Stanley “Tookie” Williams, the founder of the Crips, is up for execution in California. Largely because of a television movie about him that starred Jamie Foxx, the drive to have his execution stayed (sic?) has become a bit of a cause celebre.
Here’s why I think the famous folks need to chill out…or step up farther.

Williams is accused of killing two people in a robbery. He claims that he did not do it, but he’ll have to come with fairly incontrovertible proof of that for him to avoid the needle. “They might have gotten it wrong” isn’t enough to push an execution back. “See, I told you I didn’t do it” will work, but there’s gotta be something to see. As things stand, there’s nothing there. Because of that, he’s probably going to die.
That he’s fixed his life and written books for children that encourage them to avoid gang life isn’t good enough, either. Call me what you want, but I don’t think that’s enough to get the Governator to push his execution back. The Governator is holding a private clemency hearing, though.
We’ll see how it goes, but I have big problems with what’s going on with the celebrities, though.
Let me start by expressing my unequivocal opposition to the death penalty. I find it to be morally repugnant, but that’s not where my arguments against the penalty are raised. Morality and a token’ll get you on the subway. It’s only good for so much in any real world argument.
The problem with the death penalty is that it’s systematically flawed. For its result to be so big–yanno, death and shit–the folks get it wrong too much. As DNA testing became more readily available, more people were found to be not guilty of capital crimes, and who knows how many people in the past were executed unfairly. Economists would look at this as an expected value problem. With some probablility, the folks’ll get it right and will get it wrong with some probability. To make this penalty worth it–and I’m speaking now to people in support of the penalty–that bad probability has to be microscopic to justify the chance of killing someone for a crime not committed. I don’t think that probability is small enough for the folks to decide that killing someone is the way to punish for a crime. Just too flawed.
Historically, the death penalty has been in place to punish black folks for killing white folks. I did a project on this in college. At the time, upwards of 400 black people had been executed in this country for killing whites (and that was within some finite time period, I believe, and it doesn’t include lynchings). Vice versa–one time. That’s right, one.
That terribly human element of the penalty is another gigantic reason this has got to be eliminated. I don’t care if you think the death penalty is justifiable or not. If the system doesn’t work, it needs to be fixed or destroyed. That’s independent of anything else. You can post your moral arguments about the death penalty in one direction or another, but I’m not likely to listen to them or read them. The moral arguments are irrelevant. The machinations of the penalty are what matter, and they’re flawed.
(The same logical arguments, the way I see it, are the ones that count when talking about abortion. Think abortion is wrong all you want. Just know that legalized abortion only ensure that trained professionals will perform abortions, not somebody in the ‘hood with a steady hand and a hot wire hanger.)
So what’s the beef with the celebs?
Why Williams? I know Snoop has an attachment to him because they’re both Crips, but it’s hard for me to hear him support clemency for a man that wants kids to stay out of gangs from a man that throws the Crips up any chance he has. I understand that bangin’ isn’t a simple thing and renouncing your set has a bunch of social capital ramifications, but something about that is funny.
The problem here is the system, not this one case. These folks at the courthouse steps protesting for Williams should be out every day. A few of them should jump in their cars and head to Huntsville, TX, where my home state kills more niggaz than cancer. The problem is this penalty. I don’t think that Williams is the most worthy of this support. After Williams is executed or not, where will these people be?
And if there wasn’t a movie about this dude, who would be on the steps?
I’m pretty sure that Tookie’s gotten his shit together. At the same time, many say the same for Gangster Disciple chief Larry Hoover. The state believes that Hoover’s still runnin’ the GDs from the joint, though. It’s possible that’s trumped up, but that gives me a little pause on Williams.
(Hoover has started a program, 21st Century VOTE, that helps GDs get their high school diplomas. That just seems ignorant of the fact that being a GD makes getting to graduation really difficult.)
I sure as hell don’t believe that Williams should be executed. But where are these folks at other times? Williams is simply an example of a flawed system. If he gets clemency, are these celebrities going to have anythign to say to or about folks set to get the needle with even better cases than Williams?
This is too big a problem for us to focus on one person or another. Folks with problems with the death penalty need to work on the penalty, not just one application.
Best of luck to Williams in settling his case. And here’s hoping those famous people get the point.