Stone-cold killer or reformed bad boy?

Stanley 'Tookie' Williams

Was Stanley "Tookie" Williams a cold-blooded killer who duped Hollywood with feigned innocence, phony assertions of redemption and embellished claims of his sway over gangland LA to escape execution?

Or was Williams, who died at 9.35pm last night, a wrongly convicted man who nevertheless devoted a quarter of a century in prison to troubled kids, saving 150,000 lives from behind bars in a campaign worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize?

The debate over the most discussed United States execution in recent memory hinges on the wildly divergent views of the 51-year-old.

The transcripts of Williams' 1981 trial paint a disturbing picture of the former Crips gang leader, who was convicted of the shotgun deaths of four people during two robberies, later boasting of the gurgling sounds shop worker Albert Owens made as he died.

During the trial, prosecutors say, Williams plotted to kill a sheriff's deputy and an accomplice who was expected to testify against him, then blow up a bus full of inmates to escape in the resulting chaos.

After the jury reached its verdict Williams, according to transcripts, looked to jurors and mouthed: "I'm going to get each and every one of you motherf***ers."

Supporters say he was railroaded by an all-white jury after three blacks were removed from the panel. Those supporters include Jamie Foxx, who played Williams in the television film Redemption, and former Crips member and rapper Snoop Dogg.

Prosecutors said evidence showed Williams bought the murder weapon and an accomplice testified Williams shot Owens. Two other witnesses said he confessed to the murders.

Defenders say he found redemption in San Quentin prison, writing books urging children to reject violence and renouncing his gang life. He offered support by telephone to children.

They say his stature as a "founder" of the Crips gives him a unique ability to steer youth away from gangs and assert that he has saved 150,000 lives. He has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize five times for his anti-gang work and four times for the literature prize by backers who include university professors from the US and Europe.

However, LA Police Chief Bill Bratton said that few gang members had likely heard of Williams before press coverage of his execution.

Williams takes credit for founding the Crips with another teenager, Raymond Washington.

"Actually, everybody but Tookie gives Washington credit for starting [the Crips]," said Malcolm Klein, of the University of Southern California, who has studied gangs since 1962.

"What you're really talking about is Tookie emerging as a dominant figure, because he is such a dominant, violent, articulate bad guy."

Williams has refused to debrief authorities on the gang, saying that doing so would brand him a "snitch". Critics say Williams' books are a crass publicity campaign that have sold only a few hundred copies each. Williams' publisher, Power Kids Press, declined to reveal the sales figures.

In the 1970s, a 15-year-old Washington created the Baby Avenues gang, which transformed into the Crips. He was killed by a rival in 1979.

"The Crips were already well established when Tookie came on the scene," said retired LA County sergeant and gang expert Wes McBride.

McBride said there are now 25,000 affiliated Crips members in LA.

"There's not a lot of difference in Crips of today and Crips of yesteryear, only there's more of them. Their legacy is they've helped destroy the black community. Gangs kill communities just as they kill people."

 

Tookie: the original gangster 

Stanley "Tookie" Williams was convicted of killing Albert Lewis Owens with a shotgun as the shop worker lay face down in a robbery on February 28, 1979.

He was convicted of murdering a family of three while robbing their hotel on March 11, 1979.

Williams maintained his innocence, saying that he was railroaded by an all-white jury.

He sought clemency for renouncing his life of crime and trying to steer children away from gangs.

Williams was the 12th person, all of them men, executed in the state of California since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977.

California has more than 640 people on death row.

- REUTERS