A Tale of Two Executions

The many groups that coalesced to protest the execution of Tookie Williams did nothing for contract killer John Nixon

One day after notorious gang leader and vicious killer Tookie Williams was executed in California -- despite weeks of very vocal, vociferous, protests by Hollywood stars, political and civil rights leaders -- another man was executed in Mississippi.

John B. Nixon, Sr. was 77 years old when he was executed December 14, 2005. He was the oldest man to be executed since the death penalty was reestablished in 1976 and the oldest to be executed since 1916.

Unlike the Tookie Williams execution, there were no protests about this execution. There were no claims about discrimination when imposing the death penalty involving John Nixon. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton did not travel to Mississippi to meet with the condemned. Former actor Mike Farrell did not fly to Mississippi to appear in front of the prison on TV and rant about the inequities of this particular case or of the criminal justice system in general. Fox News Channel and Air America host Alan Colmes did not say Nixon might be innocent because there was no DNA evidence.

One has to wonder why this execution went ignored. After all, there were more circumstances involved with this case than with Williams that may have provided a reason for commuting the sentence to life.

Nixon was convicted of the 1985 murder for hire of a Mississippi woman. The woman’s ex-husband hired him. He shot and wounded the woman’s current husband before killing the woman as he was contracted to do.

The man who hired him only received a life sentence (Nixon was sentenced in 1986). Nixon made every possible appeal. All were rejected and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour did not grant clemency.

Many differences between the two cases would lend themselves for clemency for Nixon as opposed to Tookie Williams.

Nixon only murdered one person, one time. Williams murdered four people, two different times. Nixon was twenty years older than Tookie and spent less time on death row. Nixon was a former auto mechanic who volunteered for service in the Navy during World War II and was honorably discharged. Tookie was the founder and leader of a murderous gang.

Unlike Tookie, Nixon was diagnosed with a mental disorder. Unlike Tookie, Nixon saved the lives of other people.

So there were a great many reasons to spare Nixon. Yet the only protests made about executing him was a simple statement from the website of the National Coalition Against the Death Penalty and something from a Canadian anti-death penalty group. Other than that, there were some news reports -- not much though.

Contrast that with the showering of media stories, TV programs, websites, and radio shows all about Tookie Williams. He even had a movie made about him.

John Nixon had no savejohnnixon.org, website going for him, like there was a savetookie.org. There were no articles in the Revolutionary Worker Online for Nixon as there were for Williams. Nothing on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, ABC, or anyplace else for Nixon as there was for Williams.

Unlike the Tookie Williams execution, there were no interviews with college professors offering their years-long studies indicating that the administration of capital punishment in the US is discriminatory. When it came to John Nixon academicians, lawyers groups, civil rights groups, and anti-death penalty groups were all MIA.

There were no witnesses when John Nixon was executed chanting: “The State of Mississippi has killed an innocent man,” as there was when Tookie was killed.

Europeans were not outraged by Nixon’s execution as they were about Williams’.

Not one Catholic Bishop made a public statement about the execution of John Nixon. Yet, they were very outspoken about Williams’ execution. Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn, N.Y., the chairperson of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Domestic Policy, wrote a letter to California Governor Schwarzenegger requesting Williams not be executed.

Bishop DiMarzio did not write anything to Governor Barbour.

The NAACP said nothing. The Death Penalty Information Center said nothing. Amnesty International said nothing.

They were all there for Tookie. They went AWOL for Nixon.

Why though? This is the real question. Why not protest the Nixon execution? This is the mystery.

As already stated the differences between the Nixon and Williams cases lent themselves to Nixon being more worthy of commutation than Williams. Yet, no sound was made to save him.

However, there was another difference between Williams and Nixon. One that may explain why so many groups coalesced to protest the execution of Tookie Williams and not John Nixon. A difference other than Williams’ history of violence, his history of crime as opposed to Nixon’s history of working for a living. A difference other than Williams’ creation of an organized crime group and Nixon’s military service.

Nixon was white. Tookie was black. Maybe that explains the reason why the silence was deafening when John Nixon was executed and a din of protests for Williams.

Could it be that the protests about the Tookie Williams execution were just another example of racial exploitation by liberals?

Probably.

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