Oak Park Project Area Committee

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A Mom's Cry

Diana Griego Erwin: South-area mom wants to know: Where's outrage at youth violence?
By Diana Griego Erwin -- Bee Columnist
Published 2:15 am PST Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Rhonda Erwin's sister, Cora Dawson, is accustomed to the phone calls. It usually starts after her sister has read the newspaper. Take a small article that ran inside the Metro section March 13:
''A 17-year-old Luther Burbank High School student was shot and killed in the Meadowview area Friday night (March 11) while walking home, according to a Sacramento Police Department press release. Three male suspects confronted ...''
That followed by one day another report of a murder in Sacramento's south area that also made Erwin's heart fall. In that case, a 24-year-old man was shot dead in a Mack Road apartment complex in a dispute police said may have involved gangs. Several months before, another young man had been shot in broad daylight on Mack Road.
When Erwin calls her sister about these stories, she laments the lack of outrage for these murders in her community. So it doesn't surprise Dawson to hear that her sister, 43 and a mother of three living in the Valley Hi area, is bent on doing something about it.
If you lead a religious, social-service, legal or human-rights organization in her community or are an elected official, you've likely already received Erwin's admonition to take a stand and get involved. If it's buried in your e-mail, I advise you find it; my best guess is you WILL be hearing from Erwin. Her admonition is particularly aimed at African American leaders and professionals of all backgrounds whose work focuses on youth and their safety.
''I know of at least 10 deaths in the last three months,'' she said. ''... It confuses me how when one of our youth is beaten by the police we cry from the rooftops, but when (a) youth is killed by another youth we ignore it or cry silent tears. We need to yell from the rooftops, 'Red and blue are colors and no one should take their last breath because of a color.' We need to show our tears, scream our love to our children to stop the violence.''
She also takes aim at school policies that fail to rescue troubled kids. In some cases, the policies create even more barriers, she said.
She speaks from experience. A few years ago, Erwin got the call every mother dreads. Her juvenile son had been arrested. The process to get him back in school was lengthy, leaving him with the last thing he needed: more than a month of free time on his hands.
After the initial arrest, from age 15 to 17, he was in and out of custody for minor violations such as running away or missing curfew. Each time, he re-emerged more anti-social than when he went in, his mother said.
Erwin opens a thick red binder full of the research she did during that time on programs to help her son. She called every youth-centered organization in a directory of community resources, but nothing jelled. Programs were full or catered to special needs, such as kids with drug problems or children of refuges. She enrolled in classes at Cosumnes River College to empower herself to elicit change in herself, her son and community. She started passing on what she was learning to other parents in line to visit their children at Juvenile Hall. She reached out to other kids so much her son reminded her she can't parent every wayward child in the area.
Someone had to. She sees the ills in her community through Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Abraham Maslow's widely taught theory on motivation says people cannot reach higher potential until a series of needs are met, beginning with the most basic (food, shelter, water) and moving through safety, belonging and love, esteem and self-actualization. Kids who grow up without safety are not going to feel like they belong or are important, Erwin said. The justice system doesn't recognize this. In their own way, gangs meet most of these needs. Families or the community have to meet them instead.

Remember Mario

Diana Griego Erwin: Teen murder victim's mom lends voice - and heart - to stopping violence
In Tuesday's column, Erwin, a Valley Hi area mother of three, challenged us all to do something about the youth-on-youth violence that's too prevalent these days. She doesn't accept it, and neither should we.
''Don't think it can't happen to your kids,'' Erwin said earlier. ''It can.'' Michelle Brooks knows this all too well.
On Aug. 5, Brooks' 15-year-old son, Mario Vidal - sweet, respectful, a lover of basketball, music, writing poetry and soccer - was shot in the back when gang members targeted him for no apparent reason. Before the paramedics could get there, he was dead.
Except for his soldier brother in Iraq, he and his three younger siblings were growing up with his mother and stepfather in a spacious Elk Grove home, one of those newer, five-bedroom ones with a bonus room crafted for the perfect family life. Soon to be a junior at Sheldon High, he had taken over the big-brother role to his three sisters at home - ages 11, 5 and 1 - ever since Anthony Brooks, now 21, went to Iraq.
''He cared for them and played with them. He loved it,'' his mother said. Now an entire family of seven-minus-one struggles to create ''a new normal'' since Mario's death.
Brooks wants parents and youngsters denying this can happen to look at Mario's picture, so here it is. He could have been anyone's son, your friend, your grandchild. No one wants to admit this, Michelle Brooks said. It's just too painful, too scary. But we must.
''Nothing is going to change if we don't do something,'' she said. ''This can happen to you. It's not just an inner-city problem. I know people want to ignore it, though, because honestly that's how we felt.''
The ages of the assailants are just as crazy as this senseless death. With the alleged shooter, Robert Lee Crisler, a 17-year-old charged as an adult, were youths ages 16, 15, 15, 14 and 14. Another was 19. They didn't come from the so-called bad side of town. Most lived out on acreage just beyond Elk Grove. Four went to Mario's school. They just happened to be out that night looking for someone to shoot.
Sheriff's officials initially reported the assailants sought out Mario in revenge for car vandalism, and this information ran in several Bee stories, but that wasn't the case. The District Attorney's Office has since released a statement saying Mario ''did no action to contribute to his death.''
In fact, he did just what his stepfather, Garry Brooks, a peace officer, had taught him: Walk away. ''Mario refused to argue with the suspects,'' the statement says. ''In fact, he began to walk away. ... It was at this time when Robert Crisler shot at Mario. The fatal bullet hit him in the back.''
The family is crushed. They think kids running around with guns need to know that, too. ''How are you supposed to tell your son in Iraq who thinks it's him who has to be watching his back that his younger brother is dead on the streets of Sacramento for no reason?'' Mario's mother said through tears.
She plans to join Rhonda Erwin's effort to rally the community to action. Churches, teachers and community leaders have been contacting Erwin. A first meeting is set for 2:30 p.m. Saturday at All Nations Church of God in Christ, 3939 Broadway, Sacramento.
All interested parties are invited. It would be good to see some elected and school officials there, too. Other meetings are being planned. Write Erwin at amomscry@yahoo.com to make the connection.
Brooks, meanwhile, believes hearts can be changed. A friend wears Mario's photo on a dog tag around his neck. A young man sporting colors and looking like a gang member approached him and grabbed the dog tag the other day. He asked if the kid knew Mario. Yeah, the kid nervously said. He was my friend.
''I just want to say I'm sorry, man,'' the older guy said. And walked away.

God may be the Answer

Rarely does this space wander into discussions of the relevance of God in our lives, but there is no way to avoid it after attending a community meeting Saturday afternoon in Sacramento's Oak Park neighborhood.
It is a coincidence that today is Easter Sunday. Of course, some might say it isn't a coincidence at all.
Either way, I cannot report on this meeting without talking about God. God was there, you see; a lot of the people there said this was true.
I am not making light of that, because I happen to believe it myself.
For one, we were at the All Nations Church God in Christ at 39th and Broadway.
Most of the people present do not attend that church; this was the meeting on youth-on-youth violence I mentioned in last week's column on the efforts of a mother of three named Rhonda Erwin (no relation).
Yet God kept coming up. God and goals.
Yes, that's a fairer way to put it.
One of the first speakers up was Minister Isaiah Muhammad, of the Nation of Islam.
He attended the funeral of a 17-year-old in Antioch last week where he observed the reactions and grief of more than 500 other teens.
''I was seeing how hard our children live their lives these days,'' he said, how they are both traumatized and hardened by it.
''We are losing the most valuable essence we have. And if they don't see a future for themselves, then there is no hope.''
Being a minister, his answer was a return to God, and from the murmurs of approval in the audience and a few hearty ''amens,'' I'd have to say he had the agreement of many.
He spoke of children feeling disconnected, beginning with their first experiences of nourishment, a mother's breast.
Breast-feeding once bonded mother and child; now, you have Similac and a plastic disposable bottle.
The television is the entertainer and, in some cases, the parent. Our cities are about economics and not connection and family.
''I believe that God called this meeting because God heard a cry and is just waiting to be called into service,'' Muhammad said.
It's a powerful feeling in a community that, try as it might, keeps getting report after report of another kid killed, shot, stabbed, murdered, all of it senseless: God just waiting to be called.
What to do?
Another focus of the meeting was goals. Doing something that matters. Stepping up to the plate.
George Visger traveled all the way from Nevada City to see what he could do after reading about Mario Vidal, 15, a straight arrow from Elk Grove murdered by a gang of youths in August.
A former defensive lineman with the San Francisco 49ers, Visger began with his own upbringing, which was entirely appropriate.
See, all these people in that room are thinking of working on something together. They want to get something going that will actually reach kids before they turn to violence for kicks.
Visger grew up one of six kids in a small, two-bedroom home. It was one of those households where the difference between right and wrong was stressed.
Nonetheless, Visger started hanging out behind the junior high gym with the wrong crowd. Soon, he was getting high and fighting. This stemmed from bad choices on his part, not bad parenting. And if he went wrong, imagine a kid growing up in a family where the gang culture is multigenerational, he said.
The kids who commit these crimes can't see the ripple effect, he added. Not only do these tragedies hurt victims' families, they hurt the offenders' families, too.
And the ripple goes on. ''Look at me,'' Visger said. ''I was affected by it (Mario Vidal's story). That's why I'm here.
''I will never forget his face,'' he said, almost directly to Mario's parents, who sat a few rows away. ''I believe that something good comes out of everything.
''We need a goal, a game plan,'' he said, throwing out some ideas. ''One kid a day? That's a victory.''

By Diana Griego Erwin