Marissa Alexander, the woman who was sentenced to 20 years for discharging her firearm into the air, despite pleading the Stand Your Ground defense against her husband, was granted a retrial on September 26, 2013.

  The 1st District Court of Appeal granted the retrial, which ruled that a judge did not properly instruct the jury handling the case.

  We cannot talk about the retrial of Marissa Alexander, without first mentioning a major player in the original trial; Overseeing prosecutor Angela Corey.

  We now know about Corey’s alleged bias thanks to the lawsuit filed by Dr. Bao, the medical examiner and forensic scientist in the Zimmerman case. Bao alleges that he was told not talk of certain things, and that he was not asked the questions that would have assured a guilty verdict against Mr. Zimmerman.

  The fact that a prosecuter would separate a mother from her kids for shooting in the air out of desperation, after being beaten by her estranged husband, who was in violation of a restraining order, might prove that there was evidence of malice on behalf of Alexander. However, the “smoking gun” of the case was literally a garage door.

  Allegedly, Alexander was escaping from her husband after a struggle; she entered the garage and attempted to open the garage door. She claims that the door was jammed; the prosecutor said that Alexander did not prove the door was jammed, therefore proving malice. However, doors can jam at any moment; it’s a question of reasonable doubt in the mind of the jurors that the prosecution was trying to raise.

  Is this sufficient evidence to send a mother who was a victim of domestic violence to jail for 20 years? Let your logic not your emotions help you draw this conclusion. As communities across the country are outraged at the exoneration of George Zimmerman over his admitted killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, their rage may only increase with the mandatory sentence against Alexander.

  Will justice be served in the retrial?

  The public must wait and see. Petitions for a retrial and a pardon have put pressure on Florida Governor Rick Scott, and the government in general, to relook at the case. It also puts into question the implication of race in the Stand Your Ground law in how it’s applied to people of different races in Florida, and in the various states in the south where the law exists.

  Zimmerman’s jury was instructed on the Stand Your Ground law, which jurors have since admitted helped in convincing them of his not guilty verdict.

  A new trial is set for March 31, 2014. You can follow the case and updates online: www.facebook.com/SupportForMarissaAlexander