Just hours after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger denied his final plea for clemency, Stanley “Tookie” Williams was executed this morning at 12:35 Pacific time by lethal injection. Evidently, God did not answer his prayers…
In this previous article, I predicted that Schwarzenegger would grant Tookie clemency based on the legitimate claims of due process violations during his trial (not least of which was the prosecutor’s deliberate stacking of the “jury of [Tookie’s] peers” with all white people), his rehabilitation and sustainable path towards redemption. Evidently, I was wrong.
But I did not plead for his life as much as I argued for the abolition of the death penalty. And, if his execution serves any sensible purpose, I hope that it intensifies the debate on whether the specious penal purpose of the death penalty justifies the corrosive effect it has on our humanity and morality.
Meanwhile, lesser known Americans are executed almost weekly in the United States with hardly a public notice. But, such is life!
The debate goes on…
May God have mercy on Tookie’s soul!
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Mark says
Jessie Jackson comparing the Governor to Pontius Pilate? Following that scene we would find that “Tookie” represents Barabbas. In that wonderful scene we find the people wanted the vile over the one who was innocent.
Since we are drawing Biblical illustrations. What has changed over the past 2,000 years? Not much except that the names have changed. People are still willing to choose the vilest person over the innocent.
“It is not good to be partial to the wicked or to deprive the innocent of justice. Prov. 18:5”
Even Paul (and Jessie should know this) was not afraid to die if he did something deserving death. Yet “Tookie” wanted it both ways on the issue so he could manipulate the people and his situation. Michelle Malkin’s “The Tookie Files” got it right when she quoted an excerpt from the LA Times:
“Tookie wanted to have it both ways — he wanted to maintain his actual innocence claim so that he would have something to argue in the courts, but he still wanted to claim that he had been redeemed,” Levenson said. “In the end, he lost on both fronts.”
Unlike Pilate who ‘washed his hands’ and was unwilling to release Jesus even though he believed he was innocent, Arnold wasn’t a girlie man and stuck to his belief (based on the evidence) that ‘Tookie’ was deserving to die. I agree with Outside the Beltway that he is responsible for many crimes as the founder of the Crips. If he and other leaders (such as Jessie) would spend have their energy speaking out against the crime within their own culture then we would have less concerns about ‘discriminatory’ death penalty cases. And we might see less people like Wolf Blitzer defending such men. Though cited for his anti-gang work in prison you still have to wonder why he never apologized for the four brutal murders. Nice example for fellow gang-bangers following his steps