Zimmerman v. Alexander: Similar Cases?

In an article earlier this month Mary Anne Franks delved into the complex issues surrounding self-defense law in Florida and how it may or may not help women. As the article progresses she inevitably raises the comparison between the George Zimmerman and Marissa Alexander cases.

The failure to arrest Zimmerman stemmed from the police’s determination that he had acted in self-defense; the police’s immediate arrest of Alexander expressed the opposite determination. Alexander requested a Stand Your Ground hearing, where the judge ruled that she did not act in self-defense. This was despite the fact that Marissa Alexander appears to be the ideal Stand Your Ground candidate: she had a protective order against a person who did in fact threaten her with great bodily injury, according to the latter’s own sworn deposition. In addition to all of this, Alexander, unlike Zimmerman, did try to retreat — repeatedly. It was only at the moment that she realized she physically could not retreat, and that her husband was threatening her life, that she fired a warning shot. A warning shot, even though a person in her circumstances presumably would have had the right, under Florida law, to shoot to kill.

Unfortunately, this analysis obfuscates a number of important differences between the two cases. First of all, the law explicitly exempts applicability in cases where defensive use took place in a home against someone who was already lawfully there. Rico Gray had not broken into the home.