Another Dream Denied

Violence grips much of Los Angeles; its daily victims come in all colors. Merchants who work long hours operating stores often wind up as victims of the mayhem. Hyung Soo Kim was one such unfortunate merchant who deserved much better than he got.

The 65-year-old Korean immigrant died last Friday, a day after he was robbed and beaten outside his South-Central market; police are seeking a 26-year-old gang member in the killing. Kim had reopened his market in an African-American and Latino neighborhood after the store was looted and trashed during the riots last spring. He was the third Korean merchant slain in the L.A. area in the last three months.

His death might be cast as another random case of violence. But it is an example of the complex economic conditions in the inner city that breed distrust and resentment. Korean-Americans are the latest in a string of hard-working merchants--Italians, Jews, African-Americans--who have operated small stores in an inner city that until recently was abandoned by major supermarket chains. The cultural tensions that now exist between Korean- and African-Americans are exacerbated by financial institutions that have refused to lend money to black and Latino entrepreneurs.

During the Los Angeles riots about 2,300 Korean-American business owners suffered losses totaling more than $400 million. Rebuilding their lives and livelihood has been difficult. Results of a telephone survey, conducted by the Korean-American Inter-Agency Council, found that only about 44% of the 322 Korean-American merchants surveyed have reopened their stores. Of those who have not, 60% want to open another type of business and 71% want to move to another area.

Kim’s widow and two adult sons do not want him memorialized as a martyr to his people, a symbol in an ethnic cause. Kim died as his American dream shattered in the harsh reality of what residents and merchants of South-Central must live with daily.