Green Ribbon Rally Wet but Worthwhile : Social issues: ‘Weather’s teardrops’ do not keep everyone away from showing support for campaign against violence by juveniles.

No one picked up the white crosses with the green ribbons.

They were to go to different communities to show support of a grass-roots campaign--symbolized by a green ribbon--to stop violence by juveniles. But the driving rain Saturday kept the students who were to carry that message away from a rally at Mile Square Park in Fountain Valley.

Only several dozen people showed up to share their support of the Green Ribbon campaign. Organizers expected about 1,000 people.

“Even the weather’s teardrops are not going to stop us from showing our togetherness,” said Jeff Lott, whose 16-year-old son, Philip, was shot near El Toro High School on Nov. 4.

Karen Lott, Philip’s mother, said she started the campaign after watching her son in the hospital.

“I just stayed sitting in my bed thinking, ‘Lord, what can I do?’ And I dreamed about a green ribbon. When my husband was in Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War, I remembered (the yellow ribbons). If they can unite a whole nation, then why can’t we do it for our kids?” she said.

For the past eight months, she and several dozen supporters have managed to reach thousands of people in Orange County through the campaign.

“My goal is to see the teen-age terrorists punished to the maximum allowed by the law. That is my first goal,” said Karen Lott of those accused of shooting her son. “I also never want to see a child hurt like my child was. I never want to see that happen again to anyone else.”

The green ribbon effort is picking up support throughout the county.

At Huntington Beach High School, the principal passed out 2,000 green ribbons and had Philip speak about his assault to the students. Shortly afterward, the bingo club agreed to donate $200 to the campaign every week.

One of the first schools to pledge its support to the campaign was W.R. Nelson Elementary in Tustin, where one classroom wrote to Philip Lott every day when he was in the hospital, Karen Lott said.

Several professional athletes, students and community leaders who were expected to attend the rally were not there because of the weather.

Other victims of violence showed their support, including Linda and Alfred Tay, whose son Stuart was slain on New Year’s Eve. The high school honor student was beaten with baseball bats and a sledgehammer, had rubbing alcohol poured down his throat and was then buried in a Buena Park back yard.

About 135 students from different communities who were to carry white crosses with a green ribbon also did not make it to the rally because of the weather.

The crosses represented a victim of a shooting, stabbing or beating.

Philip said he was not disappointed by the turnout and thanked those who attended and endured the rain.

“We’ve got to end violence in schools,” he said.

In an interview, he said that “there are better ways to settle conflicts.”

He called his assailants “cowards” because they resorted to guns.

Philip was shot while walking his normal route home on Romera Place with a friend.

He said he looked at the assailants and was glad they were driving away.

“A man who lives in the house near where I was hit came out to help me,” Philip said. “I asked him if I was hit near the stomach and he said, ‘Yes.’ As I kept pulling my shirt out, I saw a small hole on my right side.”

He had been shot in the back by a youth with a 9-millimeter gun.

When Karen Lott heard her son had been shot, she could not believe it.

“Philip shot in El Toro? Who would want to shoot him?” she asked herself.

Karen Lott said when she saw her son hanging on to his life in the hospital she realized that something had to be changed.

“I remember seeing him in the hospital and we had to hide him because we didn’t know who had shot him or why,” she said. “That’s a horrible thing for any mother to have to go through.”

He apparently was shot over an altercation at a Halloween party. Currently, two people involved in the shooting are facing charges as adults and two others as juveniles.