This site is merely the beginning of what is to become the AntiViolence site.
My name is Sam Pfannkuche from a band called Imperative Reaction. The reason I created this fund is because my brother Josh was brutally attacked in Los Angeles on the Metro subway on May 15, 2005. The attackers slammed his face repeatedly into the bar on the seat in front of him until he was unconscious then proceeded to rob him. He woke up a few hours later and crawled onto a street where someone found him and took him to the hospital.
His jaw was broken and detached and is now wired shut, his eye socket fractured, sinuses shattered, nose broken, teeth broken. We feel truly blessed that he is still alive, as he was left for dead. He is doing better now, but life is still quite difficult. His wires are coming off in a few weeks, which is great news. He is going to need some surgery on his nose and surgery to get his jaw unwired, and quite a bit of dental work to have teeth fixed, braced, replaced and capped, but he is looking great, especially after what has happened to him.
The sense of security on the subway in Los Angeles is virtually non-existent ever since the Police Department is no longer patrolling the subway and the Los Angeles Sheriffs department are. The MTA in Los Angeles have been less than helpful. There was a camera on the train with no tape in it. The camera was closed circuit and the car operator wasn't watching. They didn't even notice my brother was left on the train for a few hours. Josh managed to crawl out onto some random street and luckily someone found him and brought him to the hospital. The MTA just mopped up the blood and never filed a report. My brother's girlfriend attempted to file a report and the transit police came three days later to get his story. Although the attackers tried to kill my brother, the Los Angeles Sheriffs Department is calling this crime a "kidnapping", as the perpetrators held him against his will on the train as they beat him. By the LA Sheriffs deeming the crime a "kidnapping", the severity of the crime is less and they have to be a lot less proactive. The LAPD would have billed the crime as "attempted murder". I definitely feel it was attempted murder. To clarify any misunderstandings, the LAPD has actually been quite helpful in this case. It's the LA Sheriffs Department and the MTA that have not. You can find his entire story in his own words right here in his Friendster Blog. This brutal and senseless act is definitely a call to action. Josh is far from alone, and there are far too few people in positions of power helping
http://www.antiviolence.us/ for more