The Movie Theater

The movie theater shooting in Colorado and all the recent rash of mass killings in our country is disturbing and heart breaking. Our sorrow for the victims and their friends and family is beyond words.

The sting of death is always revolting and crippling to those of us who live through our feelings and emotions as opposed to the rational brain types who can be dismissive and unresponsive to the loss of human life.

On July 1, 1993, I personally dealt with a mass killing incident that left 9 people dead and 6 injured. On that day at 101 California, a 148 story high rise in San Francisco, a business man name Gian Luigi Ferri, upset after losing 4 million dollars on a land deal in Nevada, came after the law firm that handled the deal with a two Intratec Tec-Dec 9 pistols and a Norinco M1911.

During that time of my life I was a single parent with two kids practicing law part-time and working with a private security company in San Francisco. 101 California was one of my accounts along with Embarcadero Center and several other buildings.

On that day, July 1, I notice fire trucks and ambulances rushing down

Market Street

toward the waterfront.  When I reached 101 California the police had the building surrounded with police tape blocking people from coming end. One of my field supervisors in the building notice me across the street and came over to escort me in. The police were still looking for the shooter.

After a quick briefing on what was happening, I met with the building manager and took charge of the security operations. We had a triage unit set up in the lobby handling the wounded. As I entered the lobby the deputy chief of police was coming in the building to take charge of police operation. All the elevators were at ground level except for a couple that were being used by security bringing groups of tenants down to the lobby.

My first job was to operate one of the elevators on manual along the building security project manager to take the special weapons team (SWAT) to the 34^th floor to search for the shooter. They were carrying M-16 rifles. There were sniper shooters in the building across the street looking for the shooter as well. I was carrying a two-way radio. Once we got the floor the officer in-charge told us to take the elevator down to the 33^rd floor and wait. When we got to the 33^rd floor and walked into the lobby, the sound of rifles cocking for fire was all around us. We fell back into the elevator on to the floor when we heard one of the officers shout, “It’s clear!” It was funny at the time but we could have been killed.

After the reports on the radio that the shooter was down in the stairwell between the 30^th and 29^th floor I headed to the 34^th floor. The shooter committed suicide after he was trapped in the stairwell while chasing two ladies who held the door closed on the 30th floor while shouting for help. At that same time, the building engineer was resetting the floor stairwell locks that activated as the ladies were holding the door. Gian was finished.

I walked out of the elevator on to the 34^th floor. Bullet shells were all over the floor. I proceeded to the conference room where three bodies were lying on the floor under the table. Then I continued down the hallway in looked in one office where another body slumped in a chair behind the desk. On 33^rd floor was another body near the library. I headed down to the 32^nd floor and walked into a small law firm office. There was a female body on the floor at receptionist’s desk and another body under a desk in the office behind her. I found out later that there was another lady wounded on that floor who later died at the hospital.

I went back down to the lobby and noticed a white van pulling up on the plaza area that turned out to be the coroners. I instructed them to take the van to loading dock area. All the bodies would eventually be taken down there for processing. I got a radio call to take the freight elevator to the 29^th floor. When I arrived they had the shooter on a stretcher to be taken down. I help them get the body on the elevator and carried them down to the loading dock.

When I returned to the lobby I was told that the police detectives’ had arrived and was on the 34^th floor and need some assistance. I met with them. They needed a special room to put the evidence collected so I unlocked a space for them.

It was close to midnight when I left the building to go back to the office and then home. My son and I along with some friends drove down to Los Angeles for the 4^th July that next day. I drove most of the way. I didn’t see much of the ocean, the mountains or trees. My mind was still some place else!

Today, my heart is with the families in Colorado and I share your sorrow. I wish I could say something like this will not happen again but it will.

How do we protect ourselves when another one of our fellow citizens who suffers meltdown and seeks revenge or suicide by mass killing? I know that since 1993, my focus was never over the threat of foreign terrorists, even after 911. My concern and weariness is always about my fellow citizen.

America is a great country but we are plague with awesome alienation from one another. It’s because of our values grounded in independence, self determination and rigorous competition. Normally we are left with only a few close friends and everyone else is a mystery.

We can call theses shooters nuts, kooks and crazies but that only leads intense media speculation full of folklore and provides a greater audience for their advertisers.

Attacks on the NRA and gun control by congress carry little weight. An attack on the 2 Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is also a nonstarter. The gun has played an intricate part of American history and will continue to do so. 

In America, some live by the gun and some us will continue to die by the gun with little recourse. No, I don’t own a gun but it does not make me less aware that my neighbor probably does and I still don’t feel any safer.

As we mourn the lives of another group of Americans who have been victimized by our own style of living let’s not forget that the police can’t protect us, congress can’t protect us and we must be forever be vigilant in finding ways to protect ourselves.

 God bless America! It will find its way!

Peace!

Happy Birthday America! 236 Years Old!

It’s Moonday! Happy Birthday America on your 236th year! As a Native-African-Irish American Patriot, I find myself perplexed about the meaning and significance of this birthday. Historians use to say that most countries that become world powers will have only a 200 year life span. If this is true then we are living on borrowed time because our sun has already set.

Like everything else written down as history you must realize that those who won the past wars write the history. We will never know what the losers had to say. When you understand that the last 200 years of American history has been written by those literally who own America, you will understand why most of our history focuses on wars and the successful economic exploitations in the world.

 It has given us a class of very wealthy people who lurk in the shadows of our lives controlling our money supply and what our perception of reality should be at any given time with the media they own.

From the listing of all the wars our country participated in it appears we are headed for more of the same. The growth of wealth and war are connected. The real reasons for all of these wars were never a matter of public consumption and only the reasons that were sold by the special interest groups prevailed.

What lessons have the American people learn about the special history over the last 60 years? War is inevitable, science will continue to debate its relevance, and the government is unresponsive to the majority of Americans. We have learned that technology permits us to access an enormous amount of information and misinformation about our present reality and we can communicate at the speed of light. Also, we have learned that hatred and deception has become the underlying theme of our political discourse and that the old wounds of the Civil War are still festering in our economic and social fabric.

It’s my opinion that this year, the 236^th, we are going to see the lessons of the past unlearned and a whole new view of our present reality will emerge not entirely controlled by the wealth holders.

Technology is going to give us the opportunity to see who we have become as a “free” nation. We are going to see how a society can be reduced to lowest level of human discourse by dysfunctional party political that leads only to mutual destruction.

Money power is now absolute. Any power that becomes absolute leads to unimaginable corruption and suffering. Like Lord Acton said, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” 

While all this is happening, our earthly environment will be unsettling and unpredictable. The weather patterns will be indiscernible and the loss of life could be unimaginable. This process has already started in some states.

The positive lessons we will learn over the next six months are in words like, “love thy neighbor, do unto others as you would have them do unto you and love thy enemies will start to make sense to a greater number of people.

The lessons of hatred, anger, violence, fear, greed, jealously, and revenge will take their toll and the end results for people who have chosen this path of existence will be unspeakable.

Let’s enjoy this celebration of the promise of freedom by those who loved liberty. As President Abraham Lincoln said to the slaves, at the fall Richmond, Virginia during the Civil War, who were referring to him as Master Lincoln, “I am not your master. You were born free and God is your only master.” Those who still love liberty understand this statement.

This is my opinion and I hope I am completely wrong!

Peace.