News & Reviews

WORD: Surreal scene at San Quentin as prison kills author Stan "Tookie" Williams: 1953-2005
By BPM Smith and Michelle Simon

A light atop one of San Quentin State Prison’s towers flashed red at 12:35 am Tuesday morning, signaling the death of author Stan "Tookie" Williams, co-founder of the Crips, a Los Angeles street gang that terrorized the city and became a symbol of American-style violence.

As San Quentin prison officials went about the grisly task of killing Williams with lethal chemicals, a surreal scene developed outside the prison gates.

A Los Angeles radio station broadcast ‘Kill Tookie Hour’ with an announcer making comments like, "Fry the black bastard!" and repeatedly using the n-word. A protester in a Bill Clinton mask smoking a cigar. About 2,000 people protested the proceedings inside. At 9 pm activists chanted slogans and waved signs amid harsh floodlights from dozens of media corps. But after midnight the mood turned somber in what amounted to a vigil.

Public officials, unswayed by efforts from Williams’ lawyers, ordered the execution despite evidence of a rigged trial. Several weeks ago, WORD’N’BASS.com learned that one of the L.A. county prosecutor’s key witnesses, a cellmate promised leniency, was given documents to buoy his testimony -- a detail finally reported by mainstream media on Monday, after an affidavit was presented to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

In addition to evidence of an unfair trial, the U.S. Supreme Court and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger rejected pleas from various celebrities and anti-death activists hailing Williams’ efforts to spread a message of tolerance and peace.

"I’ve talked to kids in West Oakland, Fruitvale and Bay View and I’m telling you these kids respect Williams’ message. Young people look up to Tookie because he is the O.G. They can’t kill the message, they can’t," said Boots Riley, a rapper with Oakland hip hop group The Coup.

Williams was convicted of killing four people in two robberies in 1981. During his incarceration, he wrote eight books geared to children and young adults that encouraged readers to stay out of gangs. Williams also spoke via telephone directly to young people at events organized by anti-gang activists and groups such as Campaign To End The Death Penalty.

"He was a gentle man. Very soft spoken, he had a very calm demeanor," reports WORD’N’BASS.com book reviewer Michelle Simon from outside San Quentin. Simon met Williams in 2004 during a visit with death row inmate Kevin Cooper, who was granted a stay minutes before his scheduled execution last year.

Meanwhile, state and local law enforcement appeared weary of possible rioting. Throughout Monday, National Guard helicopters flew over the Bay View-Hunter’s Point district, a mostly black neighborhood in San Francisco, one contact said.

Now that Williams is gone, the public is left to debate his legacy: Heartless killer or Nobel Peace Prize nominee? Godfather of a terrible gang culture or peace activist-author?

Williams, who survived several bullet wounds in a gangland shooting, wrote in his children’s book Tookie Speaks Out Against Gang Violence: "Doctors said I would never walk again. It took a long time, but I can walk now. I don’t want you to get shot too. That’s why I’m telling you my story. You can learn from my mistakes."

Twenty minutes after flashing red, San Quentin’s tower light returned to green. Stan "Tookie" Williams was no longer walking.

Michelle Simon is a graduate of Holy Names University and an organizer with Campaign To End The Death Penalty. BPM Smith is a novelist and editor of WORD’N’BASS.com.

< Back to News & Reviews Home