Living with crime: Valeshia King

So then I started embarrassing him and his friends by patting them down and telling them that if I find anything on them I would throw it in the sewer.

He grew tired of this. He felt like he could make it on his own. He left home. It lasted about a month. He came back, but he knew the stipulations were that he was to go to school and get a job. He was 17 for crying out loud. He agreed. He was home about two weeks before the shooting.

He had just left the house an hour earlier after eating dinner. I didn't hear the gun shots. Someone driving past saw two boys lying in the streets around where my son use to hang out. So my daughter and I went down there.

The police were so rude. I asked them if I could see the boys because I know a lot of the children around here (having four teenagers and two younger children myself). They told me no.

I pleaded with the officer telling him that it might be my son or my neighbor's. He asked me to describe them, so my daughter and I did. He told us there was no one like that shot. I was relieved.

I was frightened, horrified. Hell, I can't even think of the word to describe it. All I could think about was that he was lying there with no one by his side for hours.

I went home only to be waken by my phone ringing off the hook. My sister had gotten a call from my niece's boy friend telling me that he knows it's my son that was shot and in the hospital and his cousin was the other victim. I rushed out the door. I didn't know if my son was dead or alive.

I was frightened, horrified. Hell, I can't even think of the word to describe it. All I could think about was that he was lying there with no one by his side for hours.

The crime in this neighborhood saddens me. The drug dealers who scare the children, they look like me. Who am I to tell my sons that the right way out of this s***hole is to work hard when the ones flossing and shining are the ones committing the crimes?

The whores running up to cars do make my daughters say, "I never wanna be like that". That's a plus. Drugs, prostitution, killing and fighting are not the only crimes. I lost my home due to predatory lending. It bothers me that we will be homeless in another month or so, but we won't be around here.

No one wants to take responsibility. Even the ones who commit the crimes turn around and find a way out by snitching on others. Great system we have.

My family is afraid. My son who won't admit it but I know he's scared. I lost my job being at the hospital with my son. The police won't even call us to tell us anything. I don't even think they are investigating.

Every time I call they don't have anything to tell me. My son and the other boy who was shot gave them a name the same day. We have to watch our backs going in and out the house, but something (I believe it's God) won't let this neighborhood take life from me. I believe in something.