There’s arguably no cause more important to American conservatives than gun rights, and yet State of Alabama vs. Brittany Smith persuasively argues that there are limits to such convictions, especially when it comes to women. The story of an Alabama single mother who attempted to defend herself against murder charges via the state’s Stand Your Ground law, director Ryan White’s true-crime documentary is a concise and compelling look at institutional misogyny, and the double standards endemic in both a legal system and a culture that affords only certain individuals the benefit of the doubt.
White’s last Netflix effort, 2017’s The Keepers, was a seven-part venture, whereas his latest contribution to the streaming platform (out now) runs a compact 40 minutes. Nonetheless, it’s as affecting as anything he’s done (including, most recently, the feature-length Good Night Oppy), picking up with Brittany Smith as she awaits a pretrial Stand Your Ground hearing.
In Alabama, that statute says that “the defendant does not have a duty to retreat and has the right to stand his/her ground so long as he/she is justified in using deadly physical force and is not engaged in an illegal activity and is in a place where he/she has a right to be located.” In other words, if you’re in your home, not doing anything criminal, and are in grave danger, you can violently fight back in order to protect yourself and others.
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That would certainly seem to apply to Brittany. As her mother Ramona McCallie explains, Brittany was an honor roll student and “smart as a whip.” She married at age 19, but, after a tumultuous few years, she wound up following in her mom’s footsteps by raising her children on her own. In the aftermath of the loss of her newborn son to a genetic disorder, Brittany turned to meth, resulting in “one hell of a ride” that cost her custody of her kids.
By January 2018, though, she had successfully gotten clean and convinced a home evaluation representative that she was ready to be reunited with her offspring. Things were finally looking up, and, to celebrate the forthcoming occasion, she acquired a pit bull puppy for her family—which, it turned out, would be one of the biggest mistakes of her life.
To get the pooch, Brittany turned to Todd Smith, a high school acquaintance who bred pit bulls. Todd was willing to help Brittany, but on January 15, 2018, her world was turned upside-down when he called to ask her if she could pick him up from a local park and let him crash on her couch. On the precipice of finally being back with her children, Brittany let Todd know that he could only stay a single night. He agreed, but, once inside the house, Brittany claims that “something snapped inside this man.” Jumping up and screaming, Todd reportedly headbutted Brittany. She fled to her bedroom, and he broke down the door, tackled her on the bed, and began choking her. When she woke up, she was being raped, with Todd warning her that if she even breathed wrong, he’d kill her.
Faced with few options, Brittany convinced Todd to let her call her mother to go get cigarettes (since they shared a single car). Exhausted and uninterested in trekking out in the snow to help her daughter, Ramona instead sent her son Chris, who dutifully drove Brittany and Todd to the local gas station, where a battered-looking Brittany covertly informed clerk Paige Painter that she was being abused and held hostage.
Chris then dropped the duo back at home, at which point Brittany encouraged Chris to return to the gas station. Upon hearing from Paige what was really going on, Chris raced back to his sister’s home and, with his gun at the ready, confronted Todd. A fight broke out, and to halt it, Brittany grabbed Chris’ weapon and repeatedly fired, killing Todd.
State of Alabama vs. Brittany Smith contends that many Stand Your Ground cases are dismissed on the scene by responding law enforcement officers. In this instance, however, Brittany complicated her situation by making two misleading statements to the 911 operator: first, that Todd had only attempted to rape her; and second, that it had been Chris who fired the gun to save her from being strangled to death. Chris agreed to this deception because, "In Jackson County, women don't get treated fairly in general. So I thought, 'If I don't take the blame, she's never gonna get her kids back.'"
Still, Brittany quickly recanted and fessed up to her own role, and while out on bail, she and her mother—along with court-appointed public defender Ron Smith—mounted a Stand Your Ground defense, since the details of the incident aligned perfectly with the law.
As White details, that didn’t matter—nor did clear evidence of abuse, multiple witnesses corroborating Brittany’s version of events, or Todd’s long criminal record, which included domestic and aggravated assault. Due to her on-the-record inconsistencies, Brittany lost her Stand Your Ground hearing and, faced with a trial that could result in life in prison, she chose to plead guilty to murder—which, in a stunning twist, earned her a lighter sentence than she would have received for a manslaughter conviction. To everyone involved in State of Alabama vs. Brittany Smith, the message that the judge and prosecutor sent was clear as day: “The Stand Your Ground law is for white men only."
White’s textual codas explain that studies indicate that most women who kill their abusers opt for plea deals rather than face a jury, and that women are twice as likely to be convicted as men when claiming self-defense in their residences. As such, Brittany is cast as a victim of not only Todd Smith—who was so unhinged when on drugs that even his cousin thinks Brittany was justified in taking his life—but of a system that only goes out of its way to uphold shoot-first gun laws when they apply to a select segment of the population. As illustrated by this efficient, empathetic non-fiction short, Brittany’s tale isn’t unique; on the contrary, it’s merely another sad instance of criminal justice system prejudice against the most vulnerable members of society.
