When the Sun Comes Up

Fear is a compelling emotion. It creeps through a city like fog on a winter morning, paralyzing and infuriating.

It finds enemies where none exist and demands laws that smolder with vengeance.

Fear haunts and permeates. Fear sizzles, burns and implodes. Fear turns us against each other.

Write about being afraid to walk the streets, and the response is instant. Phone messages pile up. Letters clog my mail slot.

An unmarried woman won’t date because she’s afraid of being murdered.

She has simplified her life into a stark routine that takes her from apartment to work to apartment.

Essential outings are carefully planned for daylight hours. Under no circumstance will she go out after dark.

A man telephones from Fresno and wants to know if it’s safe to visit Los Angeles.

Where should he stay to assure safety for his family? Is Disneyland gang-free? Universal City? The beach? Anywhere?

Is there, in effect, a manual on urban survival that will enhance his well-being while vacationing in a city once considered so laid back it wouldn’t lift its head to watch the world pass?

A letter-writer from Hollywood wants more police, a writer from Canoga Park more neighborhood barriers.

Everyone wants a little peace.

I hadn’t realized how afraid we were.

What brought all this response was a column two weeks ago. I wrote about the tension of night-walking and an old lady’s fear in her own home.

I wrote about two women murdered in widely separated parts of the county, one in Burbank and one in West L.A.

I wrote about victims. You, me, our kids, our friends and everyone we know.

The responses ranged from ludicrous to touching, from racist to demanding.

In the case of one of the women murdered, I said she met her death while parked in an area of Wilshire Boulevard known as the Miracle Mile. The irony of death on a Miracle Mile was too disquieting to avoid.

A telephone message was waiting when I arrived at the office that morning. It wasn’t the Miracle Mile, said a voice representing the business interests in that section of the city.

Ann Yao met her death outside the Miracle Mile. Thank God for that. Too bad about her.

I mentioned that I carried a walking stick when I strolled at night. A male caller said forget the walking stick. He carries a sword.

A housewife from Woodland Hills wants a law passed that would force merchants to hire armed guards to stand in front of their stores like sentinels at Buckingham Palace.

And, of course, the gun nuts responded. Say the word, by God, and we’ll come back with killers strapped to the hoods of our cars! I’m paraphrasing. But just barely.

The racists had a field day. Blacks were to blame. Mexicans were to blame. Arabs were to blame. Asians were to blame.

Even women were to blame. Didn’t they go around damned near begging to be raped? You know, like old ladies beg to be murdered and little children beg to be molested?

Can’t have people runnin’ around begging for pain . . . and humiliation . . . and death.

One racist was blunt. People like me were creating a living hell in L.A. for people like him. Us “Latin invaders” were bringing filth and destruction to the pristine nature of his neighborhood.

“Time is running out,” he warned. “Do we want another Calcutta?”

Calcutta? Is that near Tijuana?

The most compelling words came from Denise Ritchie, whose 19-year-old son Tyge was murdered in front of a Westside deli 16 months ago.

“Every time I close my eyes I see Ronald Lambakis stabbing my son,” she wrote. “I see the blood pour from his neck and I see his face pale and scared and I hear over and over, ‘I’m not going to die, am I?’ ”

Lambakis, a violent drifter, almost plea-bargained his way to a wrist-slap. Ritchie fought it. He finally got 16 years to life.

Since then, she has become an ardent supporter of victims’ rights and is working for passage of Proposition 115, the Crime Victims Justice Reform Initiative.

Among other changes in existing laws, the measure would increase the number of crimes subject to the death penalty.

I understand the effort, but that’s not going to make us safer.

One hundred and ninety-four people have died in the gas chamber at San Quentin since it opened in 1938, but the murder rate continues to climb with the rising intensity of a scream. Vengeance is a violent, and mostly useless, response to fear.

I have no answers, only questions. I’m hoping for a sunrise somewhere, just like everyone else. Life is getting hard in Calcutta.