The Grim Statistics<br >Itwas seven o clock on a warm， still bright， July evening in 1981.<br >The street was tree-fined， lush， with almost an embarrassing<br >bounty of fiches-both natural and acquired. Suburbia， U.S.A.-<br >good smells from Weber grills， sun setting on roofs of highly<br >polished Mereedes not yet garaged for the night， two little girls sit-<br >ring on a front lawn dressing th~jr Barbie dolls， two teenage boys<br >astride fifteen-speed bicycles.<br > The ambulance was eight blocks away when its siren was first<br >audible， but it wasn t until it hit the next street that children and<br >then their parents started peering out front windows. Sirens were a<br >rare sound in this community and as an ambulance screeched into<br >the street， the residents were still more surprised. For there were<br >no old people on this block and no one knew of any sick ones. It<br >was a street of few emergeneies-a street on which people s lives<br >were as well designed as their kitchens and their grounds.<br > The ambulance stopped outside the Bentley house. Three para-<br >medics rushed inside. Neighbors now clustered on the sidewalk in<br >front， some half smiling to others whom they hadn t seen in weeks<br >or even montlis. The maid opened the massive oak doors to let<br >out the paramedics， two of whom carded on a stretcher fifteen-<br >year-old Bobby Bentley， who was obviously unconscious. The am-<br ><br >