Will Tookie Die?

At work, I was checking email, reading the latest news in the Black world and came across Earl Ofari Hutchinson's editorial Tookie Must Die. Honestly, I hadn't really been thinking much about Tookie, but he'd been mentally filed in the back of my mind. Just a week ago, MBR/C was trying to get me to sign an online petition to keep Tookie alive; I hesitantly declined.

Stanley "Tookie" Williams, founder of one of the most widely-known and notorious street gangs the Crips, if folks didn't know, was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of four people and is scheduled to be executed December 13, 2005 by lethal injection. His attorneys have a clemency hearing scheduled with Governor Schwarzenegger on December 8, 2005 (can't wait to hear how this goes). He's become an anti-gang spokesperson and is even a Noble Peace Prize nominee.

Hutchinson's editorial sparked my asking some of my co-workers if they were in favor of the death penalty. Some interesting conversation then followed.

About 3 of us agreed that we were against the death penalty, giving different reasons for our views. I personally think that the death penalty is unnecessary for a couple of reasons:

1) Putting a person to death for crimes that they've committed doesn't erase the pain, anguishgish that families endure for their lost. Death to the killer doesn't bring back the killed. Their crime still stands as is. In most Western nations, retribution isn't stated as a purpose of the criminal justice system.

2) Man can not judge another, can not assume the power of God to grant death to others.

3) Our court system is as crooked as ever; it's fallible; it's a fact that there are some people facing the death penalty who've been exonerated, sometimes only minutes before their scheduled execution, while others have been executed before when there was evidence clearing them of their alleged crimes.

4) Over 95% of defendants can't afford legal representation and end up being represented by court-appointed attorneys who either don't care or whose credentials aren't worth a thing, giving the prosecution an unfair advantage.

CHECK OUT THIS SITE FOR QUOTES ON THE DEATH PENALTY. They really will make you think: http://people.freenet.de/dpinfo/drinmatesfamilies.htm

Then there were the 2 (well, more like 1 and 1/2) that favored the death penalty expressing that it prevents offenders from ever returning to society, keeping them from harming others, and that the death of the criminal, while it may not provide full justice for the life they took, is the closest form of justice.

I've heard other reasons for the support of the death penalty such as "People who have committed the most heinous crimes have no right to life" or even that "The death penalty shows the greatest respect for the ordinary man's, and especially the victim's, inviolable value."

From this conversation, we all segued into what influences in a person's life leads them to prison in the first place, the life that inmates live (whether it's luxurious or not) and it ended up that some people had to step out of the office for a cigarette break.

Just in general conversation, people's opinion on whether Tookie's life should be spared is split. To my knowledge, he has been rehabilitated;Tookie will not become a productive member of society, but he's gained an education and attempted to make some amends for his mistakes through the publication of his children's books that advocate non-violence and alternatives to gangs. In 2004, he helped create a peace agreement between the Bloods and Crips in California and New Jersey. Even the President (if it actually counts for something) wrote a letter commending him on his social activism.

I can't help but wonder what will happen to him. By allowing Tookie to be executed, what will America be saying about it's own prison/justice system? Hutchinson touches on the notion that people are attaching the millions of ills and crimes committed under the gang that Tookie helped to establish, but that's crazy; how can one man (other than Jesus) carry the punishment for what dozens and dozens of others have done? Many people are rallying, actively campaigning against the execution, especially in the celebrity arena, from Snoop Dogg to Jamie Foxx to Danny Clover and even, Mrs. Chicken of the Sea, Jessica Simpson. Petitions have been spread around in the nation and to date, over 32,000 people have signed online petitions calling for Schwarzenegger to squash the death sentence.