Talk:Stanley Williams/Archive 1

message: I just nominated this as an article for the Wikipedia:Article Improvement Drive. As I stated in the nomination:
: * Stanley "Tookie" Williams, one of the founders of the Crips street gang is currently in the news because of his pending 13 December 2005 execution date, and the consideration of his clemency appeal to California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. That means that many people will be looking at the Wikipedia article to find out more information. The current article is not bad, but I'm sure that it could be much better. Among other items, the handling of citations needs to be upgraded to current Wikipedia standards. 
Because this article will be receiving more attention during the next few weeks, we should try a little harder to improve the article, as well as keeping an eye out for the accompanying vandalism. BlankVerse 13:01, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Article Improvement Drive nomination

message: I have twice now removed the quote marks around the name Tookie. According to Williams himself, Tookie is his real middle name, the one his mother gave him at birth. There is, therefore, no reason to put it in quotation marks. Is there a dispute about this? Perhaps someone thinks Williams is lying about this, I don't know, but here's the place to discuss it. 207.6.31.119 21:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. Maybe it'd be worth adding a sentence, with citation, explaining that fact. It'd of general interest since it's widely assumed that "Tookie" is a nickname. -Willmcw 23:08, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have just added the sentence "Stanley Williams is often simply referred to as, Tookie, which is believed by many to be a nickname, but is in fact his middle name shared by Williams and his father. " - Solar 00:09, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: His name

message: I've heard of him getting in troubles inside the prison system. In that section it's blatantly only toting his good works which goes against NPOV. Such things include arranging hits notably for members of the Bloods, attacking several guards and inmates and even plotting an escape that involved blowing a bunch of people up.
The murder section  seem way too short, I added to it a while ago but it's kind of NPOV assuming he's guilty since he was convicted of it. But the conviction came largely from fishy witnesses who were also career criminals and some of which were convicted of the same crime.
What about the Escape Conspiracy?  There are handwritten notes in evidentia circa 1979 that show Williams was planning to escape, by killing the guards (with outside help) during transport from jail to court, and then blowing up the transport vehicle.
http://da.co.la.ca.us/pdf/swilliams.pdf
--B.ellis 18:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Prison Controversies, murders, and NPOV 

message: Rapper and Long Beach Crips member Snoop Dogg is actively campaigning against Williams' execution while simultaneously promoting the Crip name through his music.
Are we sure that Snoop is a current (i.e. active) member of the Crips, as the above sentence seems to imply? If he's no longer involved in Crip activity, then the article should state "Rapper and former Long Beach Crip member Snoop Dogg..." Otherwise it could be libelous. I don't know enough about Snoop Dogg to venture a guess either way, but maybe another user knows. 207.6.31.119 22:31, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Snoop Dogg is no longer an "active" member of the hood he is from (Rollin' 20 Crip), but he does reportedly associate with its members on a regular basis. However, calling him a "former" Crip is far more appropriate.  Also, whoever wrote that passage is obviously biased, because they say that Snoop is "simultaneously promoting the Crip name through his music".  Snoop has never been particularly overt about his Crip background (although his group Tha Eastsidaz, consisting of two other Long Beach Crips, certainly has), so I dunno if it's fair to say this.
I've cleaned it up. If people want to talk about Snoop Dogg's percieved promotion of the Crips through his music, they can do it over at his page. 207.6.31.119 02:24, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Question about Snoop Dogg

message: In late November 2005, talk show hosts John and Ken of the John and Ken Show on Clear Channell's KFI 640 AM in Los Angeles, California started a “Tookie Must Die/Kill Tookie” hour on their show from 5-6 pm until Tookie Williams execution by the State of California.
Is the above information really notable and encyclopedic? Has anyone outside of Los Angeles heard of this programme? I would imagine there's plenty of morning radio shows around the country and across L.A. that have espoused opinions about this case. What makes this station so notable that it just has to be included in this article?
I'm tempted to get rid of it in a day or so, unless someone seriously objects. 207.6.31.119 20:01, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. -Willmcw 21:03, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: In the hour (and by the way, they are not "shock jocks", since they do not talk about sex or other prurient issues, but legitimate political topics), they have interviewed Barbara Becnel, Steve Cooley, Phil Gasper, Albert Owens' brother and stepmother, Jesse Jackson, and Najee Ali about this issue. That is a balance of people on both sides of the issue here. By the way, it is not the Kill Tookie hour. There was a correction in the Los Angeles Times on November 24, 2005 that retracts the statement, correctly calling it the "Tookie Must Die" hour. Unfortunately it is past the week look back so it is not online, so I cannot link to it. They are the #1 AM radio program in their time slot. So I would seriously object to removing the reference to Kobylt and Chiampou. Calwatch 23:55, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

text: If we can rephrase it to indicate that there is an iceberg below then it would have a wider meaning. Also, perhaps a mention of John and Ken's successful support for the recall and Schwarzenegger's candidadacy would make it more relevant. -Willmcw 22:02, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

text: This link,  indicates that the original name was "Kill Tookie Hour". It may have been quickly changed, or that name could even have been made up by the person in charge of the [official] blog. Some of this detail may be more appropriate at John and Ken than here. -Willmcw 00:46, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: That was just repeating the press release. If you listen to the audio archives of the show, you will see that they never formally referred to it as the Kill Tookie hour. The audio archives for November 21 when they discuss the protest have the hosts expressing their bemusement at the show being called the Kill Tookie hour. Calwatch 01:11, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the clarification. -Willmcw 02:12, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: "Tookie Must Die"

message: Added that like Tookie Williams both Hitler and Stalin were nominees of this award. Did so to underline the fact that anyone regardless of merit can be nominated for this award. Also to show that nomination is not anywhere near winning. Anyone can look up Hitler's and Stalin's nomination in the Noble Peace Prize Database, but adding it here highlights the fact that anyone can be nominated.
:You are correct about the Peace Prize, but it is too much detail for this article. Interested readers can go our article on the topic. -Willmcw
:What other article on the topic? The topic of Nobel Peace Prize Nominations?
::Nobel Peace Prize. -Willmcw 23:12, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Noble Peace Prize 

message: There has to be a way to lock "The Murders" section from the "maybe-he-didn't-do-it" Williams'
contingent who use Wikipedia as their personal propaganda vehicle. 70.111.10.89 18:30, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: The Murders

message: Since today really is "The last day", (pending clemancy or unexpected appeal), the pace of vandalisim has already started to pick up.
Might be a rough day for this article.  At what point does it become a candidate for protection?
CanadianGuy
:We should avoid protecting it unless the vandalism gets too hard to fix. All things considered this article has done very well. The ratio of useful edits to vandalism has been pretty good. Thanks to the many editors who have helped to maintain and improve it. -Willmcw 20:03, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I just looked at the edit history and it doesn't look that bad. The vandals and POV pushes have been only doing one to three problem edits before they give up, and the more responsible editors have been cleaning things up very quickly. If someone becomes a persistent vandal, however, then rush over to Vandalism in progress. There are also a couple ofWikipedia administrators that have been editing this article so even that step probably won't be necessary. If anyone is interested in keeping an eye out, there also seem to be some spill-over vandalism on some of the other gang related articles such as Crips and Bloods. BlankVerse 20:16, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Execution Day Mayhem 

message: I don't know if this is the corret forum for this question, but why was my addition "On December 12, 2005, Williams was denied clemency" deleted? —preceding unsigned comment by 216.151.69.27 (talk • contribs) 21:17, 12 December 2005  (UTC)
: Probably because you did not WP:CITE a source so other editors could verify your changes.  Hall Monitor 21:19, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Edit removed

message: How can you found a gang when you join it 2 years after it began?
http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/12/12/williams.crips.reut/
This was also discussed on NPR but that site is offline. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.254.160.82 (talk • contribs) 22:31, 12 December 2005  (UTC)
: Refer to the Raymond Washington and Crips articles for details on how and why Williams is considered to be an instrumental and founding member of the Crips gang.  Also, please remember to sign your comments by typing ~~~~.  Hall Monitor 22:35, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Crips "Founder"? 

message: The administrators have abandoned any pretense of adherence to wiki principles by locking this page against editing.  The page in its current form contains a factually inaccurate statement for which no support is offered.  "It is believed that" Williams controls Crips activities from his cell?  Who believes this?  A prison official hostile to Williams posted this claim on the Department of Corrections web site, offered no evidence for it, and it was removed the following day after the press contacted the Department.  See the CNN article at http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/11/17/crips.execution.ap/ , which includes the following quote:
"The Los Angeles District Attorney's office is expected to respond to Williams' clemency request this week. But Los Angeles Police Department spokeswoman April Harding said there is no evidence of any illegal gang activity on Williams' part.
"None," she said. "His name doesn't come up.""
By failing to consult this readily available source and locking the page in its current form the Wikipedia administrators involved have shown their incompetence and/or bias.  They should be removed from administrative status immediately.  Moreover, locking this page amounts to admitting the complete failure of Wikipedia.  Any administrator who removes this message or places it in an obscure location is only proving my point. —the preceding unsigned comment is by 71.49.21.45 (talk • contribs) 03:59, December 13, 2005
: This page was temporarily protected from vandalism in response to a user request. If you would like to request that the page be unprotected, please do so; accusations of incompetence and bias are unconstructive. I'm unprotecting the page now, but if necessary I will protect it again. // Pathoschild 04:36, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  The page has been protected again per user request to deal with vandalism. Please contact an admin if you would like to make changes while the article is protected. // Pathoschild 05:18, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Factual inaccuracy perpetuated by admin 

message: Hey guys, look at the sentence which starts right after the fifth reference link. it goes: 
"...and government informants.[5] scene matched test shells from the shotgun owned by Stanley Williams. No second examiner verified his findings. The Defense claims this expert's methodology was "junk science at best." [6]"
Notice how "scene" is not capitalized, it seems that some of the article was removed, and now the sentence is only half there.
From an earlier version of the article it reads:
"...and government informants.[5]
Williams claims that the police found "not a shred of tangible evidence, no fingerprints, no crime scenes of bloody boot prints. They didn't match my boots, nor eyewitnesses. Even the shotgun shells found conveniently at each crime scene didn't match the shotgun shells that I owned." However, the prosecution's firearms expert, a sheriff's deputy, testified during trial that the shotgun shell recovered from the Yang murder crime scene matched test shells from the shotgun owned by Stanley Williams. No second examiner verified his findings. The Defense claims this expert's methodology was "junk science at best." [6]"
I don't know if the part of the article was removed for a good reason but someone should at least fix the sentence structure so that it makes sense.
:Thanks for pointing that out. The text has been added back in as requested. // Pathoschild 08:11, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Error in "Conviction" section 

message: Both the media and the Los Angeles District Attorney have been driving attention toward two of Stanley Williams' children, Stanley Williams, Jr., and Lafayette Jones.  This may potentially give our readers the biased opinion that all of Williams' children are murderers and rapists; are there any other known children we could mention who do not hold a criminal record?  Hall Monitor 20:14, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Williams' children

message: I would recommend that people don't immediately update the article to say that is has died at 0:01 AM PST. There could be a last minute temporary stay (as in the case of Eric Nance) or just delays with preparing for the execution. It will be best to wait until the death is confirmed. Evil Monkey - Hello 04:35, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: O brave new Wiki, that hath such optimists in it. -EDM 05:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Updating 

message: Two questions - I'm pretty new here.  There are pictures of the victims available.  They are crime scene photo's and I believe considered public domain.  1) Does this meet the criteria for posting pictures and 2) I personnaly believe that adding these pictures puts this whole discussion into perspective - am I wrong?  --Geneb1955 07:33, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Victims 

message: Can someone please unprotect this article?  I have been contributing to it for a number of days and would appreciate the opportunity to continue doing so.  Can't sleep, clown will eat me 08:12, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll unprotect as soon as we get official word of his death... NSLE (T+C+CVU) 08:14, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  Fine, here you go.    Can't sleep, clown will eat me 08:27, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Unprotection request

message: Where?
You two Admin's??
65.241.54.148 08:17, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: There's no vandalism at the moment because it's protected. ;) // Pathoschild 08:25, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  VANDALISM? 

message: When will we know when he is gone? Is there a website you all are looking at?
:Main Page, Recent Deaths
65.241.54.148 08:24, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  When will we know? 

message: Blowing an elderly asian couple away, and their daughter, for a few bucks in the register, bragging about such a cowardly act, threatening the jurors - and this happened over 25 years ago! He's had all those years to live while his victims rot in the ground.
Hard to believe anyone could possibly want clemency for this criminal. Needle should have been in his arm two decades ago. TFN.
this is not a forum
gbrandt 08:31, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clemency for this monster? 

message: The unofficial death time for Stanley Williams was 12:36am local time.
:Should the article reflect the official scheduled time or the actual time? --Phoenix Hacker 08:50, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tookie died 6 minutes ago 

message: My source for the "one black on jury" claim is the recollection of the prosecutor (see Daily Breeze article and the DA response to the clemency petition.  The "no blacks on the jury" meme was thrown out by the pro clemency side and I have not seen a verifiable, confirmed source of that statement other than by the pro clemency group. Calwatch 05:17, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, do we have a photograph? My assumption based on the read was that Mr. McLurkin was probably born from an American father stationed in the Phillipine Islands. I'd like to see the photograph, but I am not going to say unequivocally that he was "Filipino". Edited to correct the contention. Calwatch 00:36, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting, and quite antiquated terminology you're using there.  And It was Third College, not Third World. Elefuntboy 20:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: The question to consider here is - do non-"dark-skinned" jurors share the same biases against "dark-skinned" people as whites? As a light-skin non-white myself, I can say the answer is not clear.--Shanky 15:36, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blacks on jury 

message: My basis for this is my own observation of the so-called "white community" who many times doen't even know that they have Oriental, American Indian, Negro, Middle Eastern, or other minority ancestries within their own genealogy chart.
I also am a graduate of Thurgood Marshall College, formerly Third World College, at the University of California San Diego (UCSD).
WB2 00:20, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting, and quite antiquated terminology you're using there.  And It was Third College, not Third World. Elefuntboy 20:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: The question to consider here is - do non-"dark-skinned" jurors share the same biases against "dark-skinned" people as whites? As a light-skin non-white myself, I can say the answer is not clear.--Shanky 15:36, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: "ten light-skinned" jurors

message: Remove the protections, they give wikipedia a bad name.
:AgreedGeorgeC 21:46, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Worse than the vandals do?  Postdlf 21:44, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: It should be up to the contributors to change articles.  Was this not the premise of establishing Wikipedia?  GeorgeC 21:46, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I agree. Until this thing dies down, it's probably best to keep it protected. Anyway, it's a very thorough article right now, cogent and balanced. Trilemma 21:59, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: After the protection is lifted: there are a large number of dates that need wikifying and perhaps an explanation of all those T numbers? Rmhermen 22:06, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Citations to the transcript of his trial.  All of those should be made into footnotes, rather than interrupting the article text.  Postdlf 22:11, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: THE PROTECTION BULLDOZER KEEPS ROLLIN ROLLIN ROLLIN!

message: i noticed that in the "Albert Owens killed" section, the word "motherfucker" is censored even though it is being used as a quote.  Wikipedia:Profanity  says you should never censor profanity with astricks, etc.  if we decide this quote is relevent (I beleive it is), the astricks should be removed, otherwise, the entire quote should be ommited.  could an admin change this?  otherwise, i'll remove the astricks when the it is no longer protected. Phantom784 22:56, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The quote "lay down, mother f*****." shouldn't be asterisked out... It's absurd to asterisk out quotes.  I'd change it, but it's locked.
--136.242.131.115 22:54, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  The quote has been uncensored as requested. // Pathoschild 23:08, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  motherf***** 

message: It is my belief that, since this article is presently linked to off of the main page, and since WP:PPol#Uses states "When a page is particularly high profile, either because it is linked off the main page, or because it has recently received a prominent link from offsite, it will often become a target for vandalism. It is best not to protect pages in this case. Instead, consider adding them to your watchlist, and reverting vandalism yourself," that this page should be unprotected.  I'm reluctant to take unilateral action, however.
In lieu of page protection I propose 24 hour automatic bans without warning for anyone vandalizing the page.  Anyone so banned who cares enough to reform can request to be unblocked on their talk page, from the admin who blocked them, or through the usual channels.  (By vandalism, I mean obvious vandalism.  I do not include POV pushing in that, although that is certainly a problem.  That should be dealt with instead with prompt reversion, escalating warnings, and finally blocks.) Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 00:07, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I've unprotected the page and added a new template created for this type of situation with your above suggestions, . // Pathoschild 00:29, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unprotect