Good Luck, Mr. Rice

A Philadelphia teenager and the empty promise of the Sixth Amendment

- By Jake Tapper

ON TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 2011, A YOUNG PATIENT WALKED HALTINGLY INTO A MEDICAL OFFICE IN SOUTH PHILADELPHIA TO HAVE HIS BULLET WOUNDS EXAMINED.

The patient was a 17-year-old named C. J. Rice, who lived in the neighborhood. The doctor was a pediatrician named Theodore Tapper.

My father had been working as a physician in South Philadelphia for more than four decades and had known Rice since he was a child. Rice had been brought in for a checkup soon after he was born, and as a doctor my father had seen Rice several times a year, along with other members of the family. Two weeks and three days before his September appointment, Rice had been shot while riding his bike, in what he believed was a case of mistaken identity. To remove one of the bullets, a surgeon had made a long incision down the middle of Rice's torso. The wound was then closed with a ridge of staples more than two dozen. After his discharge, Rice was in severe pain and could barely walk. He needed help to get dressed in the morning and help to go up and down stairs.

When Rice arrived at my father's office, the wound was still stapled together. Rice slowly lifted himself onto the examination table and winced as he laid himself down. When the exam was over, he slowly pushed himself back up. My father recalls Rice walking out of the office bent over and with short, choppy steps, like an old man.