Anarchy in America!

I am a fifty-seven year old lifelong Nashvillian, whose grandfather held a constable's license. Tennessee was always a law and order kind of state. Last night I was swept up in something I did not think was possible here in my hometown. I had picked my eight year old daughter up in Louisville earlier in the day and made it back into Davidson County around ten p.m. My eighty-one year old mother was riding with us. We were still on I-65 at about 10:15 near the 440 split, when a half dozen muscle cars raced past at over one hundred miles per hour, and I heard a shot, that my little girl thought was a backfire (I have been around guns a half century and know what the report of a firearm when discharged distinct from a backfire). We arrived at the Robertson Road/ White Bridge exit near our home and pulled up the light, only to find the path blocked by at least dozens, if not into the low hundreds, of young hooligans who were doing burnouts in the intersection or witnessing and filming the spectacle as "entertainment" on their cellphones. Several of the young Hispanic boys were displaying high-capacity weapons, including extended magazine Glocks and what looked like an Uzi or Ingram two cars and one lane away from my family. Further away in the mob, other boys actually were firing guns into the air or separately, the ground, and others were setting off fireworks. This mob action backed up several lanes of traffic hundreds of yards down onto the highway and could easily have caused a chain reaction crash. The bullets fired into the air came down someplace and could have killed people, as could the ricochets. We were in fear of our lives, and my Mom dialed 911. The throng was deliberately holding people against their will by blocking traffic and jeopardizing the safety of the community. After we were trapped there at least fifteen minutes, but within five minutes of calling the emergency number, a lone police car pulled up Robertson approaching the crowd, but then did a U-turn and proceeded back toward Charlotte Pike and White Bridge Road. We were finally able to maneuver into the farthest lane after being held at the intersection against our will by armed thugs for over twenty minutes. Innocent people might well have died and the first officer to arrive apparently abandoned vulnerable citizens to a criminal mob. I am sickened by what my city has become and my family was terrified with a crying child and shocked cancer survivor being victimized through no fault of our own.