stanley tookie willaims

[- English -]

Did he deserve to die? debait

 

[- English -]

Im not sure on his past, all i know he was convicted of killing 4 people in the 1980s period or something, but since then hes apparently become a redemed person writign childrens books to not join gangs and such.

I should have put an option for not sure, but i feel that may have been flooded, as i think its a hard one to say

 

[Benedictine]

The clue is in the word 'convicted'

Fremen stop distracting me from work and PL!

 

[DocWolfe]

Just read the wikipedia article on this guy, as I had no idea who he was. He was guilty of the crimes, she should face the punishment regardless of how much he "changed", it is clear from his actions in prison he was a brutal man.

 

[Jjuraa]

Yes he should have, end of story.

He made himself better inside, so fucking what? he had no chance did he, making himself look like a better person was his only shot so he took it. purely selfish reasons.

Someone who betters themselves because they take it upon themselves to do so- they should get respect.

As for "OMG HE WAS ONLY CONVICTED WTF SOMEONE WHO WRITES BOOKS COULDNT HAVE DONE IT"

Moot point. He was convicted so he deserved to die. wether he should have been convicted or not is an argument about the American legal system.


Edit: It also sickens me the ammount of people who change their opinions of this man simply because of a few "celebrities" sticking up for him. Fickle bastards, go get some braincells of your own.

 

[- English -]

well i voted no because i dont think taking a life will make it better. Even if he did kill those people, i still feel killing him or anyone is wrong, although as you said its the american way, and does not happen in the uk

makes a mockery of redemptoin though?

 

[Benedictine]

Yes he should have, end of story.

He made himself better inside, so fucking what? he had no chance did he, making himself look like a better person was his only shot so he took it. purely selfish reasons.

Someone who betters themselves because they take it upon themselves to do so- they should get respect.

As for "OMG HE WAS ONLY CONVICTED WTF SOMEONE WHO WRITES BOOKS COULDNT HAVE DONE IT"

Moot point. He was convicted so he deserved to die. wether he should have been convicted or not is an argument about the American legal system.


Edit: It also sickens me the ammount of people who change their opinions of this man simply because of a few "celebrities" sticking up for him. Fickle bastards, go get some braincells of your own.

You misunderstand

I was saying he should be executed as he was convicted therefore he is guilty under law!

 

[Megarevs]

Yes he should have, end of story.

He made himself better inside, so fucking what? he had no chance did he, making himself look like a better person was his only shot so he took it. purely selfish reasons.

Someone who betters themselves because they take it upon themselves to do so- they should get respect.

As for "OMG HE WAS ONLY CONVICTED WTF SOMEONE WHO WRITES BOOKS COULDNT HAVE DONE IT"

Moot point. He was convicted so he deserved to die. wether he should have been convicted or not is an argument about the American legal system.


Edit: It also sickens me the ammount of people who change their opinions of this man simply because of a few "celebrities" sticking up for him. Fickle bastards, go get some braincells of your own.

So by your words if an innocent man gets convicted, he should be excecuted?
Death sentence is an old punnishment, that shouldnt be used today.

 

[Dandare]

Im not sure on his past, all i know he was convicted of killing 4 people in the 1980s period or something, but since then hes apparently become a redemed person writign childrens books to not join gangs and such.

I should have put an option for not sure, but i feel that may have been flooded, as i think its a hard one to say

I think this is the guy I heard about the other day on the news.
My belief is a life-for-a-life and rape should have full 30 years life sentence in England....but sadly thats not the case.
But I totally see your point,a lot of states in the U.S still have the deathrow,but why does it take so long??? Appeals maybe or a silly law I don't know about.It can take 6-25 years I'm not sure if this is done on purpose to prolong the matter,but I feel that the judge gave the decison out and no redemption can justify that,surely the familes of people killed would rather have the person executed straight away to releive there stress and remorse and put to rest a seriously bad chapter to there life,instead of having it dragged out 20 years+

 

[evzy]

If by his actions in prison he was helping people out of crime - then say if one person he stopped from getting involved in a gang would have killed someone had they joined - then maybe keeping him alive would potentially have saved other lives in the future....but if it had been my family he murdered then yeah I would have pulled the switch myself... So its a tricky one but I would have to go with Yes on teh vote...

Also he never admitted his guilt with regards to the murders (granted if he never did kill them fair enough - but he was a very violent person who lets be honest probably did have involvement in murders even if not the ones he was tried for).

 

[bult]

Dont really care if he did it or not, im against death penalty no matter what.

 

[Jjuraa]

So by your words if an innocent man gets convicted, he should be excecuted?
Death sentence is an old punnishment, that shouldnt be used today.

When did i say he was innocent?


and people who take a life knowing full well what they are doing (murder, in other words) deserve to have their life taken in return. Cant stress that enough.

For example: a man kidnapps, rapes, tortures, then kills a 15 year old girl.

you think that man deserves to live? you think he has the right to live in a warm cell, take food and water and even entertainment, paid for indirectly by the girls own father? (tax etc) hmm?

Imagine you were that girls father, would you be happy with that? i fucking wouldnt, id go hunt that fucker down and kill him myself, thus landing myself a prison sentance and destroying my familys life even further. But what if i knew he was going to die anyway? that justice would be served and the law would decide he wasnt fit to be on this planet. I could probably just restrain myself, and take satisfaction that his disgusting, twisted mind wouldnt be around much longer.

 

[[SS]Gamblor]

I voted yes.

he only became the person who wrote books and the like once he was in prison , if he hadn't of been sent down , who knows what would of happened.
in reality he would of prob been gunned down long ago.


I'm not for the death penelty myself, I voted yes as the law in the sate he was in it was a option , a option a groupd of 12 of his peers decided on.

as for a innocent man being killed instead ... well he's been on death row for 20 years. that should be long enough to sort out most things ( i know mistakes will be made. Thats life)

 

[Ingafgrinn Macabre]

If anyone would kill someone in the name of state and justice... Well, in my opinion that wouldn't make them any better then the original perpetrator.
Besides that, innocent people have been executed before in the states, and that will most likely happen again. perhaps tooki was guilty, perhaps he wasn't. Don't care really, not my business. I don't have all the information. Only that information given to me by the press and well.. they aren't really trustworthy as history has pointed out.
To be able to make a judgement wether or not he was guilty you would have to have posession of all the evidence presented in court. I don't have that, so it's not in my ability to brand him guilty or not.

In my opinion death sentences should be banished for all but the likes of Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Mao Tse-tung...

 

[Lamp]

He was tried, convicted, sentenced and executed in accordance with due legal process under US legislation. He's been on death row for some 20 odd years. Thats enough time for any miscarriages or abuses in the legal process to have been discovered. He was a convicted murderer and received the death sentence, which is what you get under the relevant state legislation for murder. Its a bit late for questions on whether he deserved to die. The broader question is whether you agree with the death penalty.

 

[Ezteq]

could be wrong here but wasnt he the head of the crips? (sp?) afaik they are one of the top worst gangs in LA (possibly the whole of america, if you dont count the mafia as a gang).

watched a really really good film the other day called control, it has ray liotta and willam defoe in it, it deals with the question of death penalty, if someone is truely rehabilitated should they still die?

i have to tell you it really made me think.

 

[- English -]

yup he was founder of crips

 

[Marc]

Dont really care if he did it or not, im against death penalty no matter what.

No flamebait intended. But god forbid, someone murdered a family member of yours or close friend. Would you still feel the same?

 

[soze]

I said no just because an article I read about it showed lots of holes in the trial (Im unsure of he bias though ). Such as murder weapon found in the house of different criminals who had a case against them dropped after claiming Williams confessed to them. Finger prints and boot prints found at the scene that did not match his. Also the prosecutor was a suspected racist who got black jurors thrown out to help his case. The article i read also said that the star witness in his case was a rapist and murderer who was facing the death penalty until he testified against Williams. The only reason he was put to death seems to be that he has not owned up and said I killed them and said sorry, but if he was innocent why should he.

But basically all i think is if you are going to use capital punishment then you have to be 100% sure of guilt and from the article I read there is no way you can be.

Article here.
http://www.tookie.com/tookie_fact_sheet_10.18.05.pdf

 

[Lamp]

But basically all i think is if you are going to use capital punishment then you have to be 100% sure of guilt and from the article I read there is no way you can be.

Indeed.

The risk of executing an innocent person is one that cannot be taken lightly. Imagine if that innocent person was you, and there was nothing you could say or do to change your impending fate ?

 

[Mojo]

(Im unsure of he bias though)
Article here.
http://www.tookie.com/tookie_fact_sheet_10.18.05.pdf

The bias stares one in the face

 

[Jjuraa]

In my opinion death sentences should be banished for all but the likes of Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Mao Tse-tung...

the difference between you and me is: i put myself on both sides, i imagine if someone murdered someone i care about.

try doing that, and if you still wouldnt want the murderer to die.. well then i pity you for being so weak, for having little to no emotion inside you. for never loving or being loved 0_o

 

[evzy]

The thing as mentioned above re the Tookie website is of course its going to say he didn't do it on a website dedicated to him. If after 20years they still couldn't find anything substantial to prove his innocence then maybe it does reflect his guilt....

 

[Serosh]

the difference between you and me is: i put myself on both sides, i imagine if someone murdered someone i care about.

try doing that, and if you still wouldnt want the murderer to die.. well then i pity you for being so weak, for having little to no emotion inside you. for never loving or being loved 0_o

You don't put yourself in both sides, Jjuraa, you put yourself solely in the side of the victim, you allow hate and revenge to consume your person, it sounds like a hollow, pointless existance to me. Frankly, I wonder if you have a fucking clue what you are talking about.

And I pity you for your bloodlust, I hope you're just using an "on-line character" here, if not, well, I'll just pity you some more.

I have lost friends, family, people I knew only by name but still managed to touch me in some way. I lost them to cancer, murder, accidents, suicide. I've seen my best friend almost destroying herself trying to come to terms with her being sexually violated by a family member, only to find herself raped again. I learned from it how fickle fate can be, I mourn the passing of those I lost, I feel anger to those things and people that took them away, but I don't hate them, hate is such a pointless, futile exercise in the end. In the end, they are still 6 feet under, decomposing, what I do, or believe, will not change that.

You chose the values of death and revenge, people like you make me glad I chose life. One day, I hope for your sake, you will realise that all that anger you carry will not bring your hypothetical loved ones back. You are only sullying their hypothetical memory with your calls for revenge.

You want, as a hypothetical dad, see the murderer of your hypothetical daughter executed? Bugger that, how about comforting your hypothetical wife? How about keeping your hypothetical other kids on track? I'm sure they'd love their hypothetical daddy brooding over the death of their hypothetical sister all day.

The weak are consumed by hate, the strong find a way to carry on with their lives.

Yes, you hit a snare, I'm not going to allow myself to be called emotionless by tossers like yourself who think they are da shiz by insulting those who hold different values.

 

[Ezteq]

Yes, you hit a snare, I'm not going to allow myself to be called emotionless by tossers like yourself who think they are da shiz by insulting those who hold different values.

sorry i cut your post but i really had to highlight this bit.. can you see what i mean? by using an abusive name towards him you have yourself just done what you were accusing him of, so if your going to do a thread about how other people should respect your values, maybe you should respect theirs?

As to the rest of your post i read all of it and it was very moving and i am glad that there are people like you who know when to draw a line under things and let them go with the realisation that you cant change a thing, it is something i really wish i could do over certain issues, but we have to face up to the fact that everyone is different and where you can control yourself and feel no anger towards people who commit violence, others can't (like that spanish mother who set light to the guy who raped her young daughter, personally i would never condemn her).


But maybe instead of seeing imprisonment (or worse) as punishments we have to look at them from the other side too, the side of prevention. Some people simply will not stop, they feel no remorse and therefore if they are viewed with the attitude "its done, they did it, i cant undo it, let it go" they'll just boogie on out and go rape/murder/assult someone else and the only way to stop them is to remove them.

And tbh people really can't say with 100% sureness how they will react under such circumstances.

 

[Dandare]

You don't put yourself in both sides, Jjuraa, you put yourself solely in the side of the victim, you allow hate and revenge to consume your person, it sounds like a hollow, pointless existance to me. Frankly, I wonder if you have a fucking clue what you are talking about.

And I pity you for your bloodlust, I hope you're just using an "on-line character" here, if not, well, I'll just pity you some more.

I have lost friends, family, people I knew only by name but still managed to touch me in some way. I lost them to cancer, murder, accidents, suicide. I've seen my best friend almost destroying herself trying to come to terms with her being sexually violated by a family member, only to find herself raped again. I learned from it how fickle fate can be, I mourn the passing of those I lost, I feel anger to those things and people that took them away, but I don't hate them, hate is such a pointless, futile exercise in the end. In the end, they are still 6 feet under, decomposing, what I do, or believe, will not change that.

You chose the values of death and revenge, people like you make me glad I chose life. One day, I hope for your sake, you will realise that all that anger you carry will not bring your hypothetical loved ones back. You are only sullying their hypothetical memory with your calls for revenge.

You want, as a hypothetical dad, see the murderer of your hypothetical daughter executed? Bugger that, how about comforting your hypothetical wife? How about keeping your hypothetical other kids on track? I'm sure they'd love their hypothetical daddy brooding over the death of their hypothetical sister all day.

The weak are consumed by hate, the strong find a way to carry on with their lives.

Yes, you hit a snare, I'm not going to allow myself to be called emotionless by tossers like yourself who think they are da shiz by insulting those who hold different values.

Good point and I admire your belieif in life after going thro so much.
But to reinterate my point would'nt it be easier to just employ the death penalty asap if the conviction was certain,I think the main problem is the U.S law and how good there lawyers are over there.
I still don't get it how U.S can convict a death sentence and let it go on so long,it must be awful both famlies involved.

 

[Tasslehoff]

the difference between you and me is: i put myself on both sides, i imagine if someone murdered someone i care about.

try doing that, and if you still wouldnt want the murderer to die.. well then i pity you for being so weak, for having little to no emotion inside you. for never loving or being loved 0_o

So even putting yourself on the murdere's side you'd want him dead. Actually from both sides, and that lecture of him not being loved is SO uncalled for.
Why would you want deathpenalty if you see it from both sides? (especially how, from the murdere's side.)

Death penalty is NOTHING about love, but you seem to think it's the symbol of love. I think you're sick for throwing that crap at people, who don't agree that death penalty is the greatest invention since the wheel.

 

[- English -]

I think its especially harder becasue we are not in the actual situation of the families, however some unfortunate ones may have been. If this means anything.

 

[Shatari]

He was tried, convicted, sentenced and executed in accordance with due legal process under US legislation. He's been on death row for some 20 odd years. Thats enough time for any miscarriages or abuses in the legal process to have been discovered. He was a convicted murderer and received the death sentence, which is what you get under the relevant state legislation for murder. Its a bit late for questions on whether he deserved to die. The broader question is whether you agree with the death penalty.

couldn't agree more

Death penalty are fine. A person taking another persons life has taken that persons freedom, future and I could imagine the family would be in grief.

Yes, we could go the other way around. He is convicted of murder, but is later shown innocent, then it would be bad. Excatly for that reason there goes so many years between being a convicted and the execution when it comes to death penalty. So in this case I think it is fine.

My own opinion is that a murder convicted should have his/her very own freedom and future taken. If you can find another way to do this, I would think that the several countries with Death Penalty would be interested...

 

[Megarevs]

the difference between you and me is: i put myself on both sides, i imagine if someone murdered someone i care about.

try doing that, and if you still wouldnt want the murderer to die.. well then i pity you for being so weak, for having little to no emotion inside you. for never loving or being loved 0_o

i pity you for being emotionless tbh, maybe you should learn to forgive