Why a “Tookie” Williams?
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson, BlackNews.com Columnist In a candid, and revealing moment, Stanley “Tookie” Williams told a visitor at San Quentin prison that he helped found the notorious Crips street gang because he wanted to smash everyone, make a rep, get respect and dignity, and that he wanted his name to be known everywhere. He got his wish in more ways than he ever dreamed of. The demons that drove Williams in his reckless push for identity and prominence also drove him to become the nation’s best known condemned prisoner. He faces execution December 13 for multiple murders. William’s revelatory glimpse into his thug past tells much about the anger, alienation, and desperation that have turned legions of young black men into social pariahs, and that propel them to wreak murder and mayhem in mostly poor, black communities. But today’s Tookies didn’t crop up from nowhere. The transformation in the early 1970s of the old-line civil rights groups into business, and professional friendly o
