"Alexander is due to be sentenced soon" - Since she is a woman, we know very well that she will not serve any time. As for the poor guy who shot to scare away the burglar, too bad he has to face american sharia where the guy is always punished no matter what. And this whole issue came up in the media because Alexander was a woman and as an aside, the case of Wollard has been mentioned. I am sure no one cared about Wollard when he had been sentenced.

Red, did you miss the part about the sentence being a mandatory minimum and that the judge has no discretion to impose a different sentence? So yeah, Ms. Alexander is going to go to prison.

Had Ms. Alexander shot her husband, she'd be in the clear because of Florida's stand your ground law. Does anyone else see the craziness of that system?

Redajesh, your instinctive recasting of every story into "women protected, men punished" is boring. And, as Sara pointed out, inaccurate.

Why not just tell us which woman fucked you up this badly?

And do you really believe someone deserves a 20 year sentence for a warning shot?

There are two problems with both of these cases. First, the jury needs to know about the penalty if convicted. Second, the state prosecutor has used discretion to overcharge the defendants. Isn't it a bit strange that the prosecution has more discretion than does the judge?

IANAL
It is my understanding that if you have the time and presence of mind to fire a warning shot, the whole concept of self defense and heat of the moment is thrown out the window.

Using a gun in the commission of a crime nets you 10 years in Florida. Firing the weapon nets you 20. Injuring or killing someone nets you life. That's over and above other criminal charges.

Instead of calling it a warning shot, claim that it was an accidental discharge of the firearm when you went to clean it. No criminal intent, no crime committed.

Otherwise, put your "warning shot" betwixt their eyes and claim self defense/defense of other.

Hello? You shoot him (the husband) and place a knife in his hands. It's called a "drop weapon". Police use them all the time.

If you got a gun because you feel threatened then shoot the guy when he threatens you. If you aren't prepared to kill someone in self defense then DON'T buy a gun.

Prosecutors with moral character that equals the discretionary power they possess would not have brought charges in either case. Add immunity protections to the mix and unjust abuse of power is to be expected.

nonegiven, I'm not sure that just cuz you'd kill a burglar in self-defense means you're ready to shoot your husband and the father of your children. Nobody *wants* to hurt someone they love (even if they are an abusive asshole).

I don't understand how this is an assault. Can someone explain that?

She didn't hit anyone with a bullet. If she had fired into her ceiling while alone in her house, wouldn't get a misdemeanor charge for discharging within city limits or something?

None of this makes sense to me.

IANAL
It is my understanding that if you have the time and presence of mind to fire a warning shot, the whole concept of self defense and heat of the moment is thrown out the window.

IAANAL, but I've been trained in this area. You are only allowed to use deadly force if you are in fear of immanent death or serious physical injury to yourself or an innocent other. The firing of a warning shot shows that the immanent need to use that force is not present, and therefore unnecessary and unlawful.

It's a gun. It's not a negotiation tool. Two shots, center of mass, and if you are not scared enough to do that, then don't fire at all.

I have been to many forums (and I'm not a gun owner) where Surfed's advice is given over and over.

It's far easier to defend your killing someone in self-defense than it is to defend against a warning shot. The claim is even made that if you *could* fire a warning shot it meant you felt your life wasn't in danger.

So kill the person, then drag them inside your home if you need to. Provide them a plausible weapon.

All that said,

BarSinister's response seems the most insightful so far.

"Second, the state prosecutor has used discretion to overcharge the defendants. Isn't it a bit strange that the prosecution has more discretion than does the judge?"

+1 Insightful.

Steve, I don't want to rag on a spelling error, but yours is somewhat funny:

"Immanence refers to philosophical and metaphysical theories of divine presence, in which the divine is seen to be manifested in or encompassing of the material world. It is often contrasted with theories of transcendence, in which the divine is seen to be outside the material world. It is usually applied in monotheistic, pantheistic, or panentheistic faiths to suggest that the spiritual world permeates the non-spiritual."

If you are in immanent threat, I am not sure a bullet is going to help you.

Ok, that is funny. I'm glad I could bring joy to someone this morning, even if it was unintentional. And now you know my secret; I can't spel for shit.

And Amy, yeah. Most normal people have no desire to hurt or kill anyone else. But there are so many bad results from firing "warning shots". One, that bullet is going to go somewhere, and I'll bet the round she put through the ceiling went all the way through the roof and landed somewhere outside. That could have hurt someone.\

Two, you now have one fewer round available to you should you need to use the gun to actually defend your life. You'd be surprised how many rounds a human can take and still be able to hurt you, perhaps with deadly consequences.

Three, the person at which you fired can now say that he was in fear of his life, and if he can hurt you he'll have an excuse.

The display of a weapon should be deterrent enough. If it's not, at some point your fear will ratchet up to the point where your use of force is justified, and at that point you shoot center of mass as many times as it takes to make the threat go away.

You have a cop sergeant friend, if I remember correctly. Ask her about it if you are interested. What I wrote was what I was taught by people who were supposed to know, and they made sense to me.

But I digress. Someone should not get twenty years for discharging a firearm that results in no harm to anyone else. In Oregon (and other states as well, I'm sure) there is a misdemeanor charge called menacing, which is an attempt to place another into fear of injury or death. The maximum jail time is a year, and assuming her lack of a criminal background should have netted her time served, a fine, and probation.

"Had Ms. Alexander shot her husband, she'd be in the clear because of Florida's stand your ground law. Does anyone else see the craziness of that system?"

The fact that Alexander left the garage and went back into the house to get her keys also complicates things. Because at that point she's not evading the person she feels threatened by, nor is she holding her ground.

That being said, yes, it is absolutely nuts.

If someone scares you enough that you feel the need to draw a gun, trying to preserve their life is the WORST kind of soft heartedness.

Maybe every life does begin with an equal value, but what people do with their lives does make a difference when it comes to whether or not their life is worth preserving.

If someone is abusive and violent, if they are dangerous and predatory to honest people who prefer to do no harm to others, then trying to preserve their life with a warning takes the value of life to far.

They had their warnings growing up into adulthood, and they chose the path of predatory violence.

A gunshot to the face or to the heart is the natural outcome of their choice, and is heartily deserved.

So, you get jail time for trying to preserve a life?

Yes.

If it's not serious enough for you to shoot (at) them, then it's not serious enough for you to fire the gun.

Had Ms. Alexander shot her husband, she'd be in the clear because of Florida's stand your ground law. Does anyone else see the craziness of that system?"

Well, no, because that's not how it works.

"I don't understand how this is an assault"

An assault doesn't have to include battery. An assault could be just trying to frighten or intimidate someone.

To any lawyers here; could this make a case that mandatory minimum sentences are unconstitutional since they impose a cruel and unusual punishment in relation to the crime?

While I hate mandatory minimum sentencing, the district attorney's office is clearly nobody's friend. They could have chosen to not prosecute, but did so.

Hopefully, if this woman is convicted, the governor will commute her sentence. Yeah, fat chance, but you never know.

Ah, damn, more colloquial bullshit about gun laws.

Do not believe any person about what the law says about gun use. Look it up for your location, whether you are at home or traveling.

And if you think you will need to use a gun in self-defense, learn how. It's not just about hitting your target, making the bad guy go away. It's about surviving the encounter, then surviving the result when the State tries to determine whether you were right.

The schools are at Thunder Ranch, Gunsite, Front Sight and Lethal Force Institute.

Go look.

Go look, because you have already read more about George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin than you actually have about the defensive use of guns and those laws!

And, about this case: would you care to define what a "warning shot" is?

In practice, that would be anything that misses the target. If police can't retrieve the bullet(s), you could have shot at someone and simply missed. That's why brandishing is a crime, pointing the gun at someone is a crime and discharging the gun in a threatening manner is a crime in some jurisdictions.

Regardless -- the problem is that judges no longer have discretion. The other half of this is that giving judges discretion led to "abuse" by not giving appropriate sentences.

If they re-worded the laws that suggested this is a minimum mandatory and then set up a "review" board that did a "judicial review" of the judge, this kind of abuse of the victim and the judicial system didn't happen -- then things like this would occur less often.

Mandatory minimums just abuse the system. The liberal judges that give/gave one year for armed robbery also abused the system.

Integrity counts when you are held liable for your integrity.

If you have time to fire warning shots then by definition you are not in immediate fear of your life and can not use deadly force.

As a Floridian it drives me crazy when someone misrepresents our gun laws either intentionally or due to ignorance.

We have very liberal gun laws here in Florida (which is good), to counterbalance that we impose very harsh sentences on people who use a firearm in the commission of a crime (which is also good). The law that was probably used here is the 10-20-life law. Possessing a firearm while committing a crime gets you 10 years; discharging that firearm while committing a crime gets you 20 years; shooting someone while committing a crime gets you life.

Even a causal reading of these stories reveals huge holes in them. I don't buy either of these defendants versions' of events, and apparently neither did their juries. Maybe I'm wrong and neither of them are lying but I seriously doubt it.

"Marissa Danielle Alexander, ...had been repeatedly abused by her husband who threatened several times to kill her. On Aug. 1, 2010, Alexander's husband choked her and refused to let her leave the house."

"After breaking free and making her way to the garage, Alexander realized she did not have her car keys. Fearing for her safety, she grabbed her legally registered handgun and re-entered her home to retrieve her keys."

If she was really being abused, held captive, and afraid for her life why did she go back into her home? Why didn't she just call the cops and have her estranged husband arrested? Surely she would have had marks from her "abuse", and from being choked to collaborate her story.

We all know that after a heated argument a wife would never: grab her gun, go back into her house to confront her estranged husband, and threaten him with a firearm to show him who's really the boss. Which by the way is a crime (assault). She also wouldn't lie to avoid a 20 year prison term either. No sir that kind of thing just doesn't happen.

"Orville Lee Wollard, a lawful gun owner with no criminal history, fired a warning shot in his home to scare off a man who had been abusing his daughter."

I noticed they referred to the person who was 'scared off' as "a man who had been abusing (Orville's) daughter, not as an intruder. IF this person was an intruder in Orville's home then that man would be fair game under Florida's castle doctrine. I bet that Orville's definition of abuse includes a fellow classmate being invited by his daughter to have after school legal & consensual sexytime fun at daddy's house. If that's the case then this man should do a 20 year prison sentence.

If anyone has any information to the contrary about either of these cases please feel free post it.

"Had Ms. Alexander shot her husband, she'd be in the clear because of Florida's stand your ground law."

No she wouldn't. That's not how it works. Florida's stand your ground law is posted online. Google it and read it. I would provide a link, but I don't want this to get kicked to the spam bucket.

"The jurors were not told that, if convicted, Alexander would have to serve a 20-year mandatory minimum prison sentence."

This I actually agree with. If you're sitting on a jury, you should know how much time the defendant will serve if you convict him.