Posted on 12/11/2005 12:26:59 PM PST by doug from upland
CBSNEWS.COM Los Angeles Dec. 11, 2005
(AP) A lawyer for convicted murderer Stanley Tookie Williams asked the state Supreme Court to stay his execution, saying the Crips gang co-founder should have been allowed to argue that someone else killed one of his four alleged victims.
Attorney Verna Wefald filed a petition Saturday challenging the validity of the four convictions and death sentences given in 1981 to Williams, who is scheduled to die Tuesday at San Quentin State Prison. She also filed an emergency request seeking a stay, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Williams' lawyers also have asked Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to grant clemency, saying Williams has redeemed himself as shown by his books urging children not to join gangs. Schwarzenegger's office said Saturday the governor had not made a decision.
Williams was convicted of killing a man during a robbery in February 1979 and of murdering a couple and their daughter at a South Los Angeles motel in March 1979.
Williams denies committing the murders but has apologized for co-founding the Crips, the gang blamed for numerous murders in Los Angeles and beyond.
From behind bars, Williams has been nominated five times for a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to quell gang violence and four times for a Nobel Prize in literature.
In August, Williams received a President's Call to Service Award for his good deeds on death row, complete with a letter from President Bush praising him for demonstrating "the outstanding character of America."
The money from the sale of his books is used to support at-risk youth programs and to continue his appeals, his lawyers said.
Wefald's petition argues that prosecutors failed to disclose at trial that witness Alfred Coward was not a U.S. citizen and had a violent criminal history, depriving Williams of the opportunity to argue Coward was the killer in the February 1979 robbery.
Coward is now in prison in Canada for killing a man during a robbery.
"All of the witnesses who implicated Williams were criminals who were given significant incentives to testify against him and ongoing benefits for their testimony," Wefald wrote.
"This type of testimony is the leading cause of wrongful convictions in murder and capital cases in the United States," she wrote, citing a study from Northwestern University Law School's Center on Wrongful Convictions.
Wefald declined to comment Saturday night.
The California Supreme Court, a federal court judge in Los Angeles, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court have all upheld Williams' convictions
Put the snipers on the roofs now. And alert the Korean community to be ready.
Also, I doubt that "work" will have any influence on whether or not the Hollywood crowd and libs show up for a riot or not. ;)
Hasta La Vista Baby!
This is great. Let's agree to stay his execution for the murder in question. We will put this execution off until after the hearing but go ahead on the other 3 executions now.
No. False alarm. Another Freeper and I both thought we heard Greg Jarrett say that the Gov gave him a pardon.
Still waiting for news.
The "clinician" will rub some alcohol on his right forearm to sterilize the area of the needle puncture (Hell, we don't wan't it to get infected, do we ?). A needle will go in and deliver 2 gm of Sodium Pentothal. This will knock out Tookie, and if he is lucky he won't be conscious to know what happens to him later. After a couple of minutes or so, PANCURONIUM Bromide will be administered to "relax" his muscles, basically to collapse his lungs. Well Tookie better hope that he is totally unconscious at this stage, you don't want to be awake and realize you cannot breathe. Finally the good doctor will inject massive amounts of potassium Cholride into his bloodstream that will interfere with the sodium/potassium ionic balance and stop his heart. If the Tookster is still awake, this is going to hurt like Hell.
Come on now Tookie, you knew this was going to happen when you killed those people 25 years ago, didn' you ?
Anyone know who it was that nominated him for the Nobel Prize?
Hmmmmm, interesting theory. I could be wrong, but I think that the folks who are against granting Tookie clemency are less likely to cause serious rioting, but would rather to voice their disapproval in a more mature fashion. It's the loony libs that are known for going crazy (literally) when they don't get their way.
Bush has backtracked because someone screwed up and didn't check out Tookie's background. Kind of like Joe Wilson.
This is a virutal public announcement that the entire Nobel enterprize (in Peace and Literature) is seething with leftist politics, is nothing but a sham that is used to trick gullible news readers, reporters, and editors into promoting, and lending prestige, to radical politics (not that this is any surprise to anyone here).
I'd like to imagine that every single time any reference is made on broadcast media to a Nobel prize (Peace and Lit.) any conservatives present would immediately launch themselves into howls of ridicule saying such things as "Isn't that the outfit that wanted to give the multiple murderer who founded the Crips some big prize?"
I believe that award has been retracted. It is much like the Nobel nominations. Some politician trying to get Tookie clemency put him in for the community service award and some idiot who runs that office for the administration and didn't know who they were rewarding approved the award.
Probably his Mother.
If he is such a model of caution for kids re: gangs, why would he be making this appeal? Why not instead say, "Please stop these motions. I deserve my fate. Kids remember this. This could be you and this is terrifying and certainly not cool."
LOL!
I know you are kidding.
But the last time they had a sensitive verdict to read, they announced it at a really odd time ... like early morning mid-week so as to discourage the Friday afternoon verdict and rioting all weekend.
Then let's rename it. Now it's the NoBall prize.
Tookie needs immediate death - but I bet he won't get it.
Does anybody remember the woman who was put to death while Bush was still governor of Texas? I believe she had been a prostitute who had killed a "client" or helped somebody else kill him - but she had become a Christian and had definitely turned her life around. She probably deserved a pardon, but politically, Bush couldn't do it.
Tookie doesn't deserve a pardon, but I bet politically, since Arnie is courting the left, it's going to be impossible for the Gov to deny him one.
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