Posted on 12/03/2005 5:52:39 PM PST by bikepacker67
THE celebrity rush to save the life of convicted murderer and gang founder Tookie Williams may be the best argument yet for eliminating the death penalty. Dead, he's a martyr; alive and confined for life, he's just another nobody.
I have no wish to further elevate Williams in the public eye, but the circus surrounding his Dec. 13 execution date forces reflection.
First my bias and other disclaimers: I'm a relatively recent convert from the slow-gas-leak solution to death row crowding to a reluctant capital punishment opponent. I oppose the death penalty for one reason: The state makes mistakes, and one innocent murdered by the state is too many.
Do I think Tookie is innocent of killing four people? No, I don't. All appeals to higher courts, including the reliably liberal 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, confirm that his trial was fair and his verdict just.
Does he deserve to live? My emotions say "no." My reason skips to a different question, one that National Journal White House correspondent Carl Cannon posed in the National Review (June 19, 2000) article that helped shift my thinking:
"The right question to ask is not whether capital punishment is an appropriate — or a moral — response to murders," Cannon wrote. "It is whether the government should be in the business of executing people convicted of murder knowing to a certainty that some of them are innocent."
That certainty has been established by DNA tests showing that many death row inmates did not commit the crimes for which they were convicted. Case closed.
The painful part of this position is that we who oppose capital punishment on these grounds have to breathe the same air as the celebrities, political panderers and other hankie-twisters who materialize every time a "Tookie" runs out of options and faces a far more humane death than that which he delivered to others.
To refresh your memory, Tookie — who founded the notoriously vicious Los Angeles gang the Crips — was convicted of killing four people during a murder-and-robbery spree in 1979 that netted him roughly $250.
His first victim was Albert Owens, a store clerk in Whittier, whom Tookie murdered to eliminate witnesses and "because he was white." The others were an elderly Chinese couple and their daughter, whom Williams referred to as "Buddha-heads." All were shot at close range with a 12-gauge shotgun. Williams' defenders insist he is reformed and point to children's books he has written in prison urging kids to stay away from gangs. They also point to his 1997 statement apologizing for his role in glamorizing gang life, though he never apologized for his crimes.
The usual suspects have mobilized on his behalf, including Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins, Danny Glover, Jesse Jackson, Snoop Dogg (a fellow former Crip),'60s radical Tom Hayden and Mario Cuomo.
Perhaps some of these celebrities share the same concerns I've expressed. But others, including an activist visiting California schools in recent days to enlist children in a "Save Tookie" campaign, make it difficult to steady one's hands and stick to one's convictions.
Stefanie Faucher, projects director for the grass-roots group Death Penalty Focus, stopped at an Oakland high school, where she told students there was little evidence to convict Williams, despite what all those courts and judges had to say. Faucher left with 29 letters petitioning the governor for clemency.
It seems clear that the courts have done their job and that Williams is guilty. But it is also abundantly clear that the dramas surrounding such executions grant celebrity status to the least deserving among us.
Our first principle should be never to kill an innocent person, and thus err on the side of life. We thus liberate ourselves from involuntary servitude as audience to those for whom death row has become a stage.
Finally, killers such as Tookie Williams, condemned to life without parole, vanish into the hell of obscurity where they belong.
Me, I wouldn't mind life without parole for trash like this, but only if:
(1) They're thrown into an Alcatraz-like hole with only other lifers there. We could reopen Alcatraz and build others in similarly impossible-to-escape-from places (I'm thinking Aleutian islands, or perhaps Kahoolawe in Hawaii).
(2) NO contact with the outside world (you go there, you don't come out except in a pine box and you'll be utterly forgotten when you do).
"Our first principle should be never to kill an innocent person"
In this case an innocent will not be executed, he is guilty by his own admission.
The photo of the young victim is especially disturbing. she was shot at near point blank range (with bb "birdshot") in her left cheek. She experienced substantial gross para-mortem and post-mortem swelling.
I will never be able to wipe that image from my mind, so grotesque are the wounds.
The author makes a valid point, but what if the opposite of his fears are true, i.e. we have conclusive DNA, eyewitness and video evidence? Heck, what if the killer confesses? Then, the author should concede the death penalty is just. He wouldn't though.
Incorrect. 18 months after he's dead, few if anyone will even remember Stanley Williams.
I have no wish to further elevate Williams in the public eye, but the circus surrounding his Dec. 13 execution date forces reflection
The only circus I have seen are a few fools and black racist that speak out in support of a cold blooded murderer.
Execute him, he won't be a martyr for long...
"I've got no problem with clemency, provided there are certain conditions."
Surely his grovelling victims would have loved those options too, given the choice he forced upon them - their sudden terrified deaths without mercy.
-- nice editorial job! You must be a sufferer of ADD!! LOL
A society without the death penalty is opening itself up for vigilanteeism and personal revenge.
Actually, I like that idea. And - no cells either. Just a big wall around it, and it's all general pop. You can be the king, or the b***h for the stay, it's up to you. But hell never the less.
Let them finish the bomb disposal then send them to the farthest islet in the Aleutians.
LOL
Exactly.
"Dead, he's a martyr"
I disagree. Dead, he's yesterday's news and soon forgotten. And good riddance.
They will sputter and moan for a day or so and then nobody will give a rats ass.
Au contrare....
The courts of law have spoken and have concluded that this animal is not deserving of life. Who the hell do the 'celebrities' think they are to oppose our court system? BTW, the 'ditch diggers union' are in favor of carrying out Tooskie's execution?
Dead, Tookie may be a martyr but he will be, in fact, dead as the court has ordered. If he is granted clemency as the result of these goofy 'celebrities', he will be alive, a living martyr, available for escape, possible parole, and a trophy for the celebrities.
IMHO, the only thing that will be wrong with his execution in 10 days is that one of the family members of any of his victims will not get a chance to flip the switch.
Flex those muscles Tookie, I believe that will impress your Maker.......
Let him die.
Remember ted bundy, convicted and admitted to at least 28 murders, was in prison in colarado, for life, double, triple life when he ESCAPED and murdered at least another DOZEN women. If the crying, bleeding heart liberals would have pulled the plug on teddy boy, he never would have had the opportunity to kill more INNOCENT women. Who speaks for them?
I'd just love to hear her if one of her family members were killed by Tookie.
I know what we should do. Line up all the surviving relatives, and let the motherf*cker loose.
Make him a martyr. Let him represent the Hollywood mindset.
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