Resistance is Phutile

Tookie Williams executed.

Seem to be stuck in a busy period right now, trying to sandwich this blog in between various other commitments, but I won't be leaving it alone though, it's more interesting than the other stuff.

I remember reading about Stanley "Tookie" Williams years ago, about the early days of the Crip gang, and about Tookie's reluctance to follow suit when gang bangers were picking up guns and shooting to settle feuds in favour of fistfights. He has become known throughout his years on death row for his anti-gang work, speaking out against the culture and even writing children's books, advising them of the perils of becoming involved with gangs.

All this is nice to hear, and certainly seems to indicate some degree of rehabilitation, although a friend's observation this morning that "anybody on death row long enough will be rehabilited, so do you have to let them all off after a certain amount of time?" made me think.

In truth, it doesn't matter now whether Tookie Williams deserved to be let off of not, because he's dead, it didn't happen. What matters now are the reasons for refusal of clemency.

Again, I do not want to get into the death penalty argument too deeply, as I believe each individual case merits an individual analysis and I have neither the time nor the inclination to state a case for or against abolition here. But a couple of things struck me as odd when reading about Williams' appeal.

Schwarzenegger has written that the "continued pervasiveness of gang violence leads one to question the efficacy of Williams' message." So, whether you feel Williams has been "redeemed" or not, he's got no chance. I'd only let him off if he was any use to us, if he could wave the magic wand that expels violence from LA streets.

This idea was reflected by LA district attorney Steve Cooley, who implied that as Williams had been a founder of the Crips, he was responsible for countless murders, not just the ones he was actually accused of. Do these men honestly believe that Williams was solely responsible for the gang violence? What about the countless others involved, I wonder.

On Monday, in response to Williams' lawyer's requests for a stay of execution, three judges argued there was no "clear and convincing evidence of actual innocence." Well, that must be where I'm going wrong, and I thought I'd just about figured how this justice thing works. See, I thought you needed clear and convincing evidence of actual guilt before you sentenced a man to death.

Williams' consistent denial of guilt is one of the reasons Schwarzenegger gave for refusing to grant clemency. However, I don't think we could have expected anything different from a man who declared:

posted by Phu @ 1:55 pm