His son, Tariq Khamisa, was a college sophomore at San Diego State University and working as a pizza deliveryman in 1995, when four teenage gang members tried to rob him. Tariq Khamisa fought back, refusing to give them the pizza box in his hands. As he drove off, one gang member, Tony Hicks, fatally shot him with a stolen handgun.
Hicks was 14 years old.
Just hours after learning of his son’s death, as Khamisa lay helpless on the floor, he had an epiphany.
A message came from a higher power, he said.
“There were victims at both ends of the gun,” Khamisa said he realized. “Sometimes in deep trauma and tragedy, you have a spark of clarity.”