Laws Don't Always Protect The Right People.

About 30 years ago, I was poor...lived in South Central Los Angeles...was married to my first wife, Teresa...working and going to school. Teresa was very attractive and looked a lot like a Latin "Halle Berry". I was also somewhat naive to life and definitely to the streets. One night, Teresa and I were driving down Broadway close to...I think 87th St...I don't exactly remember. In those days, cellphones were brand new. They were the "big bricks" people carried around. Many of us...had beepers. It was about 9 PM. We were going to meet up with another couple on a double-date when my beeper sounded off. I was driving an old battered Volvo. This car had separate keys for different doors...I don't know why. We pulled over to a phone booth. I started to make the call when two 1960s Chevy Impalas slowly drove by and made a right at the next corner. I was busy with the phone when Teresa tugged my arm and said in Spanish, "We have to go right now." I remember telling her something to the effect of: "What are you talking about, I'm going to waste 25 cents." . I turned my head to the left and immediately saw what she was talking about. About 8-12 young men...really boys...probably between 13-17 years of age were walking toward us. They all looked Latino. They all wore baggy pants and wore baggy olive green army jackets and had felt caps over half of their eye-line-of-sight. Half of them were walking straight towards us and the other half were walking in an arc to flank us. I immediately understood that we were in extremely grave danger. The street were totally deserted. Right next to the phone booth was a liquor store. We quickly ran in and went in between some aisles. Teresa was more acquainted with the streets than I was. She told me to immediately give her all my money minus a few bucks that anyone would carry...petty cash...to buy chewing gum...and she took the rest and started stuffing them down her boots. In that part of town, every liquor store attendant...every gas station... worked behind bulletproof glass and had a security guard...and I'm not talking about the Bank of America 80 year old security guard with a rusty pistol. I told the security guard what was happening. He was a big tall guy...I remember he looked Pakistani. He looked outside and said: "They are waiting for you.". He then drew his gun. It looked like a magnum revolver. He held it up by the side of his head with the muzzle pointing upwards and he escorted us to my car. I remember my shaking hands trying to find the right key for the right door. We got in and drove away. If that liquor store wasn't there....they definitely would have killed me and God knows what they would have done to Teresa. They probably would have taken her away and gang-raped her. If I had a gun, I would either have drawn it or come out blazing. There really wasn't any other choice given the situation...the time constraints. If you've lived in that part of town, you'd know that calling the LAPD was absolutely futile. They either wouldn't show up at all, or they'd come late purposefully in order to take a post-report. There were times of danger when we'd falllaciously call the fire department just to scare the criminals with the sirens and of course, the firemen would be really pissed off and threaten us with legal action, however, when you're in such circumstances, you'd do anything to survive. If I had killed or maimed any of these boys, I'd have two choices: one would be to flee and not report it and the other would be to report the incident. Either way, I would lose. If I did report it, could you begin to imagine what would happen to me in court? The gang members would immediately know my name, where I lived, what I did for a living, etc. The defense attorney would suddenly become like Rev. Al Sharpton or Rev Jesse Jackson (whom I've met) and I'd be asked questions that in the sterile confines of a courtroom made sense, but in the life-death struggle of the street, made absolutely no sense at all. "How did I know that these "children"....meant to do me harm?" "Did they threaten me overtly in any way?" Did they tell me that they were going to rob me?" "Did I see any weapons?" And suddenly, they would have all been "honor students".  I would have ended up in prison. This is the consequence of individuals, who in academic confines, think that they can do justice when they've never even come close to understanding these kinds of situations. It was very much the same when I was in war. We'd be told, when leaving the base on a convoy to maintain a certain weapons condition, in which we would...for example, place our magazine in the the weapon's well but not chamber the weapon...or some such thing. In a homicidally dangerous country like Iraq, do you think there was ever a time when I left the wire not locked and loaded? In life and in business, in spite of what "experts" like Simon Sinek my tell you, experience matters and it matters a lot. Experience provides context. Wisdom arises from experience. One cannot draw conclusions without experience. One cannot judge without experience. And it is patently obvious that our lawmakers "lack such situational experience". And from such life experiences, I've learned...as a fallen angel...that in life and business, laws don't always protect the right people.