Gang founder's death row drama gains star support

Associated Press ^ | 11/26/05 | LYNN ELBER

[OldEagle]

Whether he can do more alive than dead is a given. First, no make that finally, he has to pay the piper.

[sofaman]

Apparently this has become a racial issue as well as a death penalty issue. Guilt or innocence be damned.

This man shouldn't be executed because he is Black? He shouldn't be executed because he has done "good work" since he killed 4 people in cold blood?

He is a founder of the Crips. How many innocent people have been killed by the Crips and by the gangs that his creation spawned?

Maybe it's just me but it seems to me that the rationale behind the protests is upside down. I haven't heard one word from the Belafonte's and Jackson's about the victims.

As a parting shot, I don't remember Mike Farrellhaving much to say when Daniel Pearl was beheaded.

[RedStateRocker]

"There are NO perps in CA, only VICTIMS responding involuntarily to society's inequities, on other VICTIMS"

Unless you happen to be a business owner providing employment and/or taxes revenue, then you are automatically an exploiter and only kept out of jail as a cash cow to be milked

[Prime Choice]

Yes. Breathtaking in its utter stupidity.

Anyone who claims that minorities are being somehow "held back" or "held down" because of their race is a chump. Just take a good look at the Asian community and tell me how they've been harmed by racism.

If anyone's holding down blacks, it's the black community itself. It's the crabs-in-a-bucket syndrome: one starts to climb out and the rest grab ahold of him and drag him right back down to their depths.

[hosepipe]

Jamie Foxx is becoming a stink in the nose..
The boy is RIPE... That Academy Award was Affirmative Racial Cowardice..

[sofaman]

I have no idea what you're talking about.

It is my contention that the argument is not about this person's innocence. It is accepted that he is guilty. The argument is about the death penalty.

As far as I am concerned there is no reason to commute this guy's sentence. He killed 4 people in cold blood. The very least he could do is show remorse. And part of that remorse would be an acknowledgement of what he did and an apology to the families of the victims. The fact that he has not admitted to his crimes, nor issued an apology, is very telling to me.

[Prime Choice]

I have no idea what you're I'm talking about.

There. Fixed it.

[sofaman]

Oh and btw, if you think that the anti-death penalty folks will not be at the prison protesting when Scott Peterson is days away from being offed, IMHO, you are mistaken.

Jesse Jackson won't be there..because to him this has nothing to do with justice. It has to do with race. He wants everyone to be treated equally, until they are.

[RedStateRocker]

I all respect I think the real debate is that it is NOT a given. Putting aside the racialist part of it there is an interesting question underlying can a truly repentant man do more good for society as something else than a corpse?
I honestly think it a valid philosophical question, completely aside form the guy getting the needle. Would some 'straight talk' from turn even one more punk away from the path than just offing him as ans example would?

I am not wise enough to know; and don't really care if he lives. If there are riots then the ONLY appropriate response is, and always has been - one rioter one bullet.

[phil1750]

I am not in favor of the death penalty, I am in favor of locking up murderers and child molesters in a 5 X 7 wire cage and wielding it shut. Until this type of true punishment is handed out, I will keep my mouth shut about the death penalty.

[sofaman]

He's not at all a pariah in Hollywood at the moment, imho. "Hollywood" may disagree with him on many issues, but he is far enougfh to the left of Pres Bush, that Hollywood would forgive and forget.

Based on this issue, there would be people in Hollywood that would refuse to work with him.

[BruceysMom]

I don't agree that the death sentence is about vengeance, or making him an example, it's about protecting the rest of society from him. They, his supporters, say they don't want him turned loose, yet if they commute his sentence how long til the let demands his freedom?

[sofaman]

"I have no idea what you're I'm talking about. There. Fixed it."

That's so clever!!!! Very impressive.

We're on the same side of this issue, Einstein. We both think that he should be executed.

[Prime Choice]

Ah. I must have misread you somehow. My apologies.

I must have taken my double-dose of stupid pills today. Sorry, sofaman. I got you all wrong.   :o(

[Smogger]

Noit that I would lose any sleep if every Crip and Blood disappeared into the Night and Fog.

Kant's rational for the death penalty is the most convincing I think: If you murder someone there is really no punishment that the state can extract that is equal to the crime that you have committed aside from death. The arguments about deterrent, or vengance, etc I find extremely weak.

I oppose the death penalty on purely religious grounds, but I won't lose much sleep if Tookie is executed.

[sofaman]

No problem...maybe I didn't make myself clear.

It just struck me that no-one is question this guy's guilt. So it boils down to a death penalty argument. And I am ardently pro-death penalty.

I don't care whether the guy is pink, blue, yellow or green. He killed 4 people in cold blood and has shown no remorse, in my view. Based on that, there is no reason to commute his sentence.

If there was an argument about his innocence, I'd be more inclined to re-look at the case.

[Ninian Dryhope]

Frying this murdering thug also sends an anti-gang message to the youths.

[Ninian Dryhope]

"Jackson said he prayed with Williams, promising, "We are going to fight for you and we are going to win."

Another Jackson lie.

[Seamoth]

Amen. If he were repentant, he would be begging for punishment for his atrocities.

[Lancey Howard]

Stanley "Tookie" Williams, at age 29

(From Wikipedia)

"Stanley "Tookie" Williams (born December 29, 1953) was the founder, along with Raymond Washington, of the Crips, one of the most widely-known and notorious street gangs."

"He grew up in impoverished South Central Los Angeles where he made a name for himself for being a fighter and a "general" on the streets of the West Side of South Central. He was also known for his bodybuilding, which according to Williams, once earned the praise of Arnold Schwarzenegger himself when the two met in the late 1970s."