is that the law wants us to either suffer/die, or face a jail sentence for when we defend ourselves. These laws are just all BS.
You're telling me, I reeled back in horror when I found out about this "Law" being implemented in the UK last year, seriously, what the heck?

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