Opinion
Painful or not, death penalty truly inhumane
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Last month, without much fanfare, it became clear that there is a de facto moratorium on executions in the United States. The Supreme Court indicated it will put all executions on hold while it evaluates the constitutionality of the lethal injection procedure used across the United States.
The Court isn't evaluating the legitimacy of the death penalty overall — not the fact that more than 90 percent of those charged with a capital crime are too poor to hire a lawyer, nor the fact that more than a fifth of African-Americans executed since 1976 were convicted by all-white juries. It is only considering the particular cocktail of drugs used to kill them.
And yet the moratorium doesn't only bring us one step closer to abolition by focusing attention on an institution that Americans feel ever less certain about supporting. It also reflects years of unheralded, grassroots organizing whose effects are only beginning to be felt.
For me, this case is personal — because it represents some of the greatest victories, and worst defeats, of my own experience as an activist.
In late 2005, while applying to school at UW, I was also fighting to save a man named Stan "Tookie" Williams. Tookie was a founder of the notorious L.A. gang, the Crips, and there is credible evidence that he was innocent of the crime he was convicted of. In prison, he grappled with his past and ultimately transformed himself. He used his own experiences as the basis for a series of children's books speaking out against gang violence, convinced gang members in Newark to arrange a truce and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize five times.
But to the state of California, there is no redemption for men like Tookie. Despite protests around the world, he was executed on Dec. 13, 2005. For those of us who had fought to save him, his death was a brutal blow. And it was made more horrible by the way they killed him. As Barbara Becnel, Tookie's co-author and friend, described the execution, Tookie was "tortured to death," killed in immense pain because of inadequate anesthetic.
Tookie's wasn't by any means the first execution like this, but it was the first time people paid attention. Two months later, a California judge evaluated Ms. Becnel's account and halted the execution of another man. Then anesthesiologists began to refuse to participate in executions at all. People across the country realized lethal injection procedures are based on junk science — that prisoners are pumped full of drugs to paralyze them, but not necessarily enough to stop their pain. The British medical journal The Lancet identified 21 executions where prisoners may have been conscious but paralyzed while poison stopped their hearts.
We didn't save Tookie's life. But our campaign helped keep his death from being in vain. By the time the Supreme Court agreed to take its case this fall, 11 states had put their own death penalties on moratorium over questions about the lethal injection procedure.
This summer, I was proud to be a very small part of a campaign that accomplished what everyone said we couldn't: We stopped an execution in Texas. Kenneth Foster, like Tookie, was black and poor. He was innocent, sentenced to death for driving a car. And, like Tookie, he was a political force. From death row he organized civil disobedience, fighting for his own life and his fellow prisoners', and for their dignity.
In the euphoria after Mr. Foster's execution was commuted, I felt our triumph had come out of nowhere. But as a member of the CEDP, which has been fighting small grassroots battles since 1997, told me, "It takes 10 years to have an overnight success."
That's the message I'll remember as this Supreme Court case unfolds. While they debate technicalities and procedures, I'll be thinking of Tookie and Kenneth. And I'll know we have a long way to fight until the death penalty is abolished, but that the smaller fights of today — our victories and our tragedies — are the only path from here to there.
Elizabeth Wrigley-Field
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dont you have something better to do? oh wait, no, you’re a graduate student…. you know it’s funny. You went to NYU undergrad. The rich telling the middle class how to live. Good stuff.
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“the fact that more than a fifth of African-Americans executed since 1976 were convicted by all-white juries”
What about the fact that most of these African-Americans were convicted of killing African-Americans? Do you think that all-black juries would have been more lenient? But you’re right about money - OJ didn’t need an all-black jury to get away with murder.
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One time, there was a war in Iraq and Afghanistan and someone wrote a story that has been argued over and over.
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Woah! I’m from Texas, and I’ve driven a car for many years there…thank God I was never discovered and sentenced to death for driving a car! Oh, wait a second, that’s because your statement is completely misleading and incorrect. Maybe what you meant to say was that Kenneth Foster helped commit two armed robberies while under the influence of drugs and alcohol. In your next article, please use facts and clarify your statements.
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1:30, there’s only 2 things that come from Texas…
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Screw the victims - they’re already dead anyway, just be sure to protect the poor misguided murderers.
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2:51, I believe that would be oil money and rich debutantes, right? Right!
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130
So you should be put to death for robbery now? That’s a right-wing argument I haven’t seen before. Bravo.
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“Tookie was a founder of the notorious L.A. gang, the Crips, and there is credible evidence that he was innocent of the crime he was convicted of.”
Credible evidence that he was innocent? Crime? Try crimes. Tookie Williams shot Albert Lewis Owens at a 7-11, stealing $120 dollars in the process. After the robbery, Tookie’s accomplice, Alfred Coward, testified that Tookie said he killed Owens because he was white and he was killing all white people, and that it was “hilarious.”
The second crime Tookie was convicted of was known as the Brookhaven Motel murders. In the motel, Tookie killed the Yang family of four who were immigrants from Taiwan. He stole one hundred dollars. That’s 25 dollars per victim. Witnesses later testified that Tookie called the Yang family “Buddha-heads”. Furthermore, the shotgun shell found at the scene of the Yang murder matched Tookie’s shotgtun “to the exclusion of all other firearms.” The shell found at the murder scene came from Tookie’s shotgun. Looks pretty credible to me.
While in jail, Tookie was involved in numerous fights and assaulted prison guards. There is also evidence that Tookie was still in the Crips from 1981 to 2000. Now, if you say that Tookie should have been given different treatment because of him being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, or because of his children’s books, you need to visit the Owens family as well as the relatives of the deceased Yang family and tell them that.
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do u think the death penalty should be legal
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incredible, everyone is so concerned about the killer’s rights, and too Hell with victims rights. The liberal answer to everything crime related today? build more million-dollar prisons and enslave half the damn population in this now lawless country behind those stone walls. Let us show some Christian sympathy for these murderers, repeat rapist’s and most wicked Child molesters too. who probably have a mental disorder in the first place (demonic possession)and need some expensive psychotherapy now courtesy of those bleeding heart taxpayers.
“a bullet in an evil brain, is far cheaper in the long run” You know?
you brain dead morons have no commonsense at all for dealing with reality. your all Alice, and this is Wonderland. Oh Yes your so very worried that an evil serial killer who enjoys torturing his victims to death after showing them no mercy, might feel a little pain when he is justly executed for his many crimes against God and man. shame on us all for rejecting God’s own system of justice for our failed corrupt Money first, lawless system of so-called justice.
the only way to stop this runaway crime is to
End the insanity of death row forever. bring back the firing squads comprised of the sons and daughters of victims. I want to see these murdering bastard’s hanging from the gallows by the dozens once again. bring back the rack and every other torture device known to man, and let’s send a strong message to these evil scumbags that the sheriff is back in town, and any evil behavior what ever moral caliber will not be tolerated any longer
you good people many who call yourselves Christian’s (in your own mind!) obviously know nothing about the creator and his harsh system of justice. a special branch of justice that none of us will escape in the end!!!
sincerely, M.S
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good joke m.s.! i enjoy your unique humor.
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I want MS to narrate my life.