Post-Furman US execution #1003
California execution #12 since reinstatement
In the early morning hours of Tuesday, the 13th of December, 2005, the State of California carried out the execution of 51-year-old Stanley “Tookie” Williams by lethal injection inside the death chamber at San Quentin State Prison, Marin County. Williams had spent more than twenty-four years on death row following his conviction for the 1979 murders of four people during two separate armed robberies in Los Angeles County.
His case generated immense worldwide publicity, widespread civil protests, and intense legal debate due to his co-founding of the notorious Crips street gang in his youth, set against his subsequent activities on death row as an author of anti-gang children’s literature, which had led supporters to nominate him repeatedly for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The Crimes
Stanley Williams was born on the 29th of December, 1953, in New Orleans, Louisiana, and moved with his mother to Los Angeles as a young child. In the late 1960s, alongside Raymond Washington, Williams co-founded the Crips, a street alliance that rapidly expanded into one of the largest and most violent gang networks in the United States.
The murders for which Williams was condemned occurred over two weeks in early 1979.
The first took place in the early morning of Tuesday, the 27th of February, 1979. Williams and three associates drove to a 7-Eleven convenience store on Whittier Boulevard in Pico Rivera with the intention of robbery. Inside the store, 26-year-old clerk Albert Lewis Owens, a father of two and an army veteran, was ordered into a rear storage room and directed to lie face down on the floor. While Owens lay prone, Williams discharged two blasts from a 12-gauge shotgun into his back at point-blank range, killing him instantly. The robbers took approximately $120 from the till. Witnesses subsequently testified that Williams later laughed about the murder, mimicking the gurgling noises made by Owens as he lay dying.
Twelve days later, in the early hours of Sunday, the 11th of March, 1979, an armed robbery was carried out at the Brookhaven Motel on South Vermont Avenue in South Los Angeles. The motel was owned and managed by 76-year-old Yen-I Yang and his 63-year-old wife, Tsai-Shan Chen Yang. Also present was their 43-year-old daughter, Yee-Chen Lin, who was visiting from Taiwan. Williams kicked through the office door and shot all three victims to death using a shotgun—Mrs Yang and Miss Lin were shot in the face and head, and Mr Yang was shot twice in the torso. A small quantity of cash, estimated at under $100, was taken.
Williams was arrested in May 1979 after associates informed the police of his involvement, leading to the recovery of the shotgun used in the Brookhaven Motel killings.
Trial and Sentence
Williams was indicted in the Los Angeles County Superior Court on four counts of murder, together with multiple counts of robbery and the special circumstances of multiple murder and murder in the commission of robbery.
His trial commenced in early 1981 before Judge Chester B. Stemler. The prosecution relied upon ballistic comparisons linking shotgun shells recovered from the Brookhaven Motel to a weapon owned by Williams, along with fingerprint evidence and testimony from several accomplices and jailhouse informants who recounted his admissions to both crimes. Williams maintained that he had been framed by associates seeking leniency for their own criminal charges and offered an alibi defence.
On the 13th of March, 1981, the jury found Williams guilty on all four counts of first-degree murder with special circumstances. Following the penalty hearing, during which the prosecution introduced evidence of previous violent episodes, the jury recommended that he suffer the penalty of death. Judge Stemler formally passed sentence of death on the 15th of April, 1981.
Incarceration and the Clemency Campaign
Williams was transferred to San Quentin State Prison. During his first decade on death row, he was frequently written up for disciplinary infractions and violent altercations with staff and other inmates, leading to extended confinement in the Security Housing Unit (solitary confinement).
Beginning in 1993, Williams underwent a reported personal transformation. He began writing children’s books cautioning against gang membership and urban violence, published essays, and issued a video apology for his role in establishing the Crips. His supporters cited these efforts as proof of substantial redemption, securing nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize and the Nobel Prize for Literature.
His appeals through the state and federal courts were consistently rejected. A central contention—that the prosecutor had improperly removed Black jurors from the trial panel (Batson violation)—was denied by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which nevertheless observed that Williams appeared to have undergone a notable transformation.
In late 2005, following the exhaustion of legal appeals, Williams’s legal team filed a formal clemency application with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, seeking commutation to life imprisonment without parole. The petition sparked intense public debate across the state. Demonstrations were held in Los Angeles and outside San Quentin, with celebrities, civil rights activists, and religious leaders urging mercy.
On the 12th of December, 2005, Governor Schwarzenegger issued a formal written decision denying clemency. The governor noted that while Williams had spoken against gang violence, he steadfastly refused to admit guilt or express remorse for the murders of Owens and the Yang family:
“Without an apology and atonement for these senseless and brutal killings, there can be no true redemption… Therefore, the clemency petition is denied.”
Hours later, the Supreme Court of the United States declined an eleventh-hour petition for a stay of execution without dissent.
The Execution
Williams declined the customary privilege of a special last meal, accepting only milk and oatmeal. Outside the gates of San Quentin, an estimated crowd of two thousand protesters and counter-demonstrators had gathered under heavy police surveillance.
Williams was taken from his holding cell into the execution chamber shortly after midnight on Tuesday, the 13th of December, 2005. Strapped securely to the cross-shaped gurney with six heavy leather restraints, he was wheeled into the chamber at 12:01 a.m.
The insertion of the intravenous catheters into his muscular arms proved problematic. The medical technicians struggled for twelve minutes to find a suitable vein in his left arm, causing Williams visible irritation as he winced and repeatedly turned his head towards his attending counsel. A secondary line was eventually established in his right arm.
The blinds to the witness room were raised at 12:19 a.m., revealing Williams on the gurney before approximately thirty witnesses, including state officials, five media representatives, and members of the Owens family. Williams offered no oral final statement.
The three-drug lethal protocol commenced at 12:22 a.m., comprising five grams of sodium thiopental, followed by pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride. Williams lifted his head slightly, looked directly at his spiritual adviser and legal representatives through the glass, mouthed silent words, and closed his eyes. Within two minutes, his chest ceased moving.
At 12:35 a.m. Pacific Standard Time, an examining medical official formally pronounced life extinct. Stanley Williams was 51 years of age.
In accordance with his prior written instructions, Williams’s body was transferred to a mortuary for cremation, and his ashes were later taken to South Africa for dispersal. He was the twelfth person executed in California following the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1977, and his case stood as one of the most polarizing and heavily debated executions in modern California history.
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