Born June 1, 1980 to a 14 year-old mother whose father fertilized her mother when she was 13,

Juan V. knew little about his city, Los Angeles, and less about the world he inhabited for 15 years. We might understand his ignorance when we consider his parents, as their parents, became parents before 15 years of age. In no case did these parenting couples know or attempt to apply what we might call "parenting skills." Their offspring were on automatic pilot once mobile. Their offspring were "latchkey" children for as long as anyone might care to imagine. No, we won't blame Juan for his poor understanding of his immediate, social environment.

Juans grandfather attended Fairfax High School in Los Angeles. "Joe," to those who knew him for his short, violent life, attended school just enough keep his family out of juvenile court and out of our county's child welfare offices. Joe died in a driveby one summer night, a Saturday night, as he stood with his homeboys on the corner of Witmer and Beaudry, south corner that is. Three weeks following his untimely death Joe's daughter, Maria, entered the world and followed, more-or-less, the same lackluster path to bearing age as her mother, Maria.

Fourteen years later Juan came into the world much as his mother and her mother had, born to parents ill equipted to parent a child in Los Angeles' "Pico Union District."