Posted on 12/12/2005 1:53:37 PM PST by lainie
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Convicted killer and former Crips gang leader Stanley Tookie Williams is scheduled for execution just after midnight on Tuesday (3:01 EDT/0801 GMT) for the murders of four people in 1979.
Here are key facts surrounding the case and execution:
-- Williams was convicted of killing Albert Lewis Owens with a shotgun as the convenience store clerk lay face down during a February 28, 1979, robbery and murdering a family of three while robbing their motel on March 11, 1979.
-- Williams, who claims to have co-founded the Crips street gang, maintains his innocence, saying that he was railroaded by an all-white jury. He sought clemency for renouncing his life of crime and trying to steer children away from gangs.
-- Williams, 51, has failed to overturn the guilty verdicts and death sentence in 25 years of appeals. With the rejection of clemency, lawyers for Williams could seek further intervention from the courts, although experts say such 11th-hour appeals rarely succeed.
-- Williams' claim of redemption and work with children has won him support from such celebrities as rapper and former Crips gang member Snoop Dogg and Oscar-winning actor Jamie Foxx, who starred in a TV movie about the convicted killer. Williams has been nominated five times for the Nobel Peace Prize.
-- Williams would become the 12th person, all of them men, executed in the state of California since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977. Of the previous 11 men executed, eight were white, one was Asian, one was black and one was Native American.
-- California, which has more than 640 people on death row, last carried out an execution in January, when 61-year-old Donald Beardslee, who was put to death in January for killing two young women in 1981 while on parole for another murder.
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.
Calls for clemency have been mounting from religious and community leaders and celebrities such as Jamie Foxx, Snoop Dogg, Mike Farrell, Danny Glover and Bianca Jagger.
http://www.nbc4.tv/slideshow/news/5470993/detail.html?qs=1;s=1;dm=ss;p=news;w=400
Photo slideshow of murder trial evidence (43 pictures - crime scene photos begin at #25 and are not graphic)
Don't these three have names?
Yes, they do. They are Chinese names. He murdered in cold blood a family of immigrants from Taiwan.
I say give him clemency when he brings these four people back to life.
Except he wasn't. There were Asians and Hispanics on that jury.
To their discredit, Reuters does not point out that Tookie's claim of an "all-white" jury IS A LIE.
"To their credit, Reuters "
'Credit' and 'Reuters' does not belong in the same sentence.
You can't spin irrefutable 'facts'.
"Of the previous 11 men executed, eight were white, one was Asian, one was black and one was Native American."
No truth to the assertion that the death penalty is a black man's penalty.
Hang 'em High ~ Bump!
The father, mother and daughter of the Yang family were murdered on March 11, 1979. Tookie and accomplices netted approximately $100.00. Details
Fact: The United States is a racist society that hates everyone that doesn't look like them.
Fact: Black people NEVER commit crimes.
(/sarcasm)
Fact: The American left LOVES crooks while punishing innocent people.
Fact: The American left hates millionaires UNLESS you're a criminal profiting on your story (what are the income tax rates on "Inmate" by the way?)
Fact: Once again I'm being told the criminals and lawbreakers of society are privy to rights and privileges most of us will never enjoy.
B**N IN H**L TOOKIE!
Yeah, I know. But they usually leave out the facts that don't fit the mold.
Yes, there was one black man as well as a hispanic on the jury.
WHO'S NEXT?
"But they usually leave out the facts that don't fit the mold."
Yes. That's true. But to have done so would have left the article incomplete.
But this is the part that I find really incredible.
"California, which has more than 640 people on death row"
640 on death row and only 12 executed since 1977!
Wow!
I should say right out that I have serious concerns about the death penalty. I am not sure that any state should have the legal right to take a human life. However, that said, I must admit that the death penalty is the law here, and, if anyone should receive it, it should be "Tookie." There has been a lot of talk about his good works, books for kids about the evils of gang life. Some have used that to make a claim for Tookie's redemption. But what they fail to understand is that redemption, like salvation, belongs, not to man, but to God. All we can do is act on behavior; God alone knows what's in a man or woman's heart, mind and soul. By his behavior, Tookie has earned the death penalty in the state of California.
they also forgot mumia
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