Caught in the Smoke Shop Shootout

Davey, the Good Samaritan, fell victim to JoJo’s lifetime of bad decisions

Davey Bledsoe stretched his legs along the tile floor of the county jail’s waiting area, fought off another yawn, and thought of the various ways he could die: being shot, stabbed, or poisoned. What about a bomb being dropped on him or a truck filled with explosives running him over? Not realistic.

But those options were more exciting than sitting in the glare of fluorescent lights at nine P.M. and waiting for someone who was erratic and impulsive. JoJo, a young man who had known Davey since he was a kid, found himself in and out of jail more times than a coffee drinker wandered in and out of Starbucks.

What about death by boredom?

Definitely possible.

Boredom, Davey concluded, would be the absolute worst way to go. Just sitting on a wooden bench while one minute after another ticked away on the clock with the brain eventually shutting down, his body decaying and slowly cutting off his oxygen and blood supply.

Waiting was torture. The only reading material were notices on the wall telling visitors what kind of clothing was prohibited during visitation and to arrive at least thirty minutes ahead of time. Davey read the sentences left to right and then, just for variety, right to left.

But he promised to be there for JoJo who had no one else to call family. And now here he was. Waiting for JoJo’s release.

H e had cancelled a date night with his wife and told his kids that he couldn’t watch a movie, either. Then he gripped the steering wheel while moving slowly past a traffic accident on the 210 freeway.

Suddenly, an intercom got his attention and he snapped back to the present moment. “Excuse me, sir?”

Davey turned and glanced through the tinted plexiglass where a sheriff’s deputy spoke through a microphone.

“You’re waiting for JoJo Richards, correct?”

“Yes, I am.”

“We’re doing the final paperwork and then he’ll be out. Probably another hour.”

“Okay, thank you.”

The deputy clicked off the mic and turned back to a panel of monitors.

Another hour?

A metal door to one side of the deputies’ control station clicked and a long-haired man holding his baggy jeans up with one hand walked out, struggling for any semblance of dignity. A man, a former inmate, who was just released and headed back to the streets. Either they didn’t allow belts, he lost it when he got arrested, or he never had one in the first place.

Stats clicked through Davey’s mind, mercilessly teasing him with the time he was giving up:

• Driving from home to the jail … one hour
• Waiting for JoJo… two hours and counting
• Taking JoJo out to eat on the way home … another hour

Four hours.

Letting the stats roll was worthless. It was better just to close the eyes, clear the mind and — click.

Davey sat up. The metal door opened and, finally, out walked JoJo in black sweatpants and sweatshirt. Six-feet tall, rail thin.

“How’s it going?” Davey got up and put an arm around the young man.

“It’s cool.” JoJo patted Davey on the shoulder and the two men walked out of the lobby and to Davey’s car, a four-door Nissan sedan bathed in the glare of parking lot lights.

JoJo had been in for ten days this time.

“They take a while, don’t they?” Davey unlocked the doors.

“Yeah, it’s all the paperwork.” JoJo got in on the passenger side.

They buckled up and when Davey pulled out of the parking lot and onto the street, JoJo got animated. “Now I can tell you what happened.”

“Oh? Okay.”

“My boy and me were just sitting, chilling outside these apartments where his mom lives — you remember the woman I told you about — the one who feeds me?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s where we was, celebrating that I got my stimulus check, and then this guy we know, he shoots off a gun, just showing us how it works.”

Davey waited at a red light, a few blocks from the freeway. “He shot off a gun at an apartment?”

“Yeah. He’s done it before and it weren’t a big deal. But this time, he did it and someone called the cops.”

“And you were sitting there?”

“Yeah. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I hadn’t done nothing, like I told you on the phone. Just drinking a can of ice tea. Then the cops pull up and they said I resisted arrest and other bullshit.”

The light turned green and Davey headed toward the freeway.

“Where you going?” asked JoJo.

“Getting you a motel room near us.”

“No, man. I got to get my backpack. Turn up here.”

H Street.

Davey turned right on H Street, headed north, and saw a familiar pattern developing.

“You said you wanted out of San Bernardino for a couple of days.”

The street was dark with boarded up store fronts and dimly lit government buildings sitting empty for the weekend.

“I got to stay in town so I can get my backpack in the morning. It’s at my friend Mikey’s house. You met him once. His mom’s holding it for me.”

“Last year it was the same thing,” said Davey. “You got out on November fourth. Remember? I picked you up, dropped you off at the county building, you said you’d call — “

“Just drop it. Can you pick me up in the morning, by, let’s say, eight?”

“8 A.M.?”

Plans changed fast with JoJo and he always had a reason.

It was already 10:30 at night.

“No way, JoJo. Why can’t you get your backpack tonight?”

“Cause Mikey’s mom is asleep by now. She’ll get all pissed off at me if I wake her up.”

Davey figured he should be the one pissed off. Why were inmates released so late at night?

“Get me a room at the motel, you know, the one I stayed the other week?” JoJo didn’t give up.

It was the Good Night Inn, a squalid hive of activity that was shockingly overpriced.

“I can get you a motel closer to us.”

“Aw, man. Cut the shit.”

“What?”

“Hey, I’m sorry, Davey. The Good Night’s just down the street from her place. Then you get me in the morning.”

“That means I got to make two trips. That’s four hours of driving, plus waiting time.”

Davey wanted to talk to JoJo in a different place and get his head cleared so he’d grasp the benefits of a program where he could enroll and get his life together.

Impossible. A couple were run by the county, others were faith-based.

JoJo said programs had too many rules, like jail. He said the county programs were worthless and although he believed in God, the church-based programs didn’t fit his lifestyle. Meaning, he knew the streets and that’s where he lived.

Davey glanced right and left while driving, wondering where they were going.

“Turn here,” said JoJo, excited. His voice always had an edge.

Davey turned the wheel sharply right.

“Stop here.” JoJo motioned toward a plaza, home to a Jack in the Box, a Dollar store and some boarded up windows. “The smoke shop.”

“You need cigarettes, huh?”

“Yep.”

Davey pulled into the lot.

Suddenly, JoJo rolled down the window. “Yo, Benny.” He recognized someone.

Trying to tell JoJo that he shouldn’t spend money on cigarettes was about as pointless as telling a dog that it shouldn’t pee on a fire hydrant, or telling a hummingbird not to flap its wings. The habit was ingrained and now part of his nature.

Davey parked in front of the smoke shop and JoJo jumped out of the car, slammed the door, but instead of dashing into the smoke shop he hustled toward a white, sporty-looking car.

“Where you going?” shouted Davey.

“Shhh,” JoJo turned around, looking stern. “You ain’t from around here. You got to keep quiet. That dude has a tent. Maybe I can stay there.” He then swaggered off to the car.

Davey glanced at his phone. Time was marching on.

The motel was down the street a couple of blocks. A month earlier, Davey had driven out with JoJo’s nine-year-old daughter for a quick visit with her dad. They had met at the Circle K near the freeway. It was several blocks to the north.

JoJo made his way back from the car and headed inside the smoke shop.

Now it was clear. Davey understood JoJo’s world.

He lived in a radius of several blocks east, west, north and south in a neighborhood of decaying plazas, fast food restaurants, the county services complex — and he was constantly homeless. JoJo knew people who would put him up for a night here and there or feed him and keep his backpack.

Life was different for this thirty-something man than it was for Davey’s other kids, all adopted out of foster care at different ages. Including JoJo’s sister. That’s how Davey and his wife came to know JoJo who they met when he was eleven years old, living in a group home.

Inside the smoke shop, JoJo reached for something on the counter. Maybe a pack of cigarettes. The man behind the counter looked angry and almost insulted and grabbed back at whatever was on the counter.

JoJo reached again, grabbed at something and hurried out and jumped in Davey’s car.

“Come on, get out of here.”

“What’s happening?” asked Davey, about to turn on the key.

“Just go.”

The man who was behind the counter ran out to JoJo’s side of the car. He had a mustache and was balding.

“You pay now.”

“I told you, old man, I will. Relax.”

Davey glanced at JoJo. “You didn’t pay?”

JoJo was angry and glared at Davey. “I told you to get the hell out of here.”

“I’m sick of this,” yelled the man. “You always taking my shit.”

“That’s right,” said JoJo. “It’s your shit. That’s all it’s worth.”

“What’d you take?” asked Davey. This was a different code to live by. Davey started the car.

The man grabbed for the door handle, opened it and demanded money. “You always stealing from me.”

Suddenly, a shot rang out and the man stood, frozen, and then crumpled on the ground.

“Shit,” yelled Davey.

A man came from the white car and ran across the parking lot.

“What’d you do that for?” JoJo shouted at him.

“He was going to call the cops. He did that last week. And you and I got a deal. Get out of here.”

A deal?

JoJo got out while the man lay on the ground moaning.

Davey reached for his cell phone.

“Let it go, man,” shouted the gunman.

“Oh, dear God,” Davey trembled. He could see the wounded clerk trying to move. “I got to call an ambulance.”

“Forget it, boss.” The gunman aimed his weapon.

Davey ducked.

“Not my dad.” JoJo knocked the gunman off balance and a shot went off. JoJo grabbed the gunman’s wrist and wrenched the gun. It fell to the pavement and so did JoJo, falling on top of it, blood pouring from his side.

The gunman kicked at JoJo and tried to move him off the weapon, but Davey took a breath, leaped out and punched the gunman in the back of the head, knocking him out like animals fighting and clawing for survival.

He hit the pavement hard, didn’t move, and Davey wondered if he had killed him.

JoJo was groaning and holding his side. He pleaded. “Help me, dad.”

Davey grabbed his phone and called 9–1–1. But the sirens had already sounded by the time he was talking to the dispatcher. Someone called. Thank, God.

A police cruiser’s lights were flashing with the siren wailing.

The terror had only lasted a few minutes but in that time there were three people laying on the pavement. The squad car pulled up and a cop got out, hands on his sidearm.

“Hands up.”

Davey put his hands up, weakly. His wife and kids were at home. JoJo’s daughter was in her mom’s low income apartment, probably playing video games.

“I’ll you what happened,” Davey offered.

“Arms out.” The cop searched him, checked the others for weapons, found the gun under JoJo and called for medics.

Another squad car squealed up and officers got out. They started basic first aid and then more sirens filled the night. In a few minutes, the paramedics were on the scene treating JoJo, the clerk and checking the gunman for a pulse.

Davey was terrified. He had never hurt anyone. No one.

And then, the medics got a stretcher and put the gunman on it. He was moving.

Thank, God.

He practically crumpled to the pavement from relief.

As the chaos subsided, a cop motioned for Davey. “He wants to see you.”

JoJo was wrapped in bandages. His side red. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know that would happen.”

The medics slid him into the ambulance and the doors closed. They sped away with sirens blaring and quiet descended onto the plaza. The action was like a volcanic eruption, or a hurricane of fear and needless terror.

“So, can you tell me what happened?”

Davey nodded.

The policeman took a pad from his pocket. “Okay, start talking.”

“Mind if I sit?”

“Go ahead.”

Davey slumped on the curb.

He described picking up JoJo at the jail, explained that he was the only family JoJo had, even though they weren’t related by blood or adoption, and then his voice faded as he recalled the events and emotion swept over him as he realized JoJo was a man and not a kid at the group home.

Time was ticking away.

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