Arnold Schwarzenegger denied Stanley Tookie Williams' request for clemency today. Good for him. Having Jamie Foxx in your corner shouldn't be enough to overcome the fact that you murdered four people and co-founded the most notorious gang in the United States.
Here's a point worth pondering, however: why should state or federal executives have the ability to commute a sentence or pardon a prisoner? Isn't that a slap in the face to the jury that convicted, the people of the state who voted for the criminal procedure, and the families of the victims? And if you merely commute a sentence from death to life in prison, is that enough - after all, if you're convinced there's reasonable doubt exonerating a prisoner, despite all the appeals, shouldn't you pardon? Governor Mark Warner (D-VA), are you listening?
