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Reporter's Eyewitness Account of Allen's Execution
San Francisco Chronicle ^ | January 17, 2006 | Kevin J. Fagan

Posted on 01/17/2006 9:28:37 AM PST by KingofZion

The oldest man to ever enter California's execution chamber met his doom Tuesday the way he'd wanted to: With the faint lilt of Native American chants ringing in the air around him, and loved ones mouthing "I love you" to him as his damaged vision slowly faded to black.

A symbolic Indian feather lay on quadruple murderer Clarence Ray Allen's chest for the entire 33-minute execution, rising and falling until the lethal poisons piped into his veins through intravenous tubes stopped his breathing and he at last lay completely still.

"Hoka Hey, (an Indian saying meaning) it's a good day to die," Allen, who turned 76 on Monday, wrote in his last statement.

Those whose lives he savaged by ordering up the shotgun deaths of their loved ones in Fresno in 1980 looked as if they couldn't have agreed more.

Patricia Pendergrass, whose 27-year-old brother Bryon Schletewitz died when Allen's hitman blasted him in the head, kept her hands clenched together and her lips pursed tightly from start to finish -- and then, as the official notice of his death was read off, she allowed herself the slightest hint of a smile. Five chairs to her right in the ring of witnesses sitting at a railing alongside the death chamber, prosecutor Ward Campbell lifted his chin as if in victory.

"Mr. Allen finally received the justice he deserved tonight," Campbell said a half-hour after the execution. "I was always confident this day would come. I am just very glad to have it finally be done."

MORE ***

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: allen; capitalpunishment; clarencerayallen; deathpenalty; execution; protestors; tookie
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To: Semper Paratus
"How can you write a story about an execution and not detail the condemned's last meal?"

Sometimes the condemned don't get a last meal...they just unceremoniously remove their feeding tubes.

21 posted on 01/17/2006 9:51:04 AM PST by Joe 6-pack (Que me amat, amet et canem meum.)
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To: Joe 6-pack

I think it is outrageous that they took this old man in a wheelchair to the death chamber. It would have been much more appropriate to drag his carcass to where he would assume room temperature.


22 posted on 01/17/2006 9:53:27 AM PST by at bay
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To: KingofZion

Good...the land of the fruits and nuts executes another killer/murderer....


23 posted on 01/17/2006 9:53:56 AM PST by shield (The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instructions.Pr 1:7)
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To: at bay
"I think it is outrageous that they took this old man in a wheelchair to the death chamber."

I agree completely, especially when one considers the plight of the California Condor...


24 posted on 01/17/2006 9:57:14 AM PST by Joe 6-pack (Que me amat, amet et canem meum.)
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To: KingofZion

It sounds like he wasn't perhaps as incapacitated as it seemed ... and that his "Indian" attributes were picked up while in prison.


25 posted on 01/17/2006 10:00:10 AM PST by BunnySlippers
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To: KingofZion
Re California Death Row:

NEXT !

26 posted on 01/17/2006 10:01:58 AM PST by llevrok (Drink your beer, damnit! There are people in Africa sober!.)
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To: So Cal Rocket

Needs repeating.


27 posted on 01/17/2006 10:04:42 AM PST by packrat35 (The America hating bastards at the NYT must spend their entire life with their heads in the toilet)
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To: llevrok

Another one bites the dust...another one bites the dust...for some odd reason want to sing that old but popular song...oh yea


28 posted on 01/17/2006 10:06:19 AM PST by way2cool01
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To: EQAndyBuzz
Was the "Save Tookie" crowd there?

Sorry, but this guy was missing certain characteristics that inspire that gang. For instance, melanin deficiency syndrome. But at least they are consistent in their inconsistency.

29 posted on 01/17/2006 10:08:52 AM PST by AbeKrieger (Islam is the virus that causes al-Qaeda.)
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To: KingofZion
Hoka Hey, (an Indian saying meaning) it's a good day to die.


That's not Indian. That's Klingon!!! (Stupid Indian time-traveler thieves!)
30 posted on 01/17/2006 10:10:19 AM PST by macamadamia (The great dangerous non-sequitur du jour: oil-independence will stop terrorism.)
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To: KingofZion

I guess the USSC was right. He wasn't too old or sick to die.


31 posted on 01/17/2006 10:16:16 AM PST by TheDon (The Democratic Party is the party of TREASON!)
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To: way2cool01

great song but they are pikers.....

Hunstville Texas ROCKS......We need to limit the appeals and start catching up with Huntsville.....5 years and you're out.


32 posted on 01/17/2006 10:17:16 AM PST by halfright (3 Days post Hanoi (Jihadi) Jane... 2200hrs meeting to urinate on her grave...Semper Fi !)
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To: KingofZion

33 min?????

[sigh] All this costly drug induced execution.... pfffft. Nitrogen narcosis is far cheaper, painless, effective and much quicker.


33 posted on 01/17/2006 10:18:37 AM PST by taxcontrol
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To: KingofZion
"Hoka Hey, (an Indian saying meaning) it's a good day to die," Allen, who turned 76 on Monday, wrote in his last statement."

Obviously, Allen was a member of the Indian Tribe known as the Frend-Lee nation who dance to the chant of ......

"Hey-Hah-Wah-Yah, Hey-Hah-Wah-Yah!

34 posted on 01/17/2006 10:20:34 AM PST by albee ("Those that bite the hand that feeds them will lick the boot that kicks them!" - Eric Hoffer)
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To: macamadamia
"Hoka Hey, (an Indian saying meaning) it's a good day to die"

I knew that sounded familiar:

"Meka Leka Hi Meka Hiney Ho" - Magical incantation used by Jambi the Genie (John Paragon) on the Saturday morning children's program PEE WEE'S PLAYHOUSE/CBS/1986-91. Jambi lived in a purple box with two jewel studded doors that sat on a tabletop inside Pee Wee Herman's playhouse. He had blue skin and wore a red turban but all the audience ever saw was his head which floated inside the box bathed in a glow of blue light. Once a jabbering green monster came into the playhouse. "What's he saying Pee Wee?" said Chairy (a talking chair). "I wish I knew" replied Pee Wee. Suddenly the doors of Jambi's jewel covered box opened. "Wish? Did somebody say wish?" Jambi then said "Monster, Monster, I command, Speak so we can understand. Now everyone repeat after me. Meka leka hi, meka hiney ho!" Suddenly, a halo of light filled the room and everyone could understand the monster's language. The deed done, Jambi said "The wish is granted. Long live Jambi." and the doors to his box closed. source

35 posted on 01/17/2006 10:21:43 AM PST by steelcurtain
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To: KingofZion
Allen was referred to as a white man when he went to prison, but his Choctaw and Cherokee roots took on great important in the final years of his life

Sounds like more Ward Churchill Sittingbullscheiss

36 posted on 01/17/2006 10:23:33 AM PST by Alouette (The Anti-Borg - You Will NOT be Assimilated!)
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To: YOUGOTIT
This is a disgrace he should have been axed not put to sleep.

I will never understand this sickness that some FReepers bring to these execution threads. I find it disturbing when the good guys are as depraved as the bad guys.

37 posted on 01/17/2006 10:25:19 AM PST by Melas (What!? Read or learn something? Why would anyone do that, when they can just go on being stupid)
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To: albee

If you read the part that I was forced to excerpt, you'll discover some nice info that was never previously reported, to wit:

(1) HE WAS NOT BLIND AND INFIRM! He got up out of his chair, looked over at the "audience", waved goodbye, etc.
The whole wheelchair bit was just a ploy and no doubt egged on by his lawyers, who knew he didn't have an iota of a chance on his "I didn't do it" appeal.

(2) HE WAS NOT AN INDIAN. His intake form said "white" - the whole native american routine was again concocted years later by his lawyers. No doubt he had some choctow blood, but he didn't discover his "heritage" until late in the game.


38 posted on 01/17/2006 10:27:01 AM PST by KingofZion
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To: KingofZion

I'm completely disgusted that there were 200 people protesting this thing's execution but 2000 protesting "Tookie's". Why were people upset over "Tookie" and not over this creep?
When I have the answer to that, I'll finally understand liberals.


39 posted on 01/17/2006 10:28:05 AM PST by BooksForTheRight.com (what have you done today to fight terrorism/leftism (same thing!))
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To: Blood of Tyrants
One of his "save the criminals" lawyers had the nerve to try to bring an appeal saying that 23 years on death row was cruel and unusual punishment.

Then we should give judges a pistol and some ammo...
40 posted on 01/17/2006 10:29:05 AM PST by ricer1
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