Tookie Dies Tonight...

Governor Schwarzenegger's decision not to halt Mr. Williams' execution by injection at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday is his third rejection of a petition for a stay of execution or clemency since he took office in 2003.


Stanley "Tookie" Williams

Clemency has not been granted to a death row inmate in California since 1967.

Of course, as Deputy District Attorney John Monaghan, 53, urged Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday to deny the Crips gang co-founder clemency, he faces legal troubles of his own--for killing a man he confronted while working as a reserve sheriff's deputy. In February 2003, Monaghan shot and killed an unarmed driver he had pulled over while working as a San Bernardino County sheriff's reserve deputy.

Ironic Eh?

The thing is, if Tookie Williams doesn't deserve clemency--now remember that's a life of incarceration rather than death--who does? We're long past the point where there's even a glimmer of hope for clemency for those on death row. And as I pointed out in this OpEd in the LA Times A prison without hope is a dangerous place indeed.