Tookie
Posted on 10/11/2005 4:29:14 PM PDT by calcowgirl
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The Supreme Court refused Tuesday to take the case of California death row inmate Stanley "Tookie" Williams, a founder of the Crips street gang whose later work for peace won him Nobel Peace Prize nominations.
Williams, who has been praised for his children's books and efforts to curtail youth gang violence, likely will be executed in December if Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger does not grant clemency. The 51-year-old former gang member claims Los Angeles County prosecutors violated his rights when they dismissed all potential black jurors.
Williams, who claims he is innocent, is in line to be one of three California condemned inmates to be executed within months. He was condemned for killing four people in 1981 and claims jailhouse informants fabricated testimony that he confessed to the murders.
"We feel very strongly that this is an appropriate case for clemency because of what Stan has accomplished," said Andrea Asaro, one of Williams' attorneys.
While in San Quentin State Prison, Williams has been nominated five times for a Nobel Peace Prize and four times for the Nobel Prize for literature for his series of children's books and international peace efforts intended to curtail youth gang violence. His case reached the justices following a February decision by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That court, as did the Supreme Court, refused to grant Williams another hearing based on his argument that prosecutors violated his rights when they dismissed all potential black jurors from hearing the case.
The San Francisco appellate court had suggested he was a good candidate for clemency. The judges cited the children's books he has written from prison, in addition to messages of peace he posts on the Internet.
The California Criminal Justice Legal Foundation is urging against clemency, and no California governor has granted clemency to a condemned murderer since Ronald Reagan spared the life of a severely brain-damaged killer in 1967.
"Perhaps now he will finally get the punishment that a jury unanimously agreed he deserved," said the group's president, Michael Rushford.
Schwarzenegger has rejected clemency for the first two condemned men asking to commute their sentences to life without parole. In Schwarzenegger's latest rejection in January, he said an inmate's model behavior in prison was not enough to sway him to grant mercy. That inmate, Donald Beardslee, was executed days later.
Williams and a high school buddy, Raymond Washington, started the Crips street gang in Los Angeles in 1971.
Williams was sentenced to death in 1981 for fatally shooting Albert Owens, a Whittier convenience store worker. He also was convicted of using a shotgun a few days later to kill two Los Angeles motel owners and their daughter during a robbery.
Last year, "Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story" aired on television, prompting thousands of e-mail messages to Williams from young gang members who said his life story helped them turn their lives around.
"Today is a shameful day in the history of American jurisprudence," said Barbara Becnel, a Williams confidant who edited Williams' nine children's books. "Today the U.S. Supreme Court has said in its ruling essentially that it is OK for a white prosecutor to kick all of the African Americans off of a jury."
The justices, meanwhile, on Tuesday also set aside legal challenges from California condemned inmate Michael Morales, now 45, who raped and killed a 17-year-old Lodi girl whose body as found beaten and stabbed in a nearby vineyard 24 years ago. Authorities are seeking a February execution for Morales.
Among other things, Morales challenged a jury's finding that the murder was committed while torturing the victim - which was the basis for the death sentence.
Last week, the justices also paved the way for the execution of Clarence Allen, a leader of a Fresno crime ring who ordered three killings from Folsom State Prison where he already was serving time for murder. Prosecutors are seeking a January execution for Allen.
The cases are Williams v. Brown, 04-10500; Morales v. Brown, 05-23; Allen v. Brown, 04-10556.
With apologies to John Prine who used many of these phrases in his song, "Billy The Bum".
I agree with you!
And the best way to avoid contact with our Justice System is to NOT COMMIT ANY CRIMES!
I guess Tookie never learned that.
Bush sends this guy an award and letter, and you say he did fine? Oh boy. This brutal criminal murders people in cold blood, but now has redeemed himself?
See yea!
He did fine be recognizing the good deed. Now it's time to carry out sentence.That reinforces the actual meaning of forgiveness. Because the left believes there is no afterlife, to them forgiveness means to treat the perp suddenly as if there were no crime/sin and no punishment is due- just turn him loose and maybe make him a professor.
I've seen hardened criminals who turned around and spent the rest of their lives atoning for their past. I've also seen killers who tell lawyers and parole boards what they wanted to hear. I can't claim a foolproof method to tell one from the other. Rehabilitation isn't the rule, but it does happen.
Bottom line: If Tookie really has come into the light, if he really has turned around, then after he's executed he can meet his maker with a clear conscience. Federal and state judges can't grant redemption; only one Judge can. And He can't be fooled.
Green light for you Tookie!
("Denny Crane: Gun Control? For Communists. She's a liberal. Can't hunt.")
Except for the one about 'no doubt whatsoever', I don't buy your conditions, however, despite having supported the death penalty for most of my life, I now object to it for several other reasons.
One, there have been too many (it doesn't take very many to be TOO many) people on death row found to be innocent when modern testing was used, and too many times, it was found that the cops were in a hurry to solve and crime and didn't care how they did it.
Two, it isn't sure enough or fast enough to be a deterrent. Potential criminals figure they aren't going to be caught, if they are, they won't be convicted, and if they are, they won't be sentenced to death, and if they are, it'll take 20+ years.
Oh another Mumia? Fry the prick!
However, for what he did in 1979, he was sentenced to death. That hasn't changed. There is no "extra credit" program available to raise that grade.
Reference your post # 26:
I wonder how many letters were sent to the families of the innocent people he murdered.
Probably all they wanted was to be able to earn a living and live their lives.
My sympathy is with them, they demonstrate the outstanding character of America, not some murdering convict.
I don't care what the President says.
well said !!!
I encourage you to e-mail the Govenator regarding your opposition of clemency to this cold-blooded murderer.
According to the officials at San Quentin, he's still heavily involved with gang activities from his cell on Death Row. I don't think he's changed a bit - he's just figured out how to scam the limousine liberals into supporting his "cause" (not that there's anything hard about scamming that crowd).
And how long would that take?
25 years?
50 years?
100 years?
And in the meantime you'd stop executions?
Seesh, why can't you be more honest and dipense with the first two objections?
I too am against the death penalty for many reasons. One being it's ineffective deterrent. Another being, if I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, that someone had killed a family member, with no provocation, just for money or a thrill, then I would kill them myself. Without remorse.
Wesley Clark is looking for a book deal. He is antiquated and hanging on his last toe-nail. Seriously, this guy needs a moltov cocktail just to wake up in the morning. Why do we even acknowledge these freaks?
That's not Franklin, that's Blackstone, and it's actually, "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."
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