By John Simerman,Knight Ridder Newspapers

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. – Hip-hop star Snoop Dogg will head a youth rally on Saturday outside San Quentin State Prison to protest the Dec. 13 scheduled execution of convicted murderer and former Crips gang co-founder Stanley “Tookie” Williams.

Dogg, whose real name is Calvin Broadus, once ran with the infamous Los Angeles-area street gang. He joins a chorus of opposition to the execution of a gang leader-turned peace advocate who has garnered unusual celebrity and several Nobel Prize nominations while on death row.

That chorus is bound to rise as the execution date draws near. Williams, 51, filed a clemency petition last week with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, after the U.S. Supreme Court in October refused to hear his appeal.

Williams, 51, has renounced gang life from death row. He has penned anti-gang children’s books and advocated for street peace in calls to gang members, incarcerated youth and at-risk children. Last year, Jamie Foxx starred as Williams in the cable TV movie “Redemption.”

Anti-death penalty groups see the case as a firm test for Schwarzenegger and the idea that rehabilitation should play a renewed role in clemency deliberations. Since California restored the death penalty in 1978, no governor has granted clemency.

Prosecutors and family members note that Williams continues to maintain his innocence in the 1979 shotgun killings of Albert Owens at a Whittier 7-Eleven store and Yen-I Yang, his wife, Tsai-Shai Yang, and their adult daughter, Ye Chen Lin, at a Los Angeles motel.

Williams has failed to sway the courts on his legal claims of racially biased jury selection and inadequate representation, among others.

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