Tookie Williams BBC News

 'Tookie' Williams poses at age 29 in the exercise yard at San Quentin Prison. Actor Jaime Foxx portrays Williams, death row inmate and Nobel Prize Nominee for Peace and Literature, in "Redemption: The Stan 'Tookie' Williams Story."

 

The former gang leader Tookie Williams has been xecuted at San Quentin Prison. Mr Williams was executed after a failed clemency appeal to California’s Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. California's Supreme Court and a federal appeals court both refused a stay of execution.A co-founder of the notorious Crips street gang, Williams denied murdering four people in 1979. Following his imprisonment in 1981 Williams wrote extensively on the negative impact of gang violence, for which he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. 

What did you expect from a Republican Gov? He should not have been executed. An eye for an eye leads to more blindness. We have been killing people from time eternal, has it slowed the pace of violent crime? No. There has to be a better way. Plus, what if we put an innocent person to death? How do you say whoops, our bad? Is a human life worth so little? What if it was you or someone you know wrongfully convicted? Still feel the same way? Scott Thomas, Baraboo, United States. Governor Schwarzenegger took the coward's way out and pandered to extreme right, currently running America, by not granting clemency to Mr. Williams. The Governor is under the extreme delusion that the extreme right will back his  residential bid. Mr.  Schwarzenegger has a stain on his conscience and has lost  credibility, all for a goal that he will most likely never achieve.  Jennie Jonasson, Kopavogur, ICELAND It's interesting to see that the majority US citizens accept and understand the death penalty.This is a cultural issue. In many countries around the world they have been using the death penalty for hundreds of years to punish wrongdoers. It is choice that I live in a country that doesn't condone  this penalty. Murder breeds murder and I'm not happy for my children to live in a country like that. If Tookie lived in the UK would he get the death penalty for murder? No. If Tookie lived in the UK would he have had sucheasy access to firearms to kill people with? Probably not. Doesn't that say  something? Lee, St Albans, UK