Just a simple mugging.(In Real Life: First-person America)

SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA -- In the past, when I would read a newspaper blurb about some little old lady being mugged, I'd simply think What a shame, and move on. I no longer do that. I've learned all too intimately how even a "minor" crime can become a life-altering horror.

My petite 78-year-old mother, who customarily walked three to seven miles a day, left her car at a gas station in a suburban area of Sacramento to be repaired. Since she was told that her vehicle would take a few hours to fix, she decided to walk one mile to my sister's home, located on a quiet street nearby. With her handbag over her shoulder (she didn't want to leave her purse in her trunk), Mom walked down a major artery and then made her way into the residential area.

As she was strolling down the tree-lined street just a block away from my sister's home, a man pulled up in a car, jumped out onto the sidewalk, and grabbed my mother's purse. The six-foot-plus assailant also felt it necessary to violently shove Mom facedown onto the asphalt road. She was instantly incapacitated, one arm broken in several places, the opposite shoulder dislocated, a finger broken, and her face bloodied.

Amazingly, on this weekday morning when most people were at work, someone rushed out of a nearby house and called the police and an ambulance. I was at my office in the San Diego area when I got the call from my brother-in-law. I thought I would faint, vomit, and dissolve into a pile of dust, all at the same time.

My mother underwent surgery, and I joined my family at her bedside. We tried not to cry continually, and cursed the perpetrator, who has never been apprehended. In the few hours before my mother's bank was able to cancel her ATM cards, credit cards, and checking account, the criminal charged several hundred dollars' worth of goods.

And that attacker changed my mother's life forever. After her surgery, she was unable to use either arm, and was in constant pain. She couldn't eat by herself, dress ...