11/09/02

SAN FRANCISCO -  Convicted killer Stanley Williams, the co-founder of the Crips gang of Los Angeles and a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, has been cleared for execution by a federal appeals court.

 He could be executed by lethal injection as early as next year if the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declines to reconsider his appeal and if the U.S. Supreme Court does not intervene. Williams and a high school buddy, Raymond Washington, created the Crips in 1971.

Hundreds of spinoffs and copycat gangs have since emerged across the nation. Washington was killed during a gang confrontation in 1979. Williams,  to his fellow gang members, continued his violent ways and transformed the Crips into a nationwide enterprise. Williams, now 48, was convicted of killing four people in 1979. While appealing his death sentence, he spends time writing children's books and coordinating an international peace effort for youths _ all from his cell at San Quentin State Prison. Prosecutors applauded Tuesday's decision. He's created one of the biggest criminal networks that the world has ever seen. I will be glad to see him executed, said Deputy Attorney General Lisa J. Brault.

I don't think writing a few children's books negates what he has done.

 Williams was sentenced to death in 1981 for fatally shooting Albert Owens, a Whittier convenience store worker. He was also convicted of using a shotgun a few days later to kill Los Angeles motel owners Tsai-Shai Yang, Yen-I Yang and their daughter Ye Chen Lin during a robbery in Los Angeles. Williams claims he is innocent. He said in his appeal that jailhouse informants fabricated testimony that he confessed to the murders while in jail awaiting trial. On Tuesday, the San Francisco-based court refused to block his execution. Still, the 9th Circuit Court seemed sympathetic to Williams' plight and suggested that he was a worthy candidate for clemency from California's governor.

We are aware of Williams' 2001 Nobel Peace Prize nomination for his laudable efforts opposing gang violence from his prison cell, notably his line of children's books, subtitled 'Tookie Speaks Out Against Gang Violence,' and his creation of the Internet Project for Street Peace, Judge Procter Hug Jr. wrote.

Although Williams' good works and accomplishments since incarceration may make him a worthy candidate for the exercise of gubernatorial discretion, they are not matters that we in the federal judiciary are at liberty to take into consideration.

 A spokesman for Gov. Gray Davis said it's too soon to know what will happen.

If Gov. Davis is presented with a request for clemency, he will certainly give it careful consideration, spokesman Byron Tucker said.

It's impossible to predict what action the governor might take.

Barbara Becnel, a journalist who assists Williams' publishing career and maintains a Web site for the condemned inmate, was shaken by the court's ruling.

That's incredibly bad news, she said. Williams did not win the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for his series of children's books and international peace efforts. Williams also has been nominated for the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, which is pending. The Internet Project for Street Peace links at-risk California and South African youths through e-mail and chat rooms. Police groups decried the nomination. The head of the California Association of Gang Investigators urged the Nobel committee to never elevate gang members to statesmen.