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It was a typical Sunday evening at the ‘rents house - chilandoing (Spanglish for chillin') in the front yard with little sister, sister-in-law, and the nephews - waiting for the sun to go down. My brother was a couple houses down at the Moreno's, visiting with one of their sons who was in town for the weekend.

The girls and I were in full 4th of July Block Party planning mode, an annual event on this block in South San Gabriel, a neighborhood tucked in between Rosemead, Monterey Park and Montebello. This year we have DJ The Future (one of the neighborhood kids) spinning in the middle of the street, use of the Moreno's pool, a lounge area where tarots card will be read (by me), henna tattooing (by my boo), and endless amounts of sangria being poured.

While deciding whether or not to turn the block party into a mini Coachella and draw maps with a schedule of events for everyone to have on hand, two helicopters hover directly above us. At first we think nothing of it, as ghetto birds are a fixture in this ‘hood made up equally of Latinos and Asians and where the local Lomas gang coexist.

Suddenly, the helicopters grow louder and out of nowhere a Hummer comes storming down the street doing about 60 mph with 10 Glendale P.D. chasing behind it. I snatch up Lola, my Welsh Corgi, and Alisa grabs the kids to rush inside. My sister and I run into the street following the high-speed chase (we love this kind of ish), which ended directly in front of the Moreno's house.

After the po po drew their guns on my brother (because he's brown) and he instinctively hit the ground, they told him to get inside the house and drew all their guns on the driver of the Hummer. Mr. Moreno flung open his front door, yelling that the driver was paralyzed and needed his wheelchair. It was at this point that me, and the rest of the neighborhood who now crowded the streets, realized he knew the assailant - Mr. Moreno's a civil rights lawyer and defended the driver (Javier Ovando) during that whole LAPD Rampart police sandal.

My sister has really good photos of how the whole thing went down, but ever since she graduated high school, she's been M.I.A. I guess I can't escape the heat no matter where I go-work and home both have environmental issues. Or maybe it's just summer. I heard somewhere that most crimes take place during this time. For now I just wait for nightmares to subside...

See the LA Times' take: www.latimes.com/news/local/valley/la-me-chase1-2008jul01,0,4998067.story